The foreign ministers of Germany, France, Italy, and the United Kingdom urge Israeli lawmakers to abandon a bill that would significantly expand possibilities to impose the death penalty in Israel, according to a statement shared by the German Foreign Office.
The ministers expressed their "deep concern" over the bill, which could be voted into law next week, the statement said on Sunday.
"We are particularly worried about the de facto discriminatory character of the bill. The adoption of this bill would risk undermining Israel's commitments with regard to democratic principles," it added.
Bill to be voted on in Knesset this week
A final outline for the bill was cleared for advancement on Wednesday, ahead of a final vote, which is set to take place this coming week in the Knesset plenum.
The bill outlines that any terrorist who intentionally kills a person as part of an act of terrorism will be sentenced to execution. The proposed bill also outlines that the handing down of a death sentence would not require a unanimous verdict.
Those sentenced to death under the proposed bill would be executed within 90 days of sentencing.
The method of execution detailed in the bill is hanging, which would be implemented by the Israel Prison Service. A previous version of the bill proposed lethal injection as the method of execution, which was later switched to hanging.
Keshet Neev contributed to this report.