Ramallah - Ma'an - The Palestinian Ministry of Finance announced today, Wednesday, that the Palestinian tax revenues, "clearance funds" that Israel deducts and refuses to return, amounted to about 7.26 billion shekels. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Finance, deductions from clearance funds under the name of Gaza Strip allocations amount to approximately 2.83 billion shekels since the beginning of the war on the Strip on October 7, 2023, until August 2024, at an average of 257 million shekels per month. Israel deducts these funds as a punitive measure for the Palestinian Authority's refusal to stop disbursing allocations to the Gaza Strip, especially the salaries of government employees, especially health and education employees. The Palestinian Ministry of Finance indicated that, despite this, the government continues to fulfill its obligations and duty to pay percentages of the salaries of employees in Gaza equally with government sector employees in the West Bank, including Jerusalem. Regardin g the deductions under the name of the allowances for the families of martyrs and prisoners that the Palestinian government pays to these families from February 2019 until August 2024, they reached 3.54 billion shekels, an average of 53.6 million shekels per month, and Israel is still withholding these funds and refusing to release them. The Ministry of Finance data showed that Israeli deductions from clearance funds, in favor of (electricity, water, sewage, and hospitals), amounted to about 20.2 billion shekels, from 2012 until August 2024. Source: Maan News Agency