Middle East Monitor / March 30, 2026
In a joint statement on Sunday, Berlin, Paris, Rome and London expressed “deep concern” over a proposed law that would allow the death penalty for Palestinians convicted of carrying out attacks that result in the deaths of Israelis.
The statement said: “We, the Foreign Ministers of Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom, express our deep concern about a bill that would significantly expand the possibilities to impose the death penalty in Israel.”
The four countries added that “The adoption of this bill would risk undermining Israel’s commitments with regards to democratic principles.”
They also urged “the Israeli decision makers in Knesset and Government to abandon these plans.”
The proposed law states that any person who intentionally or unintentionally causes the death of an Israeli citizen for reasons linked to racism or hostility towards a particular group, with the aim of harming the State of Israel and the Jewish people in their land, would be subject to the death penalty.
In this form, the law would allow Israel to apply the death penalty to any Palestinian who kills an Israeli citizen, but it would not be applied in any circumstances to an Israeli who kills a Palestinian.
The death penalty has only been carried out twice in Israel’s history: first in 1948 against an army officer convicted of treason shortly after the state’s establishment, and second in 1962 against Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann.
