The Death Penalty is Immoral. Even for Terrorists

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On November 10, 2025, a bill was brought for its first reading in the Knesset plenum: the Penal Law Amendment Bill (Death Penalty for Terrorists). The bill seeks to impose the death penalty on defendants convicted of murder motivated by nationalism. 

This punishment would be designated for Palestinians only, and seeks to limit the ability of the court to use its discretion by mandating the death penalty in these cases. The bill also proposes to make a similar amendment applicable in military court. Currently, military legislation stipulates that a decision to impose the death penalty must be unanimous; the bill would render it so that a majority of judges would suffice to sentence a defendant to death, and would revoke the military commander's authority to commute a death sentence to a lesser punishment. Similar proposals have been raised at points in the past, but until now have not advanced in the legislative process. 

ACRI categorically opposes the death penalty. The death penalty contradicts the most basic foundation of human rights: the sanctity of life and human dignity. It stands in complete opposition to the values of the State of Israel and fundamental democratic principles, and undermines the moral foundations of human society. The death penalty turns the law into a tool of violence in the hands of the authorities. It also serves to corrupt society and normalize violence, extremism, and indifference to the value of life. Legally, it contradicts Israel’s Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, as it nullifies the constitutional human right to dignity and life. It also goes against international law and Israel's obligations, as the occupying power, toward Palestinians residing in the occupied territories. 

Needless to say, the judicial system, like any human system, is not immune to errors. Even if the use of the death penalty could be justified, the fear that even one person might be wrongfully executed is sufficient to disqualify this cruel and irreversible punishment. 

The bill's drafters argue that the death penalty will act as a means of deterrence. But the use of killing as a means of deterrence cheapens the sanctity of human life; the State is not permitted to cheapen the lives of those convicted—even if they have committed terrible crimes—by using them as a means to send a threatening message to others. Moreover, studies conducted worldwide have found no evidence that the death penalty is an effective means of deterrence, particularly when it comes to acts of terrorism carried out on ideological grounds. Accordingly, the global trend is toward abolishing the death penalty. 

Throughout the entire history of the State of Israel, it the death penalty has been carried out only once, for Adolf Eichmann. In the State of Israel's reports to the UN on the implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, it justifiably took pride in the minimal use of the death penalty and the prosecution's policy of refraining from requesting its imposition even in the most severe cases. 

As mentioned previously, the bill designates the death penalty for Palestinians only. Section 1 of the bill states that the death penalty shall be given to a person who murders another with "...the purpose of harming the State of Israel and the revival of the Jewish people in their land;" the explanatory notes state that the bill was formulated against the backdrop of the "...murder of Jews, simply because they are Jews." Thus, the bill seeks to create a normative arrangement whereby nationalist violence by Palestinians directed against Jews is worse than any other type of violence, including nationalist violence by Jews against Palestinians. This is, of course, a massive violation of the right to equality, and equality under the law, and indicates that the law is based on the racist assumption that the lives of Jews are more important and more worthy of protection. This purpose in itself is undemocratic and fundamentally flawed. 

This bill cannot be viewed in isolation from the general conduct and policies towards Palestinian prisoners and detainees since the outbreak of the war: abuse; violence; starvation; prolonged time in handcuffs; unsanitary living conditions; and the denial of medical treatment, meetings with lawyers, and access to Red Cross representatives. Dozens of prisoners and detainees have died under these conditions. It is clear that this bill is another manifestation of a larger policy of vengeance and cruelty, and is not intended to serve any purpose other than to provide a legal pretext for executing them.