Abbas: We Will Pay Every Penny to the Martyrs

The Fellowship | February 20, 2019

Key Speakers At The 73rd Session Of The United Nations General Assembly — Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority president, speaks during the UN General Assembly meeting in New York, U.S., on Thursday, Sept. 27, 2018. Abbas called for countries to reject President Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and appealed for wider recognition of Palestinian statehood. Photographer: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Israel has at last put her foot down on payments by the Palestinian Authority to terrorists and their families, and it has gone about as well with the P.A. as you might imagine. Arutz Sheva’s Elad Benari says that P.A. chief and eternal sourpuss Mahmoud Abbas now complains that he won’t take any of Israel’s money unless he’s allowed to use it to pay those who’ve murdered Israelis:

“Israel claims that the Palestinian Authority transfers funds to terrorists and therefore wants to offset these funds,” Abbas said in a speech, according to Channel 13 News. “So I say that we do not want to receive these funds and every penny we have – we will transfer to the families of the martyrs.”

PA officials have remained defiant and have made clear that the PA will never cease paying terrorists’ salaries, threatening that Netanyahu would have to pay more if the salaries were deducted from the payments to the PA.

Abbas has in the past called the PA’s continued payments to terrorists a “red line” that would not be halted under any circumstances.

In his remarks on Tuesday, the PA chairman also said that the peace process with Israel is on the verge of collapse. “We are not interested in this because this is dangerous to the Middle East region,” he insisted.

Abbas also discussed the US peace efforts to achieve peace with Israel, which he has rejected before it has even been presented…