Israel's New Death Penalty Law Targets Palestinians, Exempts Jewish Settlers

Palestinians in the occupied West Bank now face mandatory death by hanging if convicted of killing Israelis in acts of terrorism. Jewish settlers living on the same land face no such penalty: the law that the Israeli Knesset passed on March 30, 2026, by a vote of 62 to 47 with one abstention, explicitly excludes Israeli citizens and residents from its scope. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was among the 62 who voted in favor.

The "Death Penalty for Terrorists Law," introduced by the party of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, takes effect within 30 days of passage. Sentences must be carried out by hanging within 90 days and cannot be commuted or pardoned. Military courts may impose the death penalty by a simple majority, without even a prosecutorial request, and judges may opt for life imprisonment only under vaguely defined "special reasons or circumstances."

The asymmetry at the law's core reflects a dual legal structure that has governed the West Bank since June 7, 1967, when Israeli military commanders established separate judicial authority over Palestinians. Since then, Palestinians have been tried in military courts while Israeli settlers on the same occupied land have been governed by Israeli civilian law. Two military courts currently operate in the West Bank: the Ofer Court and the Salem Court, both located in closed military zones.

The gap in legal outcomes under that dual system is stark. Palestinians face a conviction rate of 99 to 99.74 percent in Israeli military courts, with approximately 97 percent of those convictions resulting from plea bargains. The conviction rate for Israeli citizens tried for crimes committed in the West Bank between 2005 and 2024 was approximately 3 percent. Since 1967, Israel has imprisoned over 700,000 Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza.

Ben Gvir, who wore a noose-shaped pin on his lapel during the Knesset vote, declared: "From today, every terrorist will know, and the whole world will know, that whoever takes a life, the State of Israel will take their life." Opposition leader Yair Lapid condemned the bill on the floor as "a surrender to Hamas," saying, "We are not like Hamas." Arab lawmaker Aida Touma-Suleiman of the Hadash party offered a bleaker summary: "I wasn't surprised."

The Palestinian Authority's Foreign Ministry called the law a "war crime" and a "dangerous escalation" that breaches the Fourth Geneva Convention. Palestinian politician Mustafa Barghouti said it "sends another message to Palestinians that there is no place for compromise." The Association for Civil Rights in Israel filed an urgent Supreme Court petition the same day, calling the law "unconstitutional, discriminatory" and "enacted without legal authority." B'Tselem described it as further "dehumanization of Palestinians," while Israeli scholars of international law issued a collective statement declaring it violated both Israeli and international law.

UN human rights experts from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights declared the law "constitutes a discriminatory regime of capital punishment" and called on Israel's Supreme Court to invalidate "this manifestly unlawful legislation without delay, before it gives rise to irreversible harm." Human Rights Watch labeled the bill "discriminatory" and joined Amnesty International in calling on the European Union to take urgent action.

Israel has not executed anyone since Adolf Eichmann was hanged in 1962. The Knesset passed this law on March 30, Land Day, the date Palestinians commemorate to mark the 1976 Israeli expropriation of Arab-owned land inside Israel. Rights groups say that timing was no coincidence: the law is not an isolated act but the latest installment in a discriminatory legal architecture built over nearly six decades of military occupation.