“As long as I am defense minister, no terrorist will get a shortened sentence, not even by one hour.” Those are the decisive words that Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman tweeted Sept. 16. This was in response to the headlines of Yedioth Ahronoth that same morning, which announced that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had established a committee tasked with the issue of examining requests for shortening the sentences of Palestinians serving life sentences who were convicted in military courts.

This report referred to the fact that West Bank Palestinians suspected of criminal security offenses are sentenced in Israeli military courts also located in the West Bank. Most offenses committed by Israeli citizens, even if residing in the West Bank, are under the authority of the Israeli judicial system, not the military.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hurried to back up Liberman, as did right-wing ministers and Knesset members from the left-center. For example, Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin from the Zionist Camp told Al-Monitor, “The punishments for murderers of Israelis cannot be shortened. Deterrence will be jeopardized if a terrorist knows that he can harm Israelis yet assume that, eventually, there is a chance that his sentence will be commuted.”

The political storm was magnified when representatives of angry Israeli families who had lost members to terror argued that this option was, to them, tantamount to a declaration of war. Within a few hours, Liberman instructed the IDF to freeze the committee’s appointment until an in-depth discussion of the issue could be held with the relevant parties.