Justice or vengeance? Israel’s ongoing rift over the Death Penalty
On 7 Oct 2023, 1,200 people were killed in the shocking assault on southern Israel. It triggered the deadliest ever war in Gaza, where more than 71,600 Palestinians were assassinated according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.
Since the Hamas-led attacks 2 years ago, Israel has opened up one of its most contentious debates – whether or not the state should execute Palestinians convicted of crimes of terrorism against Israelis. Fueled by long-standing anger, fear, and a thirst for justice, there has been a political push for this new form of capital punishment.
Calls to reinstate capital punishment have been supported by far-right politicians who view it to be a “vaccine against murder”. Bereaved mother, Dr Valentina Gusak, thinks of the Death Penalty as a form of “deterrence and prevention” for the future. She believes that capital punishment could have potentially saved the life of her daughter, who had been killed with her boyfriend as they fled from a music festival in 2023. This resonates with many Israelis still reeling from the trauma of the attacks, as well as families of the deceased who view the punishment to be proportionate to the level of suffering caused as a result of the crimes committed.
However, these views have been met with scepticism from human rights groups who see the bill as “one of the most extreme legislative proposals” in the history of Israel. They believe it to be unethical, and because it is designed to apply only to Palestinians, they say it will bring about “racialised capital punishment.”
Arab-Israeli parliamentarian, Aida Touma-Suleiman, opposes the death penalty on principle and contends that the bill goes against international law and past treaties signed by Israel. If the legislation passes two more parliamentary votes and becomes law, she believes Supreme Court judges will strike it down.
The opponents of capital punishment maintain that it violates the right to life and faces the risk of executing the innocent. Additionally, it may well perpetuate the issue of discrimination, given that this law is specifically targeted towards Palestinians convicted of terrorism, and not Jewish Israelis or any other demographic. International implications loom large as well, where Israel has already fallen under intense scrutiny over its military actions, and reinstating the death penalty could deepen diplomatic isolation.
Israel’s legal history further complicates the dispute. While capital punishment exists in law, it has been used only twice. The last time was more than sixty years ago, to hang the notorious Nazi war criminal, Adolf Eichmann. Since then, Israel has effectively rejected the death penalty in practice.
In terms of public opinion, a large proportion of Israelis are still in favour of a punishment more draconian in nature, although this support is more prominent in the aftermath of attacks. However, when consideration for the longer-term implications of this is factored in, there has been a more cautious approach towards the topic at hand.
Ultimately, the roots of this debate lie in the way Israel defines appropriate justice in times of war. As the country continues to grapple with damage and insecurity, it needs to decide whether taking this step towards capital punishment is necessary as a form of “prevention”, or if it will simply lead to the proliferation of an entirely new set of moral issues for all stakeholders.