BTJ missionaries in the Middle East have had to relocate due to the ongoing war in Israel after the terrorist attacks and hostage abductions last year on October 7. It seems that the violence is never ending, begging the question – would suicide bombing, terrorist attacks, and hostage takings against Israel be less frequent if it weren’t so profitable?
Both America and Europe have policies that deny a reward based system for terrorists, even stating, “It is government policy to deny hostage takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession.”
However, both the EU and America are going into debt by tens of millions of dollars to terrorists, to reward them for their suicide bombings, terrorist attacks and hostage takings.
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas insists that even if the PA has only one penny left, it will continue to pay prisoners, their families, and the relatives of suicide bombers. The PA currently pays about $15 million USD per month to the families of prisoners, martyrs, and suicide bombers. This amount is paid through financial aid that the PA receives from the world community.
Financial commentator Thabet Abu Al-Rous explains, “Despite the Israeli restrictions, the Palestinian side and the Palestinian [PA] government will pay the money that the families of the prisoners and the martyrs (i.e. terrorists).”
Two months ago, the World Bank announced that it would be granting the PA as much as $300 million USD, up from its usual annual grant of $70 million USD. That’s an increase of 429%! The World Bank has no money, but uses money from its shareholders, of which the United States is the largest.
At the same time the EU has approved $445 million USD.
In June, the United States went even further by declaring that they would increase their budget by an additional $404 million in funding to go toward “food, safe drinking water, health care, protection, education, shelter, and psychosocial support,” even though the PA has shown that the funding they receive would be used to pay the families of prisoners, martyrs, and suicide bombers.
In fact, the PA has shown that payments to terrorists take priority over everything else. Even when the PA has not fallen short in their budget, they cut the salaries of civil servants between 50% and 40%, while terrorists and their families still received 100%. When the PA began making the deductions, it made a point of announcing that, although it was cutting employees’ salaries, it would NOT be cutting the salaries of terrorists.
Today however, the PA no longer discloses what terrorists receive, allowing for less resistance from foreign nations providing aid.
In this way, it can be argued that western nations are partially responsible for the ongoing war in Israel by providing financial incentives for those who perpetrate the attacks. If the world wishes to see an end to the fighting in Gaza, perhaps it could start with stopping aid to terrorists.
