Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, has passed a law on the death penalty for those found guilty of intentionally committing a terrorist attack causing death.
The law was supported by 62 lawmakers, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with 48 against.
The bill was promoted by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and his right-wing Otzma Yehudit party. The initiative stipulates that a person found guilty of intentionally killing a person during a terrorist attack should be sentenced to death by hanging.
The judge will be able to choose between the death penalty and life imprisonment, but for West Bankers only the death penalty is prescribed (judges will have to clearly justify the imposition of other punishments). The right to appeal the sentence is retained.
The initiative has been criticised by the opposition, calling it a blood PR exercise, as well as by several human rights organisations.
The death penalty is present in Israeli law, but sentences have been carried out only twice in Israel’s history. The last executed was Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, called the “architect of the Holocaust,” who was hanged more than 60 years ago, in 1962. Nowadays, those convicted of terrorism usually serve life sentences.