In Overture to Trump, Palestinian Leader Mahmoud Abbas Ends Payments for Prisoners

For years, the Palestinian administration in the occupied West Bank has doled out hundreds of millions of dollars in stipends to the families of Palestinians jailed or killed by Israel — including those involved in violent attacks.

The United States and Israel have long condemned the payments and pressured the Palestinian Authority to end them. And on Monday, the Authority announced that it was backing away from the practice — a shift that analysts saw as an attempt to curry favor with President Trump and bring much-needed foreign aid into Palestinian coffers.

Palestinian officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue, said the move was aimed to bring the Palestinian administration into compliance with American law and to allow for more foreign aid to flow. A U.S. law banned direct American economic assistance to the Palestinian Authority as long as it carried out the practice.

The ban has only deepened the economic distress of the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority in recent years and it has increasingly struggled to make ends meet and to pay its employees’ monthly salaries.

Mahmoud Abbas, the aging Palestinian Authority president, issued a decree on Monday night that overhauled the payment system. The stipends have been one of the most emotionally charged issues in Palestinian politics.

A body set up to manage social welfare payments to needy Palestinians, known as the Palestinian National Economic Empowerment Institution, said in a statement that the families of prisoners would receive funds based only on financial needs and social welfare criteria, “without regard to political affiliations or past actions.”