The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee has voted to advance the Taylor Force Act, which would halt U.S. taxpayer subsidies to the Palestinian Authority until it stops a "Pay to Slay" practice through which terrorists and their families are rewarded financially.
The international community has raised the issue because of the hundreds of millions of dollars the PA gets annually from Western nations.
For example, U.S. taxpayers send about $700 million annually to the PA, which then gives more than $300 million annually to terrorists or to the families of terrorists who die in a suicide bombing.
Now, the Palestinian Liberation Organization's executive committe has responded to the protest over subsidizing terror.
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Its message to the Senate, essentially, is,"Shut up and give us the money."
According to a Facebook post from the Fatah Movement's Bethlehem branch over the weekend, the committee, led by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, "condemned the legislators of the American Congress and their positions towards the Palestinian people," according to Palestinian Media Watch, which translated the message.
The executive committee said it "sees the American Senate Committee on Foreign Relation's approval of stopping American aid to the PA – if it does not stop the aid to the families of the martyrs (shahids) and prisoners – as an unacceptable act that will negatively affect everything that is connected to the Palestinians' rights, and particularly their right to life and protection from the occupation army's violations, and the summary executions that it carries out in the streets and military checkpoints of the West Bank, including occupied East Jerusalem."
The statement presumes the establishment of a Palestine on land that belongs to Israel, which explains the references to the "occupation army."
The PLO declared its rejection "of this extortion and the rejection of using the tool of financial aid to extract political concessions."
The committee said it "emphasized that the PLO will continue its national, moral, and humanitarian responsibility towards [sic] the occupation's victims, the victims of the organized state terror, and the victims of the herds of settlers and their terror organizations, which the government of Israel supports and provides with protection and patronage, with the blessings of the legislators of the American Congress."
PMW said the Taylor Force Act would cut off all funding to the PA if it keeps paying terrorists salaries and giving suicide bombers' families allowances.
PMW said the PA's "rewarding of terror has been a source of contention between the Palestinian Authority and its American and European funders since 2011, when Palestinian Media Watch first exposed the PA's practice of rewarding terrorist prisoners. The U.S. Congress finally decided to act decisively after becoming aware that the family of the murderer of American veteran and university student Taylor Force, who was murdered last year in Tel Aviv, would be receiving a lifetime monthly stipend."
"The Palestinian Authority sees all Israelis and all visitors to Israel as legitimate targets and therefore rewards the terrorists and families of those who are either imprisoned or killed. Accordingly, PA leader Mahmoud Abbas is defying the international community including the donor countries by continuing to spend $355 million a year on these payments."
WND reported Liberty Counsel objected to the American taxpayer dollars going to "reward terrorists who kill American and Israeli citizens.'
"As soon as attackers are arrested, the PA provides canteen expenses, salary and health benefits," Liberty Counsel said. "A government job upon release is guaranteed for those sentenced to five or more years. The families of 'martyrs' also receive large payments for the loss of their family member."
The secretary of state would be required to certify that the PA "has terminated payments for acts of terrorism against American and Israeli citizens after the attackers being fairly tried and who have been imprisoned for such acts of terrorism, including the family members of the convicted individuals."
Mat Staver, president of Christians in Defense of Israel, commended the Senate panel for advancing a bill that would "cut the supply of blood money to the Palestinian Authority to murder innocent Israelis and Americans."
"We cannot reward acts of terrorism like the one that tragically took the life of Taylor Force. 'Pay to Slay' must end," he said. "This legislation will now force the Palestinian Authority to face the consequences of its horrendous violence or end this abhorrent practice immediately. It's unconscionable that even one American taxpayer dollar has been used to brainwash young Palestinians to hate the Jewish people and to pay terrorists to ruthlessly murder Israelis and Americans."
WND reported in April the PA, in defiance of objections by the U.S. and other Western nations to stop using their funding to subsidize terror, announced raises for the families of terrorists.
Palestinian Media Watch cited Muhammad Sbeihat, the secretary-general of the National Association of the Martyrs' Families of Palestine, the PLO organization making payments to the families of "martyrs."
"In the upcoming period, the allowances of the Martyrs' families will be linked to the cost of living index, which will cause an improvement in these allowances, if only slightly," Sbeihat said.
PMW said the fact that the PA is "raising the amount of the allowances to martyrs' families, even slightly, at this time is in direct defiance of the United States."
PMW exposed in 2011 the Palestinian Authority's payment of salaries to imprisoned terrorists and allowances to families of terrorist martyrs. In 2016, it reported evidence the PA was lying when it claimed to have stopped payments to prisoners.
At that time, the PA was providing a one-time payment of 6,000 shekels to the family of a suicide bomber who tries to kill Israelis.
Monthly payments follow of 1,400 shekels, plus 400 more for a spouse, 200 more for each child and an additional 300 if they are residents of Jerusalem, PMW reported.
The report said the payments were going to more than 32,000 families.
WND reported last year that members of the Palestinian Authority military wing who are convicted of terrorist acts – but not killed – not only get paid while behind bars, they get regular promotions, a cash bonus and a guaranteed salary.
PMW's report at the time, by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik, focused on Palestinian Authority rewards for those who are convicted and jailed for taking part in the "resistance," or terror acts.
The terrorist who drove the vehicle for Muhammad Al-Faqih in a drive-by attack that left a rabbi dead, Muhammad Amira, will reach the rank of general after 20 years in prison. When Amira is released, he will receive a bonus and a guaranteed salary.
That's in addition to the salary he's receiving while behind bars.
Al-Faqih allegedly murdered a father of 10 in the drive-by shooting near Hebron. He was killed in a confrontation with Israeli soldiers later.
Amira, a member of the PA Security Forces, was arrested for driving the vehicle used in the drive-by.
PMW reported that based on a chart published in 2013 by WAFA, the Palestinian Authority's news agency, PA military achieve the rank of general after 20 to 25 years in prison.
The chart:
"Should Amira, the driver of [Mickey] Mark's shooter, be released from prison, he would return to the Palestinian military and receive a salary according to his new rank," PMW's report explained.
The 10 accomplices arrested, which included weapons suppliers, are not in the PA Security Forces. But the report said they will be rewarded with raises in civil service rank for their time in prison.
"This will guarantee that they will receive high salaries upon release from prison," PMW's report said.
The chart:
In 2015, WND reported Norwegian officials called on the Palestinians to drop a program that uses funding from U.S. and other Western nations' taxpayers to pay salaries to jailed murderers.
Borge Brende, the Norwegian foreign minister, confirmed then in a report in the daily Dagen newspaper that he told PA President Mahmoud Abbas to cancel the payments, according to Palestinian Media Watch.
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