The scope of the PA’s pay-for-slay payments to terrorists has decreased by 30-40% in 2024, despite expectations of increased payments following the October 7 massacre, according to a study.
“Surprisingly, we’re seeing a trend opposite to what we expected,” explained Lt.-Col. (res.) Adv. Maurice Hirsch, a senior researcher at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs.
“While we should have seen a sharp increase in payments following the PA’s policy and the high number of arrests and casualties among terrorists, in practice we’re witnessing a significant decline.”
Three main factors have been identified as responsible for the surprising decrease in terrorist funding.
“First, the decision to prevent Red Cross representatives from visiting prisons created significant bureaucratic difficulties,” said Hirsch. “Second, the economic pressure on the Palestinian Authority reached an unprecedented peak: new data from the Finance Ministry shows that Israel deducted about NIS 3 billion from PA funds through November 2024.”
The senior researcher emphasized that the third factor can be attributed to the disruptions in Gaza.
“The ongoing fighting in the Strip has caused significant difficulties in transferring payments and producing required documents. Terrorists’ families are struggling to submit necessary forms and even receive the funds themselves.”
Hirsch, who previously served as chief military prosecutor in the West Bank, highlighted that this is not an ideological shift led by the PA, but rather a direct result of measures taken by Israel.
For the first time in history, Israel’s actions and the material circumstances forced the PA to include terrorists’ salaries in economic cuts, something that hadn’t happened before, even in the most severe crises, according to him.
Looking ahead to 2025, the JCFA report offered several practical recommendations to continue fighting the pay-for-slay policy, including increasing economic pressure, preventing cooperation with external entities that assist with payments, and creating additional bureaucratic obstacles.
Hirsch clarified the importance of maintaining pressure.
“2024 provides clear evidence that terrorist payments can be reduced through the right combination of economic, legal, and operational measures. If we continue this approach, we might see a further reduction in terror compensation next year as well.”
‘Pay-for-slay’ and counter-legislation
In an earlier interview with The Jerusalem Post, Hirsch reminded that, as part of the Oslo Accords, Israel pledged to transfer sums dubbed “tax money” to the PA in several categories, including goods intended for the PA that were unloaded in Israeli ports, a measure not practiced in other countries.
However, in light of the increasing phenomenon of the PA’s pay-for-slay system, Israel passed legislation in 2018 to freeze or deduct some of the said “tax money” that was being transferred to Ramallah.
Likewise, in his interview, Hirsch suggested that some of these funds would be deduced from the Palestinian Authority to fund the legal defense of terrorists who participated in the October 7 massacre, instead of drawing them from public funds.
However, despite the Knesset legislation, it appears that some of the funds still found their way to the PA. For example, in 2020-2021 alone, Israel transferred approximately NIS 2.2b. to the PA for containers destined for the PA, though formal Tax Authority data showed that, in the past five years, most of these containers never made it to their destination.
Despite this, Israel continued transferring sums of “tax money’ to the authority regardless.In this context, only this week the High Court of Justice issued a conditional order against Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich for it they deemed “transferring taxes estimated at billions of shekels to the Palestinian Authority, without any justification.”
The judges demanded that Smotrich, the Tax Authority, and the Attorney-General’s Office explain why Israel continues to transfer these funds from public funding while avoiding compliance with the law.