Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud AbbasYonatan Sindel/Flash 90

A PA official said on Saturday that PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas “completely rejects” Israel’s call to the PA to stop granting stipends to jailed terrorists, Channel 2 reported.

The PA’s official in charge of “prisoner affairs” Issa Qaraqe said that the PA was fully supportive of Palestinian terrorists sitting in Israeli jails.

“We will continue funding them. The Chairman has made clear that he supports them completely,” Qaraqe said.

His comments come as a hunger strike held by Palestinian Arab terrorists in Israeli jails enters its 14th day.

The striking terrorists are demanding a range of benefits, from better medical care to phone access.

In an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity earlier this month, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had called on US President Trump to pressure Abbas during their upcoming meeting in Washington to stop encouraging terror by funding jailed terrorists and their families.

“The first test of peace is to say to them ‘Hey, you want peace? Prove it. Confront terrorism, stop rewarding terrorism, stop paying terrorists. And don’t finagle the books.’ What they do is [say], ‘Okay, we won’t pay directly, we’ll pay it to somebody else and they’ll pay it to the terrorists’ in a sort of circular fashion. No. Come clean on this.”