Netanyahu: World must condemn Iran for paying terrorists’ families
PM says international community must also denounce incitement, ‘the number one cause of terrorism’
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday urged the world to condemn Iran for providing financial support to the families of Palestinian terrorists.
The prime minister also called on the international community to denounce Palestinian incitement, which he said is the “number one cause of terrorism.”
“Our fight against terrorism, which comes with the assistance and agitation of states and regimes, does not exist in a vacuum. Yesterday Iran announced that it will finance the families of the terrorists and murderers; this shows that Iran, even after the nuclear agreement, is continuing to aid terrorism, including Palestinian terrorism, Hezbollah terrorism and its assistance to Hamas,” Netanyahu said.
“This is something that the nations of the world must confront and condemn and assist Israel – and other countries, of course – in repelling,” he added.
Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, Mohammad Fateh Ali, said Wednesday that Tehran would give $7,000 to the families of each Palestinian terrorist killed while attacking Israelis. Iran will also give $30,000 to Palestinian families whose homes have been destroyed by Israel because a family member carried out a terror attack, he told a news conference in Beirut.
According to Iran’s official news agency IRNA, representatives of the Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as well as Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, met with Fateh Ali in Beirut.
The money pledged is in addition to the monthly aid paid since 1987 by an Iranian institution to families of Palestinians killed in the violence, he said.
Speaking alongside visiting Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov on Thursday, Netanyahu also condemned Palestinian incitement, and addressed the killing of Eliav Gelman by friendly fire during a stabbing attack against him in the West Bank.
“Second, the terrorism by those wielding knives, the Palestinian children, also does not exist in a vacuum. It comes from the Palestinian education system, which is controlled by the Palestinian Authority,” he said. “Yesterday Eliav Gelman lost his life in another terrorist attack, not by the students of terrorism, but by those who teach terrorism, a Palestinian teacher. Therefore, the world needs to stand with Israel against this incitement, which is the number one cause of terrorism.”
Twenty-nine Israelis and three non-Israelis have been killed in a wave of Palestinian terrorist attacks and violence since October. Over 170 Palestinians have also been killed, some two-thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.
