The measure was championed by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, head of the Jewish Power party, who marked the occasion by celebrating with champagne.

The new "Death Penalty for Terrorists Law" specifically targets Palestinians calling for capital punishment in cases where a "terrorist" is convicted of deliberately killing a person "with the intent to deny the existence of the State of Israel."

The discriminatory wording of the new law establishes a distinction ensuring it would apply essentially only to Palestinians while simultaneously exempting Jewish terrorists, including in the West Bank, from any such consequences.

Two years ago, Ben Gvir, who has responsibility for the Israeli prison system, called for executing Palestinians to make more room in the prisons. After Monday's vote, Ben Gvir proclaimed, "The State of Israel is changing the rules of the game today: whoever murders Jews will not continue to breathe and enjoy conditions in prison. This is a day of justice for the victims and a day of deterrence for our enemies."

The bill, which makes death by hanging the default sentence, passed with support from 62 Knesset members, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Forty-eight lawmakers opposed it, and one chose to abstain.

The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem strongly condemned the new law, noting that such trials of Palestinians in the West Bank will be conducted in military courts where evidence is questionable and conviction rates very high.

"The penalty – execution by hanging – must be carried out within 90 days of sentencing, with no possibility of pardon," the organization explained. "The death penalty will be determined in military courts where only Palestinians are tried."

"These courts have an approximately 96% conviction rate, based largely on 'confessions' extracted under duress and torture during interrogations," the rights group added.

Additionally, the "death penalty will be the default sentence, and judges will be able to commute it to life imprisonment only in special circumstances," the B'Tselem statement continued. And "once the sentence has been handed down, there will be no possibility of a pardon or any reduction of the sentence."

Human Rights Watch deputy Middle East director Adam Coogle observed, "Israeli officials argue that imposing the death penalty is about security, but in reality, it entrenches discrimination and a two-tiered system of justice, both hallmarks of apartheid."

The Palestinian Authority (PA) also denounced the new law with the Palestinian presidency saying it "amounts to a war crime against the Palestinian people and comes within the broader context of escalating Israeli policies and measures across the occupied Palestinian territories, including the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem."

The PA statement went on to pledge the new law "will not break the will of the Palestinian people or undermine their steadfastness" or will it "deter them from continuing their legitimate struggle for freedom, independence, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital."