In the shadow of the operation, a discussion in the Finance Committee took place on Wednesday and created outrage, after some committee members requested that the discussion not take place without the heads of municipalities in the south who could not attend. Committee Chairman Moshe Gafni and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich refused the request.
Likud members on the committee opposed Smotrich's property tax fund, partly due to pressure from Likud mayors such as Haim Bibas, and asked to exclude it from the Arrangements Law. Netanyahu's adviser was called in to tell them that the prime minister wanted to support the proposal.
Mess in Finance Committee: In the shadow of the Gaza operation, the discussion took place without mayors from the south | Knesset Channel
Likud members as well as opposition MKs complained that there are mayors from the south who are not in the discussion, and who want to split the law and discuss it without pressure and outside the framework of the Arrangements Law.
The Arnona Fund is expected to take more money from large municipalities that will suffer at a higher level than small municipalities, in order to establish a fund that will provide building grants and whose source of income will be the percentage of municipal contributions from non-residential property taxes, so that large municipalities will give higher percentages. Likud's mayors claim that there are many parameters that have not been taken into account that will also ultimately harm the small municipalities.
Minister Smotrich, Photo: Oren Ben Hakon
Finance Committee Chairman Moshe Gafni clarified: "The law to lower the cost of housing (Arnona Fund) discussed in the committee strengthens the periphery, lowers the cost of living and benefits weakened authorities such as Sderot and Netivot, which are currently dealing with a difficult security situation. At the request of many mayors from the periphery in the south and north, the discussions are still taking place today, despite the complex security situation."
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