Senate Softens Bill Targeting Palestinian Payments To Terrorists’ Families

Image by Wikimedia Commons

By JTA August 2, 2017

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has softened a bill that cuts U.S. funding to Palestinian areas as long as the Palestinian Authority pays subsidies to the families of Palestinians who attack Israelis.

The change to the Taylor Force Act apparently was made to attract Democratic and mainstream pro-Israel support.

On Wednesday, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee endorsed the measure, a day ahead of its consideration by the committee, in a signal that the moderated bill now has bipartisan backing.

AIPAC does not generally back legislation without considerable backing on both sides of the aisle, and the bill, named for an American stabbed to death in a 2016 terrorist attack in Tel Aviv, until now did not have significant Democratic backing.

As originally written, the bill would have slashed the vast majority of funds earmarked for the Palestinians unless the Palestinian Authority stopped the payments.

Israeli security officials reportedly had quietly objected to the act as originally written, fearing that cutting the $250 million to $300 million earmarked for the Palestinian areas would seriously destabilize the West Bank and lead to violence. The act would in its earlier version have left in place $60 million that subsidizes the Palestinian Authority police. Those subsidies remain in the new version.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

The coming year promises to be filled with more complex and historic developments. We are entering an era where independent, fact-based Jewish journalism will be more important than ever. We need to be ready for whatever 2025 will bring, and with your help, we can be.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO