The law stipulates the death penalty for anyone who intentionally causes the death of a person in an act classified as "terrorist," with no possibility of pardon or commutation of the sentence, and its execution within a period not exceeding 90 days.
The law grants the Prime Minister the authority to postpone implementation in "special circumstances" for a period not exceeding 180 days. It also stipulates discrimination in its application between within Israel and the West Bank, where the primary penalty is the one in the latter, with the exceptional possibility of replacing it with life imprisonment.
The law was passed after the National Security Committee approved it last week, despite thousands of reservations being submitted, amid widespread controversy over its legal and human rights implications.
In contrast, the Palestinian Authority said that the Knesset's passage of the law to execute prisoners seeks to legitimize extrajudicial killings.
For its part, the Adalah Center announced its intention to challenge the law before the Supreme Court, describing it as "racist legislation" that violates international law and the principle of equality.
An official at the center said the law legitimizes premeditated murder and is based on ethnic discrimination, warning that it violates international agreements, including the Hague Convention.
Suhad Bishara, director of the legal unit at Adalah Center, said, "This law represents the legitimization of premeditated cold-blooded murder in circumstances where the convicted person poses no actual danger."
She stressed that it is "legislation based on discrimination on the basis of ethnicity, and directly violates the principle of equality, based on classifications that reflect racist perceptions, amounting to prohibited racial discrimination."
She explained that "applying Israeli domestic law to the residents of the West Bank constitutes a clear violation of international law," adding that the Knesset "does not have the authority to legislate for the population under occupation, according to the Hague Convention."
European countries and international human rights organizations had expressed concern about the bill, considering the death penalty to be an inhumane form of punishment.
The far-right "Jewish Power" party, headed by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, submitted the bill, which was voted on in its first reading last November.
Last week, the Knesset's National Security Committee approved a bill to execute Palestinian prisoners after introducing amendments to it, and referred it for a vote in the second and third readings necessary for its approval, according to the Israeli Broadcasting Authority, without revealing the nature of the amendments.
More than 9,300 Palestinians, including 350 children and 66 women, are held in Israeli prisons, where they suffer, according to Palestinian and Israeli human rights organizations, torture, starvation and medical neglect, which has led to the death of dozens of them.
Since October 2023, Israel has escalated its measures against Palestinian prisoners, coinciding with its war on the Gaza Strip with American support, which resulted in more than 72,000 martyrs and about 172,000 wounded, most of whom were children and women.
