Taylor Force Act

The bill was named in honor of Taylor Force, a native of Lubbock, Texas who graduated from the New Mexico Military Institute (a secondary school) and then West Point in 2009 and served tours of duty in both Afghanistan and Iraq. After completing his service, Taylor entered the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University to study for an MBA. He was murdered in Israel in 2016 by a Palestinian terrorist. At the time of his murder, he was visiting Israel as part of a Vanderbilt University study group examining global entrepreneurship. He was killed on March 8, 2016, in a terrorist attack by a Palestinian from the West Bank city of Qalqilya, a stabbing attack in Tel Aviv that injured eleven people. Because the killer died while committing an act of terrorism, the killer's relatives are paid a monthly pension equal to several times the average monthly Palestinian wage. The pension, paid by the Palestinian Authority Martyr's Fund, is part of a Palestinian Authority policy to pay a monthly cash stipends to the families of Palestinians killed, injured or imprisoned for involvement in attacking, assisting in attacking, or planning to attack Israel, or for other types of politically inspired violence, including riots, violent demonstrations, and throwing rocks. ==Bill==

The bill was co-sponsored in the United States Senate in 2016 by U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), Dan Coats (R-Indiana), and Roy Blunt (R-Missouri). On August 3, 2017, the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations passed the advancement of the bill by a vote of 16–5. The Bill, passed on March 23, 2018, as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018, ends American aid to the Palestinian Authority unless the Authority ceases to pay stipends to the terrorists and their families, including the families of suicide bombers. Democrats, initially reluctant to support the Bill on the grounds that the payments were necessary to keep the West Bank from political upheaval, became more inclined to support the bill in 2017. ==Discussion==

The editorial board of The Wall Street Journal endorsed the bill on the grounds that it would force the government of Mahmoud Abbas to end a policy of "rewarding terrorism". The Palestinian Authority argues that if it ceases to make such payments families will suffer from poverty; others refute this assertion by pointing out that American foreign aid could be distributed on the basis of need, instead of as a reward for murder and attempted murder. The PA also argues that if it stops rewarding terrorists and their families, Hamas will step in to make such payments and gain power in the West Bank. ==References==