The Knesset approved Monday a first reading of a bill that would enable Israel to offset any stipend given by the Palestinian Authority to terrorists and their families by deducting the amount from taxes collected on behalf of the Palestinian Authority. The bill  passed with 55 votes in favor and 14 against, and will be moving forward in the coming weeks.

“We’re cutting Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] off,” Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman Tweeted after the reading passed.  “This madness, in which we transfer funds to the PA, which it uses to encourage terrorism against us is going to stop,” he added.

“This is a justified and moral law. We wholeheartedly support [the two state solution], but what’s on the table is the fact that over 7% of the PA’s budget goes to supporting terrorists” said opposition MK Itzik Smhuli (Labor).  “You can’t hold the stick from both ends. This law is necessary for anyone who supports the security of the State of Israel,” Shmuli added.

Strong objections to the law were noted mostly from MKs from the Joint Arab List with MK Ahmad Tibi calling it “blackmail of the Palestinian people.” MK Abd al-Hakim Hajj Yahya accused the government of hypocrisy and said it was treating “the symptom instead of the problem” and that the problem was “the occupation.”

Referring to the Israeli Jew who massacred 29 Palestinian Muslim worshippers in Hebron in 1994, Hajj Yahya asked:  “Doesn’t Baruch Goldstien’s family receive welfare from the state? Shame on you for legislation such a law.”