Israel finds another way to kill Palestinians: Labor preserves the structure.

Israel has now formally written the execution of Palestinians into its apartheid system, already built to dominate Palestinians. On 30 March 2026, the Knesset passed a law by 62 to 48, making hanging the default sentence for Palestinians convicted in military courts, and carried out within 90 days unless vague “special circumstances” apply.

If devastating Palestinian life was not enough through mass destruction and genocide, Israel has adopted another way to kill through a so-called mechanism of “law”.

Israel has not merely passed a death penalty law. It has done so over a prison system holding over 15,000 Palestinian hostages, according to some public records, even though no transparent public accounting has been given of how many hostages may ultimately be pulled into this new execution regime. These include 350 children and 79 women.

Labor objects to the rope while preserving the relationship with the hand that tied it.

To date, not a single Labor minister has condemned Israel for genocide. Not Albanese and not Tony Burke. They’ve hidden behind party language and expect the communities they serve to keep absorbing the insult. Their response to this new low by Israel is to reach for a universal phrase about opposing the death penalty “in all instances”, as Penny Wong told Labor caucus on 31 March. The phrase treats the issue as though it were merely an instrument of punishment detached from the structure that produces it. Labor speaks as if it is confronting an excess while working carefully to preserve the relationship that makes each “excess” politically survivable.

This new Israeli low and Labor’s response to it are not distant decisions. They enter our lives directly because Palestinians are our family, our mothers, our children, and our dead. Foreign policy does not remain overseas. It moves through our homes, our mosques, our classrooms, our speech, our hearts, and the limits of what this country expects us to absorb. The Muslim Vote raises this because decisions that wound so intimately cannot be allowed to pass without accountability.