NGO: Red Cross facilitating Palestinian terror payouts

(With thanks the Palestinian Media Watch)

 Since Oct. 7, the International Red Cross has been helping imprisoned Palestinian terrorists receive controversial stipends from the Palestinian Authority, according to Israeli NGO Palestinian Media Watch.

According to PMW, incarcerated Palestinians fill out forms to receive the stipends, and the Red Cross delivers the paperwork to Ramallah.

“The role of the International Red Cross in this process is central,” explained PMW director Itamar Marcus. “The international health organization is involved in this because as they visit prisoners, they’re able to bring in forms. Israeli security is not looking at the forms or preventing the terrorist prisoner access to the forms they need to sign.”

The prisoners’ paperwork needs to be completed by the end of 2023 in order to receive stipends in 2024. Terrorists imprisoned before Oct. 7 are also sending renewal forms via the Red Cross to Ramallah, according to PMW.

A Fatah directive dated Dec. 4 and translated by PMW instructs Palestinians to “please produce a [Red] Cross document for those who have no sentence whose names appear below; a [Red] Cross document accompanied by a new administrative [detention] order for the administrative detainees; and a [Red] Cross document accompanied by a verdict for the sentenced prisoners.

Lists of prisoners from Bethlehem and Hebron districts were circulated on social media to encourage prisoners and their families to claim the payouts. Other Palestinian organizations, such as the PLO’s Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs, joined the publicity campaign.

Since Oct. 7, around 2,400 Palestinian terror suspects have been arrested throughout Judea and Samaria, of whom about half are associated with Hamas.

Israel argues that these stipends are nothing more than economic incentive to commit murder, and refers to them as “pay for slay.”

The International Red Cross did not respond to a request for comment.