However,
Switzerland makes more than cheese...
they warned that if Israel carries out its threat to deduct the payments from the tax revenues it collects on behalf of the Paleostinians, this would seriously deepen the deficit the PA budget is already suffering from.
The PA Finance Ministry said on Tuesday that Israel was already deducting NIS 120 million each month (from the tax revenues) to cover the costs of electricity and water that Israel supplies to the Paleostinians, in addition to medical treatment Paleostinians receive in Israeli hospitals.
The ministry pointed out that the PA government and its agencies were paying the prisoners and their families about NIS 100m. every month.
Paleostinian officials warned that any financial sanctions would have a negative impact on relations between the PA and Israel, aggravate tensions on the Paleostinian street and embolden Lion of Islam forces, including Hamas, the well-beloved offspring of the Moslem Brotherhood, and other terror groups.
The PA leadership stressed on Tuesday that it will not be deterred by these initiatives, including US threats to cut the funding, and will continue to pay salaries to the prisoners and their relatives.
Earlier this week, the Knesset passed into law a bill that allows the Israeli government to deduct the payments the PA makes to the prisoners and their families from the taxes Israel collects on behalf of the Paleostinians.
The Paleostinians received another blow on Monday when Australia announced its decision to cut direct aid to the PA over the payments to the security prisoners and their families.
The two moves have drawn sharp criticism from the PA and several Paleostinian officials, who claimed that the "punitive" measures were aimed at exerting pressure on the Paleostinians to accept US President Donald Trump
...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
’s yet-to be-announced plan for peace in the Middle East.
"Suspending the funds [to the PA] will not have a severe impact on the PA because only 15% of its budget comes from international aid," a Paleostinian official in Ramallah told The Jerusalem Post.
Another official said the PA leadership was not particularly worried about US threats to cut the funds "because they are anyway irregular and intermittent."
The PA, he said, has learned over the past years that it can survive even without American financial aid.
According to the official, the big challenge will be if additional countries decide to follow suit and cut financial aid to the PA. "The Paleostinian Authority will then be in big trouble," he warned. The PA government will then have to seek loans from the World Bank and other international institutions, he predicted.
The PA government, which discussed the new Israeli law and its repercussions during its weekly meeting on Tuesday, condemned it as a "flagrant violation of international laws and conventions and Israeli obligations under the terms of agreements signed between the PLO and Israel, including the Gay Paree Economic Protocol," which was signed in 1994 and serves as the framework for establishing the interim-period economic relations between Israel and the PA.
"The Paleostinian leadership, headed by President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas
... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial..., will not abandon the prisoners and the families of the deaders, who sacrificed their lives for the sake of their homeland," the PA government said.
The government said it was planing to take action against Israel in various international forums to force it to backtrack on its decision to deduct the payments from the tax revenues.
The Paleostinian Commission for Prisoners Affairs said that providing financial aid to the prisoners and their families was within the framework of Article 22 of the Paleostinian Basic Law, which is considered the constitution of a future Paleostinian state. "The money that is being paid to the families of the prisoners goes for food, housing, education and healthcare," the commission said, adding that this practice has been effective since the "launching of the Paleostinian revolution in 1965."