Israel’s national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has released a video showing him confronting jailed Hamas operative Hassan Salameh and threatening to have him executed.In the video, Ben-Gvir is seen standing in front of Salameh inside an Israeli prison while flanked by armed, masked guards. According to The Times of Israel, Ben-Gvir tells Salameh that the prison conditions are those he imposed before saying, “I want to kill you. I want to put you to death.”He also says the encounter gives him a sense of “closure”, recalling that he protested as a teenager following the 1996 Jerusalem bus bombings.Ben-Gvir tells Salameh that while he is responsible for making his life “hell” in prison, he wants him to be executed.Salameh is serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison for his role in a series of Hamas-orchestrated attacks in 1996, including suicide bombings targeting buses in Jerusalem. The Times of Israel reported that the two Jerusalem bus explosions he orchestrated killed 45 people.The attacks were part of a wave of suicide bombings in Israel in 1996. Salameh was subsequently arrested and convicted in Israel over his role in the attacks and sentenced to multiple consecutive life terms. Al Jazeera described him as a senior Hamas figure serving multiple life sentences for his involvement in the 1996 attacks.Ben-Gvir has repeatedly advocated tougher treatment of Palestinian security prisoners and has publicly promoted his policy of imposing harsher prison conditions on them. The Times of Israel has previously reported that he posted videos from Israeli prisons in which he confronted Palestinian prisoners and highlighted his prison policies.The latest video also comes after Israel’s Knesset passed a law in March providing for the death penalty in certain terrorism cases involving Palestinians tried in military courts. Ben-Gvir has publicly pushed for the measure and recently called for it to be applied to another Palestinian prisoner convicted in a deadly attack.
