Two courts, one ethnicity on the gallows, zero pretense.
Israel’s parliament – called the Knesset, which is basically just their version of Congress – voted on Monday to make the death penalty mandatory for Palestinians convicted of killing Israelis. Not optional. Mandatory.
The default sentence is death by hanging. Benjamin Netanyahu showed up in person to vote yes. His far-right National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, walked into the chamber wearing a tiny decorative noose pin on his lapel.
Yes. A pin on his jacket coat of a noose.
What makes this headline news is that the Knesset also gave Israeli courts – the ones that handle Jewish Israeli citizens – the option to impose either the death penalty or life imprisonment for similar crimes. Not mandatory. A choice. Two different legal tracks, almost perfectly sorted by ethnicity. Amichai Cohen, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, told the Associated Press directly: “Jews will not be indicted under this law.”
For context on why the court structure matters: Palestinians in the occupied West Bank aren’t Israeli citizens, so they’re tried in Israeli military courts. Jewish Israeli settlers who live in the same West Bank territory are tried in civilian courts. Same land, same type of crime, completely different legal system depending on which group you belong to. This law made mandatory death penalties the rule in military courts – meaning Palestinian courts – and left civilian courts, meaning Jewish courts, with discretion.
The law also strips away the usual appeals process. Executions must be carried out within 90 days of sentencing, with no right to presidential clemency.
An Israeli human rights group called Yesh Din tracked what happened when Israeli settlers committed crimes against Palestinians in the West Bank over a nearly 20-year period. About 94% of those investigations were closed without any charges being filed at all. Of the cases that did go to trial, settlers were convicted about 3% of the time. The same government that couldn’t find enough evidence to charge settlers in 94% of cases now wants to execute Palestinians within 90 days.
Israel technically had the death penalty on the books before this – for genocide, espionage, that kind of thing – but hadn’t executed anyone since Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in 1962. Sixty-three years without a single execution.
Amnesty International said the law makes the death penalty “another discriminatory tool in Israel’s system of apartheid.” Human Rights Watch called it discriminatory and said it “entrenches a two-tiered system of justice.” The European Union called it “a clear step backward.” The Palestinian Authority called it a war crime under the Geneva Conventions, which are the international agreements that set the rules for how civilians must be treated during wartime and occupation.
The Israeli government says it’s about security. It’s about deterrence. But a two-tiered legal system that imposes mandatory death on one ethnic group while giving another group discretion for the same crime has a name, and it’s not a security policy.
Sources
- Israel’s parliament approves death penalty for Palestinians convicted of murdering Israelis
- Israel’s parliament passes death penalty bill targeting Palestinians
- What’s Israel’s death penalty law that only applies to Palestinians?
- Israel approves death penalty for Palestinians convicted of murdering Israelis
- Israel/OPT: Newly adopted death penalty law must be repealed