Israeli lawmakers clash over mandatory death sentence for terrorists

Tel Aviv [Israel] September 28 (ANI/TPS): Israeli lawmakers opened a contentious debate on a bill to impose the death penalty on convicted terrorists. Proponents told the Knesset’s National Security Committee that capital punishment represented “justice,” while opponents warned it could endanger hostages currently held by Hamas.

The proposed legislation, championed by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, would make execution mandatory for certain terror convictions. The measure would also allow a majority of judges to impose the death penalty and would eliminate the possibility of commuting such sentences once finalised.

“A terrorist who is convicted of murder motivated by racism or hostility toward the public, and in circumstances aimed at harming the State of Israel and the resurrection of the Jewish people in its land, will receive a mandatory death sentence,” the legislation’s explanatory notes stated.

Committee Chairman MK Zvika Fogel of Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party dismissed security warnings about the timing of the discussion. “I have heard all the situation assessments, and I do not accept them,” he said. “We cannot continue with the same concept. The death penalty for terrorists is not revenge–it is justice.”

Ben-Gvir emphasized that he had been asked by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office to postpone the debate but refused. “The answer is a big no,” Ben-Gvir said. “This law is the order of the hour. To create a weighty warning and impose the death penalty on these terrorists. At this moment, they know that if a hair from a hostage’s head falls, it would be a death sentence.”

Referring to warnings that advancing the legislation could provoke Hamas, Ben-Gvir said, “After October 7, all arguments about timing proved meaningless.”

Opposition voices, however, criticized the move as reckless. Gal Hirsch, the government’s coordinator for hostages and missing persons, argued that the timing of the debate could put lives at risk. “I object to the date of this discussion when there are 48 hostages, including 20 believed to be alive,” Hirsch said. “I do not represent a personal view–I represent the issue and the families of the hostages.”

Ben-Gvir rejected Hirsch’s argument. “You do not represent all the families, and you know it,” he said. “Some families don’t think that way.” The tension escalated further when opposition lawmaker Gilad Kariv of The Democrats clashed with Ben-Gvir over past interactions with Palestinian prisoners. Security guards eventually removed Kariv from the committee room.

The only individual ever executed by Israel was Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi architect of the Holocaust. He was hanged in 1962, and his ashes were scattered at sea after he was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity.

An Israeli court sentenced John Demjanjuk to death in 1988 for crimes against humanity while working at various concentration camps. However, Israel’s Supreme Court overturned the sentence in 1993. Israel eventually extradited Demjanjuk, who was later convicted in Germany as an accessory to the murder of more than 28,000 Jews at the Sobibor death camp. Demjanjuk died in Germany while appealing that conviction.

Approximately 1,200 people were killed, and 252 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage in Hamas’s attacks on Israeli communities near the Gaza border on October 7. Of the 48 remaining hostages, about 20 are believed to be alive. (ANI/TPS)

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