A final vote which would have passed it into law on Monday was postponed at the request of coalition chairman David Amsalem.
By GIL HOFFMANUpdated: JUNE 25, 2018 23:38A Palestinian prisoner, convicted of security offences against Israel, looks out of his cell at Nitzan jail(photo credit: REUTERS/NIR ELIAS)
Twenty family members of victims of terrorism from the Almagor organization demonstrated outside the Likud faction meeting at the Knesset on Monday after they were not permitted to address Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Likud MKs about the need to pass a bill meant to discourage the Palestinian Authority from continuing to pay terrorists.The Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee authorized legislation two weeks ago that requires the government to deduct the amount the PA pays terrorists from the taxes and tariffs Israel collects for the authority.A final vote on Monday, which would have passed it into law, was postponed at the request of coalition chairman David Amsalem, who acts as the parliamentary arm of the prime minister. The Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee will meet either this Wednesday or next week to consider revisions of the bill that would water it down.“I am worried the bill will be buried,” Almagor head Meir Indor said. “I try to respect the prime minister, but we have our limits. A similar bill already passed in both houses of Congress in the US, and we have been legislating it for a year. We would rather have the bill not pass at all than pass with half its power taken away.”Netanyahu himself requested a delay in the voting from the heads of the parties in his coalition. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman and Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon have created obstacles that have made it harder to pass the bill due to battles over credit. But the bill’s sponsor, Yesh Atid MK Elazar Stern, said on Monday that he blames only one man for the legislation not yet being law.“This is all because of Bibi and only Bibi,” Stern said.
