Israel has stopped in the last three months deducting Palestinian payouts to families of assailants from the tax revenues it is transferring regularly to Ramallah. According to Israel’s public radio Kan, six months ago, former Defense Minister Naftali Bennett neglected to present to the Cabinet a report detailing the sums paid by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to families of Palestinian assailants. Without the report, there was no deduction to be approved. And so Israeli authorities stopped deducting these funds, transferring instead the entire tax revenues it collected on behalf of the PA.
According to the 1994 Paris Protocol signed between Israel and the PLO, Israel is the one collecting tax revenues of imported goods on behalf of the Palestinians. But in 2018, Israel’s parliament adopted a controversial law, enabling it to deduct stipends from tax revenues the PA offers monthly to families of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel or killed while perpetrating an act of terror. Yisrael Beitenu leader Avigdor Liberman and Likud Knesset member Avi Dichter were the ones who pushed the bill, with Liberman labeling it the Pay to Slay law.
