Ramallah: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates has declared that Israel’s draft law to impose the death penalty on Palestinian detainees constitutes a war crime and signals a new level of Israeli extremism and criminality against Palestinians.
According to Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA, the Ministry issued a statement on Monday asserting that the Israeli judicial system and the Knesset act as tools of occupation that legitimize crimes and ensure impunity. The Ministry emphasized that the death penalty law represents an extrajudicial execution decision, reflecting an intention to commit new crimes, furthering the ongoing genocide in Gaza and extending to the West Bank, including Jerusalem. This development has serious implications for detainees.
The Ministry condemned the draft bill approved by the Israeli Knesset, which mandates the death penalty for Palestinian detainees, describing it as a step towards continued genocide and ethnic cleansing under legal pretense. The Ministry stated that this move amounts to an official declaration of war crimes and crimes against humanity endorsed by the Knesset.
Furthermore, the Ministry declared that the bill reveals the trajectory of racial extremism and fascism within the Israeli legal system, violating international conventions, norms, and laws, including the four Geneva Conventions.
The Ministry vowed that the Palestinian people and their leadership would oppose this plan through all legal and political channels. It warned that approving the bill without holding its proponents accountable would stain humanity’s conscience and equate to complicity in extrajudicial executions.
The Ministry called on the international community and legal bodies to take immediate action against this perilous course pursued by Israel, to activate accountability and justice mechanisms, and to place Knesset members supporting the bill on terrorism lists. It urged for a boycott of these members and the institution itself.