PA Martyr Payment Program: The Facts Behind "Pay to Slay"

The Palestinian Authority (PA) — the internationally recognized governing body of the Palestinian people, funded substantially by U.S., EU, and international donor aid — operates a formal, budget-funded program that provides monthly stipends to Palestinians who are killed, imprisoned, or wounded while carrying out attacks against Israelis.

Critics call it "Pay to Slay" — a term that implies a bounty for killing. The PA calls it a welfare program for "martyrs" and prisoners. The accurate description of the mechanics is narrower: payments are triggered by documented outcomes (death, imprisonment, or wounding), not by the act of attacking itself. An attacker who commits violence and escapes undetected would not be in the payment system. An attacker who is killed or captured enters it immediately.

The program has been in continuous operation since the PA was established in 1994. It is not a response to October 7.

The payment program did not begin with October 7, or with Hamas, or with any particular escalation. It has been PA policy since the Authority's founding:

• 1994: The PA is established under the Oslo Accords. Payment structures for prisoners and "martyrs" are inherited from the PLO and codified into Palestinian governance.
• 2000–2005 (Second Intifada): Suicide bombers who killed dozens of Israeli civilians in buses, restaurants, and markets had their families enrolled in the payment program. This is when the program first attracted sustained international attention.
• 2000s–2010s: Palestinian Media Watch systematically documented the program using the PA's own official budget documents and public statements, publishing findings over more than a decade.
• 2016: American veteran Taylor Force is stabbed to death by a Palestinian attacker in Tel Aviv. The PA pays the attacker's family. U.S. Congress begins work on legislation.
• 2018: The Taylor Force Act is signed into law, cutting U.S. non-security economic assistance to the PA until it ends the program.
• 2018–2024: The PA did not end the program.
• 2025–2026: The PA announced a reform in February 2025 moving payments to a needs-based welfare body (PNEEI, formerly Tamkeen), implemented from December 2025. A PA-commissioned Alvarez & Marsal audit (July 2026) largely supported a need-based system but found at least NIS 320 million paid under the old system in Feb–Dec 2025; the U.S. declined to certify compliance and Israel says payments continue via other channels (Israel Policy Forum). The U.S. has withheld non-security aid accordingly. The EU and most other international donors have continued general PA funding without this condition.
• October 2023: Hamas carries out the October 7 attack. Families of attackers killed or captured enter the existing payment system.

The PA's "Law of the Prisoner" and related legislation (amended multiple times) establish payments in three categories:

• Killed in an attack: The attacker's family receives a one-time payment and an ongoing monthly stipend.
• Imprisoned in an Israeli jail for a security offense: The prisoner (or their family) receives a monthly salary from the PA, paid for the duration of the sentence, scaled upward with sentence length.
• Wounded during an attack: Eligible for separate benefits.

Approximate monthly payments (based on PMW documentation):

For context: the average Palestinian wage in the West Bank is approximately $600–700/month. A prisoner serving 20 years receives more than four times that wage from the PA for the duration of their sentence. The longer and more severe the attack (which correlates with a longer sentence), the higher the payment.

The program is not a minor line item:

• In 2021, Palestinian Media Watch documented approximately $349 million in martyr and prisoner payments — roughly 7% of the PA's total budget that year.
• In 2022, the figure was estimated at over $300 million.
• Since the Oslo Accords, the PA has paid an estimated $4+ billion in total.
• The payments appear in the PA's own published budget under the "Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs" and the "PLO Commission of Detainees' Affairs." They are not hidden.

The international aid context: The PA is substantially funded by international donors — the U.S., EU, World Bank, and others have collectively provided billions in aid annually. The U.S. withheld non-security economic assistance after the Taylor Force Act (2018). The EU, which provides several hundred million euros annually to the PA, has not imposed equivalent conditions and has continued general PA funding while the program operates.

The families of Palestinians killed or captured in the October 7 attack applied for benefits under a program that had been running for 30 years.

Haaretz — a left-leaning Israeli newspaper — reported in November 2023 that the PA had begun processing payments to families of those killed on October 7. No PA policy change was announced; it was the standard operation of an existing program.

One practical consequence: To receive payments, families must document their relative's death and the circumstances of it. Some researchers have proposed using PA payment records as a cross-reference against the Gaza Health Ministry's death toll.

The PA does not dispute that the program exists, that it has operated continuously, or its approximate scale. What is disputed is the characterization:

• The PA calls the payments a social welfare obligation and a matter of national honor.
• Critics — including the U.S. Congress in the Taylor Force Act's findings, the U.S. State Department in annual terrorism reports, and Palestinian Media Watch using the PA's own documents — describe it as a payment system that rewards attacks on Israelis.
• The Wall Street Journal and other Western outlets have reported on it using the critics' "Pay to Slay" terminology.

The facts the PA does not contest: the payments exist, they are scaled to the severity and length of the offense, families of October 7 attackers are reported by critics to be eligible for them, and the PA has explicitly refused international demands to end the program.