PA Must Pay Terror Victims, Israel’s Top Court Says

Wednesday, 22 January 2025 | Israel’s Supreme Court last week dismissed a petition against a law that compensates victims of Palestinian terrorist attacks using Palestinian Authority [PA] funds.

Asher Stub, an attorney from the Justice for Terror Victims group that initiated the law submitted by Knesset member Yitzhak Pindrus and others, told JNS on Monday that the Supreme Court’s ruling “cleared the last hurdle” between victims and compensation.

The petition dismissed was filed last year by the Palestinian Authority against legislation passed by the Knesset in March 2024 titled the “Compensation of Victims of Terrorism Bill (Exemplary Compensation).”

It asserted that the Palestinian Authority, which spends hundreds of millions of dollars annually on paying salaries to terrorists in Israeli prisons, is encouraging terrorism and is, therefore, liable to pay damages in civil lawsuits. The money is to be deducted from tax revenue that Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority on goods passing through border crossings.

The Palestinian Authority claimed the law abused punitive damages mechanisms, adding the law would cause its “collapse.” It also said Israel lacked legal justification to confiscate its tax revenue. Justice Yitzhak Amit wrote in his ruling that the Palestinian Authority’s petition omits how it “pays terrorists and members of terrorists’ families money and benefits at significant rates, in close connection to the criminal acts of terrorism they committed.”

The Palestinian Authority’s Martyrs’ Fund, also known as the “pay for slay” policy, is a cornerstone of PA law, granting terrorists or their next of kin the right to receive payments as long as they live.

The ruling clears the path for terror victims or their relatives to file civil lawsuits and receive compensation, Stub said. His organization, Justice for Terror Victims, is handling lawsuits for about 35 families on a nonprofit basis, he said, adding that the statute of limitations on relevant lawsuits is seven years.

According to the Palestinian Authority’s estimates in its petition, it stands to lose approximately NIS 2 billion shekels ($562 million) from immediate tax revenues plus another NIS 5 billion ($1.4 billion) in funds that Israel is already holding that belongs to the Palestinian Authority, it argued.

In the ruling, Justices Khaled Kabub and Yael Wilner condemned the Palestinian Authority’s “reliance on Israeli constitutional law, which primarily protects human rights, to avoid the consequences of its support for terrorism against the state and its citizens.” They called this “repugnant both morally and legally.”

“We are proud to assist many victims in filing lawsuits under this new law and will persist in fighting terrorism and its financial backers,” Stub said.

In a statement after the court’s decision, Stub and Sander Gerber, a global investment manager, called the petition’s dismissal “a groundbreaking step in our efforts to stop the Palestinian Authority’s’ pay for slay’ policy and secure rightful compensation for terror victims.”