On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu initiated a legal move to strip two Palestinian men of their Israeli citizenship due to convictions on terrorism charges.

This marks what seems to be the inaugural application of a law passed three years prior, which permits the revocation of citizenship and subsequent deportation for Palestinian citizens involved in specific violent crimes, such as terrorism, and who have allegedly received financial incentives from the Palestinian Authority.

Netanyahu’s court submission contends that the gravity of the offenses, coupled with the alleged payments from a Palestinian Authority fund, provide sufficient grounds for revoking their citizenship and expelling them from Israel.

He has consistently accused the fund of incentivizing violence, including attacks targeting civilians.

In contrast, Palestinian officials argue that the fund serves as a vital support mechanism for families of detainees in Israel. They claim Netanyahu is spotlighting a minority of recipients involved in such attacks.

When the law passed, critics argued that it allowed Israel’s legal system to treat Jewish and Palestinian people differently. Civil rights groups said that basing a deportation law on Palestinian Authority payments effectively excluded Jewish Israelis, including settlers convicted of attacks against Palestinians, from the threat of losing their citizenship, as the statute targeted people of a certain race.

Netanyahu said this week that the government launched proceedings against the two men and that similar cases would be brought in the future.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked a court to revoke the Israeli citizenship of two Palestinian men convicted of terrorism offenses. (YAIR SAGI/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Israeli officials said Mohamad Ahmad, a citizen from Jerusalem, was convicted of “offenses that constitute an act of terrorism and receiving funds in connection with terrorism.” He allegedly received payment after he was sentenced in 2002 for a shooting attack and served 23 years before his release in 2024.

Mohammed Ahmad Hussein al-Halsi was sentenced in 2016 to 18 years behind bars for stabbing elderly women. He also allegedly received payments while in prison.

Ahmad would be deported immediately, while al-Halsi would be removed upon his release, as individuals are subject to removal to Gaza once their sentences are complete under the 2023 law, which applies to citizens or permanent residents convicted of “committing an act that constitutes a breach of loyalty to the State of Israel,” including terrorism.

When the law passed, critics argued that it allowed Israel’s legal system to treat Jewish and Palestinian people differently. (REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun/Pool/File Photo)

The general director of Israel’s Adalah legal center, Hassan Jabareen, called the move to use the law “a cynical propaganda move” by Netanyahu. He said stripping citizenship violated the most basic principles of the rule of law, including by acting against people who have completed prison sentences.

“The Israeli government is attempting to strip individuals of the very foundation through which all rights are protected, their nationality,” he said on Thursday, according to The Associated Press.