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Palestinian Authority Must Pay $3.61 Million in Torture Case
(Al-Monitor) Ahmad Melhem - Payment has come due in a two-year-old court case, and the Palestinian Authority (PA) now must forfeit $3.61 million for arresting and torturing more than 50 Palestinians who hold Israeli citizenship, an Israeli court ruled. The victims were arrested between 1990 and the early 2000s, in the days of PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, on suspicion of collaborating with Israel. The prisoners escaped from PA prisons in 2002 after the Israeli army carried out Operation Defensive Shield and re-entered the West Bank. In July 2017, the court ruled the PA did not have the authority to arrest the individuals, and their detention caused them grave physical and psychological harm because they were tortured in Palestinian prisons. The Israeli Ministry of Finance recently transferred the money from Palestinian tax funds to the Israeli Law Enforcement and Collection System Authority, Israeli newspaper Maariv reported Aug. 15.