NAZARETH (Palestine Foundation Information Center) The Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich ordered the seizure of the Palestinian Authority’s tax money with a total value of 100 million shekels ($26 million), under the pretext of being used for the support of the families of Palestinian resistance fighters.
The Israeli Ynetnews reported on Monday that Smotrich is launching a war against the “incitement” of the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the funds that it diverts from its budget to the families of resistance fighters.
Smotrich’s decision followed Israeli court rulings against the PA, stipulating for an immediate seizure of the PA’s funds and handing them over to compensate the Israeli families affected by the Palestinian resistance operations.
This is the fifth time that Smotrich has issued decisions to confiscate the PA tax funds.
Last June, Smotrich ordered a $35 million deduction of PA’s money and transferring them into bank accounts of Israeli families who have members killed in attacks carried out by Palestinian resistance fighters, according to the Israeli newspaper, Israel Today.
On May 23rd, the World Bank warned that “the PA’s financial situation has seriously deteriorated in the past three months, portending a public financial collapse.”
The PA government uses tax revenues mainly to pay the salaries of its employees, which constitutes 65% of its total financial revenues.
Since 2019, the Israeli occupation government decided to deduct 600 million shekels ($165 million) annually from the PA tax revenues, in exchange for the monthly allocations provided by the PA for prisoners and ex-prisoners.
