Family of Itamar massacre victims sues terrorists, PA for NIS 400 million
Lawsuit argues Palestinian Authority bears responsibility for murder of 5 members of Fogel family, as it pays stipends to assailants and their families
The family of an Israeli couple who were murdered along with three of their children in their West Bank home in 2012 filed suit Monday against the terrorists behind the attack.
In addition to seeking damages from attackers Hakim and Amjad Awad, the Fogel family is also suing the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian Liberation Organization for allegedly encouraging the stabbing attack and for paying stipends to convicted terrorists.
The suit, which was filed at the Jerusalem District Court, is seeking NIS 400 million ($114 million) in damages.
“To this day, the terrorists continue to receive inflated salaries from the Palestinian Authority, which flies in the face of logic and justice,” the family said, according to the Yedioth Ahronoth daily.
It added that the PLO and PA “knew, or should have known” that its policy of paying a monthly stipend to terrorists would encourage attacks “such as the murder of the deceased.”
On March 11, 2011, the two terrorists entered the home of Rabbi Ehud and Ruth Fogel in the West Bank settlement of Itamar and brutally murdered them and three of their six children — 11-year-old Yoav, 4-year-old Elad, and 3-month-old Hadas.
Signatories to the suit included Ehud and Ruth Fogel’s daughter Tamar, her two younger brothers and 19 other family members.
The filing of the suit comes a week after the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee unanimously approved for a first Knesset reading a bill that would slash funds to the PA by the amount Ramallah pays out to terrorists and their families.
The bill would allow the government to either deduct the funds from tax revenues Israel transfers annually to the PA, which would be irreversible, or “freeze” the payments, leaving the security cabinet with the final say.
Under an economic agreement signed in 1994, Israel transfers to the PA tens of millions of dollars each year in customs duties levied on goods destined for Palestinian markets that transit through Israeli ports.
The PLO gives monthly payments to all Palestinian prisoners jailed in Israel, no matter the reason for their incarceration, and also to families of so-called “martyrs” — a term used by the PLO to refer to anyone killed by an Israeli, including in the act of carrying out an attack.
A recent report published by the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, the Israeli Defense Ministry agency responsible for administering civilian affairs in the West Bank and the crossings with Gaza, said that around one-third of the Palestinian prisoners are “directly responsible for the murder of Israelis.”
According to the Defense Ministry, the Palestinian Authority in 2017 paid NIS 687 million ($198 million) to the so-called “martyrs’ families fund” and NIS 550 million ($160 million) to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club — some 7 percent of its overall budget.
Palestinian prisoners serving 20-30 year sentences for carrying out terror attacks are eligible for a lifetime NIS 10,000 ($1,900) monthly stipend, the Defense Ministry said, citing PA figures. Those prisoners who receive a 3-5 year sentence get a monthly wage of NIS 2,000 ($580). Palestinian prisoners who are married, have children, live in Jerusalem, or hold Israeli citizenship receive additional payments.
US lawmakers have also been advancing a similar bill, the Taylor Force Act — named for a US national killed in a Tel Aviv stabbing terror attack — which would cut US funding to the PA unless it discontinued its practice of paying monthly stipends to the families of terrorists who kill Israelis.
The PA has refused to cease the payments to Palestinian prisoners.
