Statement
Wednesday, April 22, 2026
The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in South West Asia and North Africa (WHRDMENA) joins Palestinian groups and organisations, the United Nations, and all those who have widely condemned the law passed by the Knesset against Palestinian prisoners, which allows for the sentencing of those accused of committing “terrorist crimes” to death by hanging. The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders believes that the passage of this law is a new weapon for the Israeli entity and the occupying regime to continue committing crimes of genocide against the Palestinian people.
A security committee has passed a bill introduced by the Knesset that will allow Israeli courts to impose the death penalty by hanging without a request from the prosecution or the need for a unanimous decision; it should be noted that this will also apply to military courts in the West Bank. Furthermore, this law closes the door to appeals or the use of “clemency” (1). It should also be noted that “within the framework of Israel’s civil judicial system, the law imposes the death penalty for the premeditated murder of a person who ‘denies the existence of the State of Israel’… It restricts the defendant’s right to legal counsel and family visits, limits external oversight, and grants immunity to those involved in carrying out executions… (It) also mandates that this be carried out within an expedited period of 90 days… (and) Israeli citizens and residents are explicitly exempt from this provision: military jurisdiction applies exclusively to Palestinians, while Israeli settlers are tried in civilian courts” (2).
The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in South West Asia and North Africa (WHRDMENA) cannot overlook the parallels between this law and the extrajudicial executions committed in the United States against African Americans, where 4,743 African American citizens were executed between 1882 and 1968 as “a systematic form of racial terrorism and social control, (and served) as public spectacles aimed at imposing white supremacy and suppressing Black civil rights” (3). This approach underscores the Regional Coalition’s firm conviction that the United States sponsors the Israeli occupation and the genocide of the Palestinian people, and that the United States serves as a role model for an occupying entity.
Enough is enough of the negative practices—addressed in the statement issued by the Palestinian NGO Forum—which consist of mere condemnation without taking any legal or procedural measures to deter the Israeli entity from the crimes of genocide and apartheid it continues to commit. The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders joins its voice to the demands of the Palestinian NGO Forum (4) to call on the global human rights community to repeal this law, and calls on feminist and human rights communities regionally and internationally to work to eliminate this law through all legal means and through international advocacy, for the Palestinian cause against the Israeli occupation and its apartheid regime are, at their core, feminist and human rights issues.
Long live the Palestinian people against occupation and genocide!
