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Palestinian Authority Denies ‘Politico’ Report That It Will Change Pay-for-Slay Program
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas appoints Mohammad Mustafa as prime minister of the Palestinian Authority (PA), in Ramallah, in the West Bank March 14, 2024 in this handout image. Photo: Palestinian president office/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo
The Palestinian official in charge of ensuring that salaries are paid to the families of terrorists in the notorious “Pay-for-Slay” program has categorically dismissed reports that the Palestinian Authority (PA) would end the payments.
A March 2024 report in Politico cited two Biden administration officials saying that, “the U.S. is near a deal with the Palestinian Authority to end its contentious ‘martyr payments’ for people who commit acts of violence against Israel.”
In response, Qadura Fares, the Director of the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs and Chairman of the PA-funded Prisoners’ Club, declared that the reports are false because paying salaries to prisoners is “anchored in Palestinian law and is non-negotiable”:
Senior sources in the American administration said that a draft of the American plan that was submitted to the PA presents an alternative solution to the question of the salaries paid to the Palestinian families, and it will start by implementing a comprehensive plan by the PA on the topic of welfare …
Director of Palestinian [PLO] Commission of Prisoners’ [Affairs] Qadura Fares emphasized that the reports given on this matter are baseless, but they are being disseminated now and then. He directed attention to how this is part of the Israeli media’s attempt to distort and tarnish the image of the PA.
In an interview with Erem News, Fares said that the payment of salaries to the families of the prisoners and the Martyrs is anchored in Palestinian law and is non-negotiable, and he even strongly emphasized that the payment of salaries to the families of the prisoners and the Martyrs by the PA is “a red line.” [emphasis added]
[Erem News, UAE-based news website, April 1, 2024]
For years, the US and European countries have demanded that the PA reframe its rewards-for-terrorists program so that it becomes a social welfare program for the families of terrorists, but the PA has refused. Now, Politico has reported that “drafts of the PA payments reform plans seen by U.S. officials indicate that Palestinian leaders will replace the current scheme with a general welfare program.”
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) reported on a similar initiative in 2013, just two years after PMW exposed the PA’s Pay-for-Slay program.
After PMW presented the evidence to European countries, both Britain and Norway asked the PA to make a superficial change to their law by calling the payments social “assistance” instead of salaries to prisoners. Even this cosmetic change, however, was met with outrage among the Palestinian public and the prisoners’ organizations.
The then-Minister of Prisoners’ Affairs, Issa Karake, explained that the prisoners are supported by the PA “out of esteem for their sacrifice and struggle,” i.e., as a reward for their terror. Referring to terror rewards as social “assistance” was considered insulting to the terrorists.
PMW has already proven that the salaries the PA pays to the terrorist prisoners are not welfare payments that are based on need, but rather are rewards for terror that increase the longer the terrorist is in prison.
Repeating the PA position from 2013, Qadura Fares continued to express his indignation at the mere prospect of labeling the payments as social welfare, calling it a “principled issue.” In response to a question from Ajyal Radio asking about the difference between the terms, Fares said:
The issue is not just the finances of the families that lost their source of livelihood, whether as a result of Martyrdom, imprisonment, or wounding. The issue is not just a material issue. Likewise, if you would pose this question as a poll to the Palestinian public opinion, the overwhelming majority of our Palestinian people would say there is a difference. Yes, there is a difference …
This is a Palestinian internal national issue, and we are taking action relying on a principle that was approved by the [PA] Parliament (Legislative Council) that was elected by the Palestinian people, the Palestinian National Council, and the [PLO] Central Council, which are the central institutions and which adopted the principle that the families of the Martyrs, the wounded, and the prisoners need to live a dignified life. [emphasis added]
[PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs, Facebook page, April 2, 2024]
According to Fares and the PA, having the prisoners’ families receive social welfare instead of terror rewards is not dignified.
Fares is not the only senior official confirming that the terror rewards will stay. PA General Intelligence Service officials also stressed that the PA would continue to pay the prisoners’ salaries, even if it went bankrupt:
[PA General Intelligence] Service Director in Jenin Adnan Abu Aisheh said that the message of the service, under the instructions of its leader [Head of PA General Intelligence Service] Majed Faraj, is to emphasize what [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas has emphasized again and again –that if we are left with one penny, it will be paid to the families of the Martyrs and the prisoners. [emphasis added]
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 5, 2024]
Significantly, not only did Abbas say that, but — as reported by Palestinian Media Watch — official PA TV has rebroadcast Abbas’ statement well over 200 times: that even if the PA had only “one penny” left, it would go to the terrorists and their families.
PMW will continue to follow this important story, as the PA vows to continue rewarding its terrorist “heroes,” while the US seeks to have the PA make cosmetic changes to create the pretense that the PA is no longer a terror-supporting entity.
Ephraim D. Tepler is a contributor to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). Itamar Marcus is PMW’s Founder and Director. A version of this article originally appeared at PMW.
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Netanyahu Says Israel Will Make Own Decisions on Self-Defense After Meeting With Allies to Discuss Iran Attack
Israel’s military displays what they say is an Iranian ballistic missile which they retrieved from the Dead Sea after Iran launched drones and missiles towards Israel, at Julis military base, in southern Israel, April 16, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Wednesday that Israel will make its own decisions about how to defend itself after meeting with the British and German foreign ministers to discuss how the Jewish state plans to respond to a recent direct attack by Iran.
“During the meetings, Prime Minister Netanyahu insisted that Israel preserve the right to self-defense,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “The Prime Minister thanked the Foreign Minister of Great Britain and the Foreign Minister of Germany for their unequivocal support and for the countries’ standing in an unprecedented defense against Iran’s attack on the State of Israel.”
