Far-reaching PMW achievement in Israeli Parliament today
Far-reaching PMW achievement
in Israeli Parliament today
Today the Knesset (Israeli Parliament) Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee voted unanimously to deduct the amount that the PA pays to terrorist prisoners and terrorists' families from the tax money that Israel collects and transfers to the PA each month. The amount, according to the 2018 PA budget, is approximately 1.2 billion shekels per year (approx. $350 million). in Israeli Parliament today
The legislation adds that the withheld money will be put into a special account which will be used to compensate victims of terror and their families, as well as to compensate Israelis for economic damage caused by Palestinian terror, and other uses.
Since the vote was supported by all the Knesset members present, both of the coalition and opposition, the legislation is expected to pass the second and third readings in the Knesset shortly and be enacted into law.
Palestinian Media Watch has been working with the Knesset committee in all of its deliberations about this legislation. On November 13, 2017, PMW was invited and made a PowerPoint presentation to the committee introducing the Knesset committee to the topic of Palestinian rewards to terrorists.
PMW showed the Knesset the history and scope of the PA practice:
The amount the PA spends on terror rewards;
Proof that these rewards motivated terror attacks;
Proof that at least part of the money Israel transferred was reaching terrorists in prison; and much more.
Subsequently, the Ministry of Defense announced that the Israeli government would like to initiate its own version of the legislation. Representatives of the Ministry of Defense turned to PMW and met with us numerous times for information detailing the practice and its scope.PMW was invited to the four subsequent meetings in the Knesset Committee in 2018, (January 9, February 12, May 15, and today), and played an active role in all the meetings.
The new Israeli legislation comes on the heels of U.S. Congress passage of the Taylor Force Act, which cuts off virtually all American funding to the Palestinian Authority until it cancels the PA laws for rewarding terrorism and in fact stops the practice.
Following today's committee vote, PMW spoke with a member of a European parliament and is providing information to enable them to consider their own legislation.
PMW has been documenting the PA salaries to terrorists and working with the parliaments around the world on proper responses to combat the PA terror rewards since we first exposed the PA's programs, in 2011. PMW and many governments around the world see the PA practice of paying salaries to terrorists as a fundamental impediment to peace. PMW notes that, after years of condemning the PA practice, governments are now taking concrete legislative action to penalize the PAs terror rewards program.