At least 160 newly freed Palestinian prisoners have become terrorist millionaires under the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) long-running “pay-to-slay” program, according to a report by Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). The analysis found that the PA funneled nearly $70 million to the 250 terrorists Israel released as part of the Trump-brokered Gaza peace deal.
PMW reported that the PA “paid the terrorists high monthly salaries,” rewarding convicted murderers and bombers with fortunes built through international aid money. Among the released are Hamas commanders responsible for attacks that killed dozens of Israelis. “The Palestinian Authority spends hundreds of millions of dollars each year rewarding terrorists,” said PMW director Itamar Marcus.
One Hamas commander, Mohammed Shamasneh, left prison with nearly 2 million Israeli shekels—around $555,400—after serving time for murdering four people. Iyad Abu al-Rub, a senior Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader, earned more than 1 million shekels while planning suicide bombings, including one “from a school.” Other released terrorists include Imad Qawasmeh, who orchestrated a 2004 attack that killed 16, and Riyad al-Amour, who led cells responsible for multiple kidnappings and murders.
PA president Mahmoud Abbas has repeatedly vowed to end the pay-to-slay practice but continues to fund it. Marcus said European aid to the PA “effectively subsidizes and sustains the very system that incentivizes Palestinian terror.”
President Donald Trump’s peace plan barred Abbas’s government from controlling Gaza, citing the program as evidence of its deep-rooted extremism. Despite global condemnation, many of the released prisoners returned home to “joyous scenes” in Gaza and the West Bank, celebrated by gunmen firing weapons in the air.
