Blatant contempt for Palestinian life is a gold-star badge of honor within this Israeli government \u2014 and not just for the extreme right. Most Israeli ministers have a record of genocidal comments not just about Palestinians but also Lebanese and others. So, is it a surprise that the Knesset has passed a death penalty law that specifically targets Palestinians?<\/p>\n
This law is the pet project of Itamar Ben-Gvir, the minister for national security, and his racist acolytes. Ben-Gvir celebrated the law with Champagne in the Knesset. Even before the vote, he posted chilling videos from Israeli prisons showing the preparations for the hangings he so clearly cherishes.<\/p>\n
But this is not some extremist fetish. The Knesset passed the legislation by 62 votes to 48. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voted in favor. And it is not a product of the post-October 2023 Israeli fury, as it was included in the coalition agreement four years ago.<\/p>\n
As any Palestinian will tell you, Israel already has a policy of execution, just one that is not enabled through the courts<\/p>\n
Chris Doyle<\/p>\n
Supporters argue that Israel is not the only state to have the death penalty. True, of course. Twenty-seven of the 50 US states have it, for example.<\/p>\n
But there is a monumental difference between this Israeli law and those of every other state that has legalized executions. What is so barbaric about this legislation is that it targets one group: Palestinians. Yes, in theory, a Jewish Israeli citizen could be executed, but only if the intention of an attack of which they were convicted was to \u201cnegate the existence of the state of Israel.\u201d It is tough to conceive of circumstances where a court would determine an Israeli Jewish citizen had that intent. How would a court determine that intent? It will become the default sentence for Palestinians found guilty of killing an Israeli.<\/p>\n
This will be weaponized by a very racist government. Take the words of the Israeli ambassador to Australia as an example. He claimed Palestinians deserve the death penalty because they are \u201cderanged\u201d and \u201cthe usual punishments don\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n
This hardens the regime of apartheid that Israel operates against Palestinians. Their lives are valued less than Jewish Israeli lives and this is codified in law. Even in the apartheid regime in South Africa, such a law was never passed.<\/p>\n
Considering that this will largely affect Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, it is also a blatant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Volker Turk, the UN\u2019s high commissioner for human rights, was clear: \u201cIts application to residents of the occupied Palestinian territory would constitute a war crime.\u201d<\/p>\n
Having visited Israeli military courts on dozens of occasions, I am in no doubt about the slim chances any Palestinian has of proper justice. The system has, by its own official figures, a 99.74 percent conviction rate. Increasingly, Israeli military judges are settlers themselves. \u201cKangaroo court\u201d would be a generous description. Even Israeli civilian courts could order executions, so the Palestinian citizens of Israel and residents of East Jerusalem could be affected.<\/p>\n
Yet, as any Palestinian will tell you, Israel already has a policy of execution, just one that is not enabled through the courts. Israeli forces have for decades carried out extrajudicial executions of Palestinians as a matter of state policy. Increasingly, these are no longer even targeted. In Gaza, the targeting policy permitted the killing of 300 Palestinians as collateral damage. Israeli snipers have targeted Palestinian infants in Gaza, according to verified reports.<\/p>\n
The case for sanctioning the sponsors of this law is watertight. But spines are in short supply when it comes to Israel<\/p>\n
Chris Doyle<\/p>\n
Settlers in the West Bank killed six Palestinians in the first three weeks of March, according to the UN. The chances of any of the perpetrators being arrested and put on trial are close to zero. They certainly would not face the death penalty under this law. Last month, 30 US senators demanded in a letter that President Donald Trump insist on an independent investigation into the February killing by settlers of a Palestinian American, the ninth US citizen killed in the West Bank since 2022.<\/p>\n
The Israeli death penalty law is being challenged at the Supreme Court. Israeli human rights organizations are pushing this, but the only other opposition within the country is from the ever-more-impotent left.<\/p>\n
How has this gone down regionally and internationally? Palestinians went on a general strike in the West Bank. They have few options. Demonstrations were held in Syria and Turkiye, among other places. Pakistan, Turkiye, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Qatar, \u200cSaudi Arabia and the UAE issued a joint statement, as did six Western states, importantly including France, Germany, Italy and the UK.<\/p>\n
The case for sanctioning the sponsors of this law is watertight. But spines are in short supply among European leaders when it comes to Israel.<\/p>\n
Will this change how the world views Israel? Its reputation has already plummeted over the last two years. Will European leaders desist from referring to having shared values with Israel or from billing it as a democracy that adheres to the rule of law? Its reckless war against Iran reinforces Israel\u2019s image as a pariah state. The death penalty for Palestinians shows it is both rogue and racist.<\/p>\n
Chris Doyle is director of the Council for Arab-British Understanding in London. X: @Doylech <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Blatant contempt for Palestinian life is a gold-star badge of honor within this Israeli government \u2014 and not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-378113","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}