Interior Minister Moshe Arbel said on Monday that his ministry would transfer money to Arab authorities in light of the war, despite Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich's objections.
Smotrich: "I will not allow the transfer of budgets without oversight mechanisms"
Arbel announced that he intends to transfer the NIS 200 million budgets to the Arab municipalities, even without Smotrich's consent and despite the fact that transferring such a budget requires authorization from the Minister of the Interior and Finance. However, Minister Arbel will not be able to transfer the budgets on his own, unless he has a similar budget in the Ministry of the Interior.
The budgets of the Arab municipalities, which were determined by a government decision, were frozen, at Smotrich's demand. He announced that his ministry would not transfer them until a mechanism was established to check exactly where they were going. Smotrich backtracked, but so far the budget for the 67 Arab municipalities has not reached.
Arab municipalities are waiting for budgets. Photo: um al-Fahm, Photo: Gideon Markowitz
Only last week, in a conversation between the interior minister and the chairman of the local government center, it was agreed that NIS 140 million would be transferred to the Arab authorities for emergency purposes, but this too was not carried out and the Arab Authorities Committee threatened to take harsh measures as a result.
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