PA official glorifies terrorists, reiterates Abbas insistence that terrorists will receive salaries “until the PA’s last penny”
Official PA TV program Giants of Endurance, hosting Tubas Deputy District Governor Ahmed Assad
Tubas Deputy District Governor Ahmed Assad: “We are in the former Fara’a Prison, the Martyr Salah Khalaf Fortress (i.e., Khalaf was head of the terror organization Black September). We are talking about an important issue, a strategic issue in the equation of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The prisoners are a real part of our Palestinian society. Therefore, throughout the years of the struggle the Palestinian revolution has conferred great significance to the prisoners’ issue, and this has been done through [prisoner] exchanges that took place between the Palestinian revolution and the Israeli occupation state. With the establishment of the [Palestinian] Authority, the prisoners’ issue became an issue present in all of the agreements. The basis of the Oslo Accords was the emptying of the prisons and the release of our heroic prisoners, due to the Palestinian leadership’s understanding that the prisoners are the symbol of the Palestinian struggle-”
Official PA TV host: “Certainly, of course.”
Ahmed Assad: “-and their suffering is a laurel wreath on the head of the Arab and Islamic peoples. The Palestinian prisoners are participating in the battle of the struggle on behalf of the Arab and Islamic nation. Israel flouts all of the agreements, the last of which was the attempt that the American administration made through the government of Israel to erase the prisoners’ issue and prevent the payment of the prisoners’ money (refers to Anti “Pay-for-Slay” Law to deduct terror salaries; see note below –Ed.). But the Palestinian leadership was clear on this matter, and His Honor [PA] President [Mahmoud Abbas] said his famous words, that the Palestinian leadership- that the State of Palestine will pay the salaries of the prisoners and the Martyrs until the State of Palestine’s last penny.”
Abu Iyad (Salah Khalaf) - PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat’s deputy, one of the founders of Fatah, and head of the terror organization Black September, a secret branch of Fatah. Attacks he planned include the murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics (Sept. 5, 1972) and the murder of two American diplomats in Sudan (March 1, 1973). It is commonly assumed that his assassin, a former Fatah bodyguard, was sent by the Abu Nidal Organization, a rival Palestinian faction.
Israel's Anti "Pay-for-Slay" Law - Israeli law stating that the PA payments to terrorists and the families of dead terrorists is a financial incentive to terror. The law instructs the state to deduct and freeze the amount of money the PA pays in salaries to imprisoned terrorists and families of "Martyrs" from the tax money Israel collects for the PA. Should the PA stop these payments for a full year, the Israeli government would have the option of giving all or part of the frozen money to the PA. The law was enacted by the Israeli Parliament on July 2, 2018. During the parliamentary vote, the law's sponsor Avi Dichter said: “The Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee received much help in its deliberations... from Palestinian Media Watch who provided us with authentic data that enabled productive and professional deliberations, nuances that are very difficult to achieve without precise data.” [Israeli Parliament website, July 2, 2018] In accordance with the law, as of September 2021 Israel’s Security Cabinet had ordered the freeze of 1.857 billion shekels ($580.15 million) - the sum equivalent to the PA payments to terrorists in 2018, 2019, and 2020.