Khaberni - Volker Türk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged the Israeli authorities to retract a new bill that imposes the death penalty on Palestinians under certain circumstances, warning that Israel is challenging international law.
In a statement published on Friday, Türk urged the occupation authorities to abandon their plans to propose new legislation that imposes mandatory death sentences, to be applied exclusively to Palestinians.
He emphasized that the drafting of this legislation, along with statements from Israeli politicians, indicates that the aim is to exclusively target Palestinians, who are often convicted after unfair trials.
He stressed that depriving any Palestinian from the West Bank and Gaza Strip of the fair trial guarantees stipulated in the Fourth Geneva Convention constitutes a war crime.
The statement comes in response to a series of proposals presented before the Israeli Knesset—including an amendment to the military law enforced in the West Bank—that mandates military courts to impose the death penalty mandatorily on all those convicted of premeditated murder.
The proposals include an amendment to the Israeli Penal Code to introduce the death penalty for those convicted by the occupation authorities of "deliberately killing Israelis in a terrorist act," retroactively affecting participants in the "Al-Aqsa Flood" operation on October 7, 2023.
There is also a proposal to use the death penalty for "acts of terrorism, racism, or hostility towards the public," terms that are very vaguely and loosely defined, according to the United Nations Human Rights Office.
Serious Concerns
The High Commissioner emphasized that these proposals raise serious concerns regarding discrimination against Palestinians and violations of their rights to fair trials, in addition to other violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law.
He stated that the proposed laws also violate international humanitarian law standards related to criminal procedures and the imposition of the death penalty on inhabitants of occupied territories.
He noted that the United Nations clearly opposes the death penalty under all circumstances, as it is difficult to reconcile this punishment with human dignity, and it poses the risk of executing innocent people, which is unacceptable.
He affirmed that the Israeli proposals for introducing mandatory death sentences leave no discretionary power to the courts and violate the right to life.
