The Palestinian Authority Martyrs Fund is a fund operated by the Palestinian Authority for the purpose of paying a monthly stipend of $350 to the families of Palestinians killed attacking Israelis.
The practice was established in 1967 by the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and routinized during the Second Intifada (2000-2005). In 2016, it made payments to 35,000 families, including the families of suicide bombers, from a 2016 annual budget of $170 million. The stipend is higher than the average Palestinian wage.
Prime Minister Netanyahu calls the payments "an incentive for murder". The Israeli government, describing the payments as glorifying terrorism, responded to the 2016 killing of Hallel Yaffa Ariel with an announcement that going forward it will deduct the value of "Martyr" payments from the tax revenue it pays to the Palestinian Authority. The United States also deducts the sums paid out to "martyrs" via the fund from the subsidies it grants to the Palestinian Authority.
The "martyr" payments are "exceedingly popular" among Palestinians, Ziad Asali, founding president of the American Task Force on Palestine, told a reporter that Palestinian politicians and the media have elevated these payments to the point where they are "sacred in Palestinian politics," and no government dares terminate the practice.