Bennett orders seizure of PA funds for families of Arab Israeli terror convicts

Defense minister says directive to confiscate payments is part of effort to ensure ‘Jewish blood will no longer be financially lucrative’

By TOI STAFF

Defense Minister Naftali Bennett (R) meets with IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi on November 13, 2019. (Ariel Hermoni/Defense Ministry)
Defense Minister Naftali Bennett (R) meets with IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi on November 13, 2019. (Ariel Hermoni/Defense Ministry)

Defense Minister Naftali Bennett on Wednesday declared he was taking steps to make sure that “Jewish blood will no longer be financially lucrative,” after signing an order to prevent families of Arab Israelis convicted on terrorism charges from receiving salaries and payments from the Palestinian Authority.

According to the order, which Bennett described as “another step in the campaign against terrorists,” Israel will seize payments totaling hundreds of thousands of shekels made to the families of eight Arab Israelis who have been convicted of terror.

In a statement, the Defense Ministry described Bennett’s move as “the first time” that Israel has taken direct action against payments that provide an “economic incentive to carry out terrorist attacks,” and promised more such orders down the line.

Israel has long protested that such payments encourage terror attacks.

Those included in the order were convicted for participation in various terrorist acts and related offenses, including a 2003 double suicide bombing at the old central bus station in Tel Aviv, which killed 23.

Illustrative: Palestinian members of Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, the terrorist wing of the Fatah party, raise their weapons during a rally to support Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his government on March 1, 2016, in the West Bank Balata refugee camp near Nablus. (AFP/Jaafar Ashtiyeh)

This February, the security cabinet approved the implementation of a law to cut more than half a billion shekels in funds to the Palestinian Authority over its payments to terrorists and their families. The ministers agreed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could withhold NIS 502,697,000 ($138 million) in PA tax revenues, the amount Israeli officials say the PA paid out in stipends to attackers and their families in 2018.

Applying the law has faced opposition from the security establishment, who worry it could destabilize the situation in the West Bank.

This came just under a year after US President Donald Trump signed the bi-partisan Taylor Force Act, which mandated cutting off certain kinds of aid to the PA, until they ended these stipends.

December 25, 2019 | 5 Comments »

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5 Comments / 5 Comments

  1. Not enough. They should expropriate the homes and land of the families of Palestinian terrorists and award then to the families of the victims or incorporate them into the JNF. The families of terrorists should be deported to Gaza. Redeem the land, one terrorist plot at a time.

  2. The money should be going to as said by D B. also those suffering hurts, mental hurts, the families of those held in Gaza, a stipend for those who have to be bunkered when the alert goes off. We are not talking wooden nickels some of those sodomites are in the bill gate earning league if you include rooming, Halel food etc.

  3. Long overdue. Withholding suggests the money could be released in the future. Big mistake..
    Confiscate and pay the Social Security fund back for Monies sent to Israeli widows and orphans paid with Israeli taxes.

  4. PM Netanyahu gets credit for the actions of his brilliant Defense Minister, the next Prime Minister of The State of Israel, Naftali Bennet.
    Naftali, you have lowered every Jewish person’s systolic blood pressure and in so doing; accomplished something which will significantly save Israeli lives.

  5. Kudos to Defense Minister N. Bennet and the PM who appointed him to his position, The Great PM of Israel, Binyamin Netanyahu. May he not only prevail in The Likud contest this week, but go on to get a huge mandate in The next election in The Knesset, to form a strong new government.
    The People of Israel appreciate your public service and will endeavor to protect you from harm.

    “Jewish blood no longer financially lucerative…” What self respecting “proud” Jew and supporter of Israel’s “right to exist”.. and “to defend itself…” would object to that?
    Well socialist democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders last week claimed that he was such a Jew, as described above, do you suppose he might support DM Bennet’s orders to seize the before mentioned PA funds in question. Someone needs to ask him that in front of many witnesses, because I would not bet my life on that.