Netanyahu echoed that message in a subsequent meeting of the Israeli cabinet. The premier said that while he appreciated the “suggestions and advice” from David Cameron of the UK and Annalena Baerbock of Germany, Israel would “make our own decisions, and the State of Israel will do everything necessary to defend itself.”
The top British and German diplomats traveled to Israel to meet with Netanyahu as part of a coordinated effort to prevent confrontation between Iran and Israel from escalating into a regional conflict.
Iran launched an unprecedented direct attack against the Israeli homeland on Saturday. Israel, with the help of allies including the US and Britain, repelled the massive Iranian drone and missile salvo.
World leaders, especially in the US and Europe, have been urging Israel to show restraint in its response and to de-escalate tensions. The US, European Union, and G7 group of industrialized nations all announced plans to consider additional sanctions on Iran.
From his meetings, however, Cameron said it was “clear that Israel has decided to respond to the Iranian attack. We hope that Jerusalem will act in a way that will cause as little escalation as possible.”
Baerbock argued that escalation “would serve no one, not Israel’s security, not the many dozens of hostages still in the hands of Hamas, not the suffering population of Gaza, not the many people in Iran who are themselves suffering under the regime.” She also told Israel officials that “we won’t tell you how to act, but think about the future of the region. Act wisely.”
Leading up to Saturday’s attack, Iranian officials had promised revenge for an airstrike on Iran’s consulate in Damascus, Syria last week that Iran has attributed to Israel. The strike killed seven members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), a US-designated terrorist organization, including two senior commanders. One of the commanders allegedly helped plan the Hamas terrorist group’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
Israel has neither confirmed nor denied involvement in the incident.
The escalating tensions between Iran and Israel risk spreading an already explosive situation in the Middle East amid the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. Iran has been Hamas’ chief international sponsor, providing the Palestinian terror group with weapons, funding, and training.
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UN Security Council to Vote Friday on Palestinian UN Membership
PA President Mahmoud Abbas gestures during a meeting in Ramallah, in the West Bank August 18, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman/Pool
The United Nations Security Council is scheduled to vote Friday on a Palestinian request for full UN membership, said diplomats, a move that Israel’s ally the United States is expected to block because it would effectively recognize a Palestinian state.
The 15-member council is due to vote at 3 pm (1900 GMT) Friday on a draft resolution that recommends to the 193-member UN General Assembly that “the State of Palestine be admitted to membership of the United Nations,” diplomats said.
A council resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the US, Britain, France, Russia, or China to pass. Diplomats say the measure could have the support of up to 13 council members, which would force the US to use its veto.
Council member Algeria, which put forward the draft resolution, had requested a vote for Thursday afternoon to coincide with a Security Council meeting on the Middle East, which is due to be attended by several ministers.
The United States has said that establishing an independent Palestinian state should happen through direct negotiations between the parties and not at the United Nations.
“We do not see that doing a resolution in the Security Council will necessarily get us to a place where we can find … a two-state solution moving forward,” US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said on Wednesday.
The Palestinians are currently a non-member observer state, a recognition that was granted by the 193-member UN General Assembly in 2012. But an application to become a full UN member needs to be approved by the Security Council and then at least two-thirds of the General Assembly.
The Palestinian push for full UN membership comes six months into a war between Israel and Palestinian Hamas terrorists in Gaza, and as Israel is expanding settlements in the West Bank.
Israel‘s UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan said earlier this month that “whoever supports recognizing a Palestinian state at such a time not only gives a prize to terror, but also backs unilateral steps which are contradictory to the agreed-upon principle of direct negotiations.”
A Security Council committee on the admission of new members — made up of all 15 council members — met twice last week to discuss the Palestinian application and agreed to a report on the issue on Tuesday.
“Regarding the issue of whether the application met all the criteria for membership … the committee was unable to make a unanimous recommendation to the Security Council,” the report said, adding that “differing views were expressed.”
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Hezbollah Attack Hits Community Center in Northern Israel, Injuring 18
An Israeli soldier looks on at a scene, after it was reported that people were injured, amid ongoing cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, near Arab al-Aramashe in northern Israel, April 17, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Avi Ohayon
Fourteen Israeli soldiers and four civilians were injured on Wednesday when Hezbollah fired drones and missiles at northern Israel, escalating tensions along the border between the Jewish state and the Iran-backed terrorist group in Lebanon.
Some of the military projectiles hit a community center in the Bedouin town of Arab al-Aramshe near the Israel-Lebanon border. Soldiers may have been using the building as a gathering space.
The victims were taken to Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya. According to the hospital, one was listed in critical condition and four others were seriously wounded, while the remaining victims were moderately and lightly hurt. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that all five victims who were in critical and serious condition were soldiers.
Hezbollah claimed responsibility for firing anti-tank guided missiles and explosive-laden drones from Lebanese territory toward northern Israel, saying the attack was in response to the killing of three of its members, including two commanders, in Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon a day earlier.
Video posted to social media showed what are called “suicide drones,” which go directly toward the target and blow up as opposed to dropping a payload — hitting the community center. A nearby car was also struck.
Israel said it responded by targeting the launch sites of the attack.
Tensions have been escalating between Israel and Hezbollah for months, fueling concerns that the war in Gaza — the Palestinian enclave ruled by Hamas, another Iran-backed terror group, to Israel’s south — could escalate into a regional conflict.
Tens of thousands of Israelis have been forced to flee their homes in northern Israel due to constant Hezbollah attacks.
Israeli leaders have said that while they do not seek war with Hezbollah and hope for a diplomatic resolution to the escalating tensions, they are prepared to use significant military force to combat the terror group and allow evacuees to return to their homes in northern Israel.
The post Hezbollah Attack Hits Community Center in Northern Israel, Injuring 18 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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