Disturbing New Palestinian Constitution Deepens Rift With US
The Palestinian Authority (PA) is sinking its claws deeper into the governance of the Palestinians, and not in a good way. Gaza’s technocratic committee, the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, recently replaced its logo with the PA’s logo. According to the official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Egypt is planning to train 5,000 Gazan police officers who will be paid by the PA, while the EU will train an additional 3,000 PA police officers in Judea and Samaria to then be deployed to Gaza.
While the above developments seem innocuous, the PA’s newly released draft constitution shows its true colors. Rather than serving as a bridge for peace and enlightened governance, the draft is bogged down with old hat ideas that oppose American foreign policy and doom Gaza to a continuing, forever war against Israel. (RELATED: The Day Arafat Invented the Palestinians)
The draft constitution clearly enshrines the “pay to slay” model, where the PA financially rewards terrorists and their families for killing Jews.
First, the draft constitution clearly enshrines the “pay to slay” model, where the PA financially rewards terrorists and their families for killing Jews. In an attempt to prevent the PA from doing this, President Trump signed into law the Taylor Force Act in March 2018, which prohibited U.S. funding of the PA until the PA stopped making such payments.
But the PA missed that memo and instead chose to continue “pay to slay” despite U.S. law. Article 24 of the PA’s draft constitution states that the PA will “…work to provide protection and care for the families of martyrs, wounded, and prisoners, and those released from the occupation prisons…” Article 44 calls for the PA to provide “…comprehensive care for the families of the martyrs, wounded, and prisoners, and those released [from prison], in preservation of their national dignity and their humanitarian and living needs.”
Despite PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas claiming in February 2025 that the PA ended “pay to slay,” last September, Secretary of State Marco Rubio protested that the policy was still in force. And the PA handed out an estimated $315 million to at least 23,500 terrorists in 2025 alone, according to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). PMW further claims that the PA added at least 6,000 additional recipients to the “pay to slay” dole in 2026 so far. Recently, the PA sent a notice through its prison affairs commission that terrorists released in the past need to prove proof of life to continue to receive life-long salaries, and that those released in 2025 deals with Israel need to provide banking information to begin receiving salaries. Additionally, a Syrian journalist recently disclosed on PA TV that “we all know” that Palestinian families orchestrate their children being injured in conflict with Israel in order to collect such payments.
Second, the draft constitution undermines U.S. policy on Jerusalem. In December 2017, the Trump administration “recognized Jerusalem, the ancient capital of the Jewish people, as the capital of the State of Israel,” and in May 2018, moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.
On this as well, the PA chooses to live in an alternative universe. In Article 3, the new draft constitution calls Jerusalem the “capital of the State of Palestine, and its political, spiritual, cultural, and educational center, as well as its national symbol.” It also states that the Palestinian Authority “…is committed to preserving [Jerusalem’s] religious character, and protecting its Islamic and Christian sanctities… [author’s emphasis].” The draft constitution thus not only ignores U.S. policy on Jerusalem, but fails to recognize the long history of Jewish rights, archeology, sovereignty, and semi-sovereignty there. (RELATED: ‘Mamdani the Hater’ Slanders Jews and Judaism)
Palestinian leadership even mocks U.S. policy on Jerusalem outright; the PA called Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s and Ambassador Mike Huckabee’s visit to the Western Wall last fall an “invasion” and that the Western Wall is “an inseparable part of the blessed Al Aqsa Mosque” and a “purely Islamic site.” The PA’s stance on this subject tracks back to at least 1998, when the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem denied that Solomon’s Temple was in Jerusalem. Such revisionist history has significant consequences in Jerusalem and beyond; Arab leadership and terrorists have been invading, defiling and destroying various heritage sites in the modern period, including but not limited to the Mount of Olives and the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus/Shechem, and Rachel’s Tomb and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
Third, the draft constitution puts the viability of religious tolerance under the PA on shaky ground: it contains merely a veneer of religious tolerance for Christians, and not even that for Jews. In Article 4, the draft constitution states that “Christianity has its status in Palestine, and its followers’ rights are respected.” The draft has a glaring omission of Jewish rights to pray and live in the land. This tracks with PA’s continued contempt for and incitement to violence towards Jews. Recently, a PA village council chairman stated that the Jews “provokes [sic] disgust” among the Palestinians. PA-sponsored sermons call for Allah to “strike the thieving Jews” and to “kill Jews one by one, and do not leave even one.”
Of course, the nod to Christianity and its followers in the draft constitution is a fraud. The PA continues to co-opt Jesus into their narrative, maintaining that Jesus was a Muslim and a Palestinian, and the first “self-sacrificing fighter,” a term used by the PA to refer to terrorists. A recent PA sermon also described Christians as “aggressive Crusader Christians” that Allah needs to “strike” along with the “thieving Jews,” as both peoples “…have behaved arrogantly and tyrannically on earth and increased corruption on it.”
And further complicating the likelihood of the PA as being religiously tolerant, in Article 4, the draft constitution calls Islam “the official religion in the State of Palestine,” and also deems that “the principles of Islamic Sharia are a primary source for legislation.” This may come as a surprise to many who believe that the PA is a secular organization, and shows that the PA (like Hamas) models itself after countries like Afghanistan, Iran, and Qatar.
By supporting terrorism, re-imagining Jerusalem, and creating a precarious future for religious tolerance, the PA’s new draft constitution continues to show the true colors of Palestinian nationalism as opposing American foreign policy and values. Only with a government free of Hamas and PA influence will Gaza be able to move forward in a durable détente with Israel.
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