Israel’s far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has called for nightly killings in Gaza of dozens of people who he says are ‘not worthy of life’. It’s the latest in a series of attempts at making life unbearably harsh for Palestinians.
Published On 16 Aug 202616 Aug 2026
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Three-quarters of the world has abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, according to Amnesty International.
Published On 12 Aug 202612 Aug 2026
Lebanon has become the first country in the Middle East to abolish the death penalty.
On Tuesday, a majority of the 128-member parliament voted in favour of scrapping capital punishment. Death sentences will be replaced with life imprisonment with aggravated hard labour.
Lebanon has observed an unofficial moratorium on executions since January 2004, but its courts have continued to issue dozens of death sentences.
At the end of 2025, 85 people were facing death sentences, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Justice’s Directorate of Prisons.
According to the latest Amnesty International report on death sentences and executions, as of December, close to three-quarters of the world’s countries had abolished the death penalty in law or practice, meaning they have not carried out executions for the past 10 years.
Some countries have abolished the death penalty for “ordinary crimes” only, which refers to exceptional crimes such as those committed under military law or those committed in exceptional circumstances
Overall, this includes:
The map below highlights where each country stands on capital punishment:
Amnesty International’s monitoring of worldwide use of the death penalty recorded 2,707 executions in 2025, up 78 percent from 1,518 in 2024. Amnesty attributed that spike primarily to executions in Iran, which more than doubled from 972 in 2024 to at least 2,159 in 2025.
Amnesty’s figures exclude what it says are thousands of executions that have been carried out in China. Executions were carried out in 17 countries, consistent with the historical lows seen since 2018.
Death sentences will be replaced with life imprisonment with aggravated hard labour.
Published On 11 Aug 202611 Aug 2026
Lebanon’s parliament has passed a law to abolish capital punishment, making it the first country in the Middle East to do so.
The Lebanese parliament’s speaker’s office said lawmakers signed off on the legislation Tuesday after making several amendments.
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A majority of the 128-member assembly voted in favour of ending the death penalty, with the exception of the parliamentary bloc of Hezbollah.
Justice Minister Adel Nassar, who was in parliament, called it a “historic step” for the country.
The new system replaces the death sentence with life imprisonment with aggravated hard labour.
While Lebanon has observed an unofficial moratorium on executions since January 2004, courts have continued to issue dozens of death sentences.
At the end of 2025, 85 people were facing death sentences, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Justice’s Directorate of Prisons.
Rights group Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa director, Heba Morayef, praised Lebanon’s move to end capital punishment as “a major milestone and a victory for human rights in the country”.
“After more than two decades without executions, today’s step transforms a precarious hiatus in executions into lasting legal protection upholding the right to life and bringing Lebanon in line with the global trend towards abolition,” Morayef said.
It is unclear how aggravated hard labour would be enforced, with some legislators saying the terms of the new punishment are not yet clear. Lebanon does have the punishment of hard labour written into law and court decisions, but even those have been rarely enforced in recent years due to cash-strapped Lebanon’s lack of resources and capacity within its overcrowded prisons.
Lebanon’s abolition of the death penalty comes as parliament also debates a controversial general amnesty law, the largest since the end of its 15-year civil war in 1990, that could reduce sentences or even release some people convicted of violence offences.
Family members of Lebanese soldiers and servicemen killed in attacks have repeatedly protested against the law, some saying they had hoped to see the perpetrators who killed their family members executed rather than be issued reduced prison sentences.
MINNEAPOLIS — The man charged in the political assassinations of the top Democrat in the Minnesota House and her husband, as well as the nonfatal shootings of a state senator and his wife, pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday after prosecutors said they would not seek the death penalty.
Vance Boelter was charged with murdering Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark Hortman, and with shooting state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette Hoffman. Boelter came to their doors in the early hours of June 14, 2025, disguised as a police officer and driving a fake squad car.
The Hortmans’ golden retriever was so gravely injured that it had to be euthanized.
Boelter, 58, was captured near his home in rural Green Isle the day after the shootings following what prosecutors have called the largest search for a suspect in Minnesota history. He also faces state charges, which have been on hold pending the resolution of his federal case.
The U.S. attorney’s office in Minneapolis notified the court Wednesday that the Justice Department would not seek the death penalty against Boelter in accordance with a proposed plea agreement, and the court set the change-of-plea hearing for Thursday.
Minnesota abolished capital punishment in 1911 and has never had a federal death penalty case. Daniel Borgertpoepping, a spokesperson for the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, said the federal plea deal would not affect Boelter’s state charges.
While the Trump administration has pushed for greater use of capital punishment, there were questions about whether Boelter’s case would qualify for the death penalty under federal law.
Prosecutors have called the shootings political. When they announced the federal indictment in July, they released a rambling handwritten letter they say Boelter wrote to FBI Director Kash Patel in which he confessed to the attacks. However, the letter didn’t make clear why he targeted the Hortmans or the Hoffmans.
In some messages to media, Boelter referenced a vague and cryptic “investigation” he had been carrying out, sometimes suggesting it was about the COVID-19 vaccine.
Friends described Boelter as an evangelical Christian and occasional preacher and missionary, who held politically conservative views and had been struggling to find work.
John Hoffman said in a lawsuit filed against Boelter in April that his left arm and hand likely would never fully recover, and that he also had permanent injuries to his digestive and urinary systems.
Yvette Hoffman was left with permanent physical weakness, the lawsuit said, while their adult daughter, Hope Hoffman, who was there and called 911 but was not shot, suffered severe psychological trauma.
Judge Emily Marks had previously allowed the execution to proceed, arguing that no execution is entirely without pain.
Published On 9 Jun 20269 Jun 2026
A federal judge in the United States has permanently blocked Alabama from executing an inmate with nitrogen gas, after declaring that the method violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
On Tuesday, US District Judge Emily C Marks permanently enjoined the state from executing Jeffery Lee by nitrogen gas. Lee was scheduled to be executed Thursday at an Alabama prison.
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Her decision came a day after an appeals court reversed her earlier ruling that the method is constitutional.
The case centres on how to interpret the US Constitution’s Eighth Amendment, which bars the government from inflicting “cruel and unusual punishments”.
A spokesman for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said the state is reviewing the decision and considering next steps, including an appeal. The case will likely end up before the US Supreme Court, which has previously let nitrogen executions proceed.
A spokeswoman for Lee’s legal team said they did not have an immediate comment.
In her 26-page ruling, Marks said litigation is a constant in death penalty cases.
“Were Alabama to adopt firing squad as a method of execution, that method would likely be challenged as well. Indeed, there is likely no method — no matter how humane — that would be immune to constitutional challenge,” Marks wrote.
“But the Constitution does not guarantee a painless death, and human life cannot be purposefully extinguished without some risk of pain. The Court, the condemned, and the State must all confront that sobering reality.”
Marks noted that the state has two other authorised execution methods: lethal injection and the electric chair. She said Lee is “not entitled to an injunction barring the State from executing him using one of those methods”.
Marks also ruled that the state could switch to Lee’s preferred method, a firing squad. Inmates challenging execution methods are required to suggest an alternative method.
“The State can readily obtain rifles, ammunition, and other materials necessary to carry out a firing squad execution,” Marks wrote.
“Additionally, the State would be able to modify space at Holman to carry out executions by firing squad. The State is also able to source and train volunteers willing to carry out such an execution.”
Lee is currently housed at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore.