An Israeli parliamentary committee has put forward a bill proposing the death penalty for those it defines as "terrorists". The driving force behind it is National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir — the same minister who, for context, had labelled the activists of the Global sumud flotilla as "terrorists" — and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also stated his support for the bill. The death penalty is in fact already provided for under Israeli law for certain specific offences, but has not been applied since 1962. Now comes the attempt to make it operational once again in order to "eradicate terrorism", as Ben Gvir put it.

Death penalty for terrorism

Israel's National Security Committee has approved an amendment to the penal code introducing the death penalty for the offence of "terrorism". The proposal, championed by National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, must now be debated by parliament but has already secured an important endorsement — that of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The bill stipulates that "a terrorist convicted of murder motivated by racism or hatred towards the population, and in circumstances where the act was committed with the intent to harm the State of Israel, shall be sentenced to death, mandatorily". Israel's definition of the word terrorism is, however, extremely vague, as recent history shows. On several occasions, ministers in the current government have branded all Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as terrorists, in order to justify the genocide perpetrated over the past two years. The thousands of Palestinian people imprisoned in Israeli jails are also accused of terrorism, even though the administrative detention status of many of them means they have never received formal charges or a trial. The new bill also precludes convicted individuals from filing an appeal.

The last execution in 1962

Minister Ben Gvir has said the aim of the bill is to "eradicate terrorism and create a powerful deterrent". The text had been awaiting approval by the National Security Committee for months, but the discussion had been suspended pending the release of the hostages held by Hamas. Ben Gvir threatened to withdraw his support for the government should parliament fail to pass the law by the end of the week. A death penalty for terrorism had been proposed in the past but had never received approval.

Motasem A Dalloul ✓ @AbujomaaGaza

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In Israel, the death penalty is already provided for in the penal code for the offences of treason, genocide, crimes against humanity and crimes against the Jewish people in wartime. The first and only time it was applied in the country's history, however, was in 1962, in the case of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, who was hanged at Ramla prison. The debate over the new death penalty for terrorism bill comes ahead of the imminent trial of Hamas members who were captured and accused of having played an active role in the planning and execution of the 7 October 2023 attack, which claimed the lives of 1,200 people. In recent days, Minister Ben Gvir had himself photographed in front of several Palestinian prisoners, forced to kneel with their hands bound, for whom he had called for the death penalty.