Hebrew media: Demands the Ministry of Finance to ask Smotrich about the costs of the occupation of Gaza.
The economic newspaper Demaraker published a critical note regarding Israel’s approach to the continuation of the war.
The note states: The Ministry of Finance has recently begun examining an increase of tens of billions in the budget of the Israeli military system to be able to respond to the decision to completely occupy the Gaza Strip.
But at this critical stage, and precisely at this stage, is there no official in the Ministry of Finance’s budget department who dares to speak out about the need to end this unbridled war budget allocation and its short- and long-term consequences?
According to this media outlet, the 2025 budget has become a very sensitive budget due to the huge amounts needed. To date, the Israeli Finance and Defense Ministries have reached an agreement on an increase of 42 billion shekels to the 2025 and 2026 budgets. 28 billion shekels are to be added to the 2025 budget of the Ministry of Defense to cover the expenses that the Ministry of Defense has spent during this period. This amount has been spent on expanding the scope of the war in the Gaza Strip and the consequences of the war with Iran. However, there is no agreement on increasing the war budget for the future. This disagreement is not only about the needs for strengthening and rebuilding capacity, but also about the new plan for expanding the war in Gaza in the coming months.
According to this economic media outlet, what the Israeli Finance Ministry has provided so far only covers past expenses, but the ministry has not approved any plan for the costs of the coming months of the war.
This lack of transparency and ambiguity is generally due to the intense political conflicts that the Israeli Finance Minister is leading. The Finance Minister has voted against Israeli cabinet decisions and has also declared his lack of confidence in Benjamin Netanyahu in recent months.
Smotrich wants the complete occupation of the Gaza Strip and the resumption of settlement construction there. He is strongly seeking to expand the war in this region on a large scale and even seeks to form a military government in the region for the long term. While in this situation, billions of shekels should also be provided as humanitarian aid for the residents of Gaza.
These measures, which are currently being considered, could shave tens of billions of shekels off Israel’s expenses in the short term, and this figure will multiply in the long term.