Israeli Foreign Minister blasts PA Pay-for-Slay after terror attack kills 2
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Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar criticized the Palestinian Authority (PA) for encouraging terrorism through its notorious “Killing to Pay” program after a Palestinian killed two Israelis on Friday.
Palestinian terrorists killed 19-year-old Aviv Maor of Kibbutz Ein Harod and 68-year-old Mordechai Shimshon of Beit She’an in northern Israel on Friday.
The Palestinian Authority’s “Payment for Killing” policy attracted public attention when Taylor Force, a West Point graduate who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, was brutally stabbed to death by a Palestinian terrorist during a trip to Israel on March 8, 2016. President Donald Trump signed the Taylor Force Act into law in October 2018, following a strong campaign by Force’s parents, Robbi and Stuart Force.
TRUMP ADMINISTRATOR HEAVILY WELCOME THE TERRORISM SANCTIONS AGAINST THE UN PALESTINE ASSISTANCE AGENCY OVER HAMAS ALLEGATIONS
Israeli security forces are investigating the location where a vehicle was used by the attacker in the terrorist attack that took place in Afula, northern Israel, by hitting and stabbing a vehicle that killed two people. Israel December 26, 2025. (Gil Eliyahu/Reuters)
Before Friday’s terrorist attacks, Sa’ar warned the international community about the alleged deception of the Palestinian leadership. He wrote about End the quid pro quo now!”
Abbas is the 90-year-old, smoking President of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank (the region is known in Israel by the biblical names Judea and Samaria).
Kobi Michael, a senior researcher at the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies, told Fox News Digital that, contrary to the Palestinian Authority’s claims that the “Pay” program should be stopped, there has been “no significant change in the Palestinian Authority’s policy regarding payments to terrorists.”
Taylor Force was a West Point graduate who served in Afghanistan and Iraq and was pursuing an MBA at Vanderbilt University. Her bright future was brutally cut short on March 8, 2016, while Taylor was walking with her Vanderbilt friends along the Mediterranean coastline in Tel Aviv, Israel. A Palestinian terrorist attacked the group with a knife and Taylor was stabbed to death. (Courtesy of Force Family)
“They make it sound like they’re changing their policies,” he continued. But he described it as a “semblance” of no change in policy.
“Pay-for-Slay will continue in a different way. Donors and the international community,” Michael said. [who finance the PA] It’s going to be harder to watch.”
UN UNDER FIRE AS USAID INVESTIGATORS EXAMINING HAMAS DIFTERS OF AID TO GAZA
Michael, a counterterrorism expert who also works at the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, said the Palestinian Authority “describes terrorists as social welfare. They continue to support incitement against Israel and remain dysfunctional.”
According to a Dec. 19 report in the Times of Israel, the Palestinian National Economic Empowerment Corporation (also known as Tamkeen), a Palestinian Authority-affiliated organization, disputed the Israeli government’s claim that “Pay the Price for the Killing” is still intact.
Tamkeen noted in its statement that it “confirms that the payment system based on number of years of incarceration has been completely and permanently abolished and is no longer in effect at all.” “The allegations regarding the continuation fall into the category of intentional misinformation and falsification of facts.”
Fox News Digital has repeatedly reached out to the Palestinian Authority for comment and sent press questions to the Palestinian National Economic Empowerment Corporation (Tamkeen).
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas met with then-President Joe Biden in the West Bank town of Bethlehem on Friday, July 15, 2022. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
When asked by Fox News Digital what donor countries can do to stop “Pay to Kill,” Michael said, “Be tough when it comes to financial donations,” adding that there are “many ways to pressure the Palestinian Authority.”
He harshly criticized Western European leaders who recognized an independent Palestinian state in 2025 without guaranteeing that the state would not support terrorism. “Western leaders, the British prime minister, the French president and the Spanish prime minister are rushing and rushing to recognize a Palestinian state, and they don’t care about what is happening in these areas under Palestinian Authority rule.” He said their recognition was “an incentive to continue ‘Redeeming the Massacre.'”
Michael said the Trump administration is the only one “putting pressure on the Palestinian Authority.”
A Palestinian terrorist from the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade is seen carrying a weapon during a military parade in the Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus in the northern West Bank. (Photo: Nasser Ishtayeh/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
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He emphasized that if Hamas, which the US defines as a terrorist organization, is not dispersed and disarmed in Gaza, “this will be another success of Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.”
The US State Department and the American Embassy in Jerusalem did not immediately respond to questions from Fox News Digital media.
