The Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas has rejected Israel's partial transfer of Palestinian tax revenue, stating that he would turn to the International Criminal Court (ICC) unless Israel fully releases hundreds of millions of dollars in tax monies owed to the Palestinian Authority. "We will not take the money until we get all of it: either you give us the full amount or we go to the ICC," President Abbas said, underscoring that he would accept nothing but the full amount of money that Israel owes to the Palestinians. "They said they were going to send the money and in the end they did, but a third of it was deducted, why?" he asked during a speech in the West Bank city of Ramallah, while confirming that two thirds of the money had been transferred. "Now we have a new file to take to the ICC, first there was the (summer) war in Gaza, then there was the settlements and now the Palestinian leadership is considering presenting this issue to the court in due time," he added.

Despite the Palestinian Authority becoming a member of the ICC on April 1, the U.S. and Israel opposed the Palestinians' membership to the court, claiming that Palestinians are not eligible to accede to the Rome Statute, or join the ICC. After the Palestinians announced that they were joining the International Criminal Court (ICC), Israel started withholding around $130 million a month in tax and customs revenue in December, as a move against the Palestinian government. Considering the frozen Palestinian tax revenue, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office issued a statement, saying that Israel deducted a portion of the Palestinians' electricity, water and health bills from the tax revenue it transferred, and the rest of the tax revenue will be "transfer[red] back to the Palestinian Authority the sum that was returned whenever it wishes." Israeli authorities said that the money was deducted to cover Palestinian debts to Israeli utility companies. The deductions amount to a third of the total sum that Israel owed the Palestinians, said Abbas.

In February, Israel's state-owned electric company briefly cut power to several Palestinian cities in the occupied West Bank to press for payment of what it said was $492 million owed by the Palestinian government. Palestinians are largely dependent on electricity supplied by the Israel Electric Corporation. Under an economic agreement between the two sides signed in 1994, Israel transfers to the PA tens of millions of dollars each month in customs duties levied on goods destined for Palestinian markets that transit through Israeli ports.