A stormy meeting in the Finance Committee on the bill intended to enable the amendment of the 2023 budget.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said: "The war is an economic event that will have short-term effects. The OECD recently published a report on Israel. There is no denying that the war is an economic event and will have consequences. The Israeli economy knows how to deal with the challenge, the Israeli economy knows how to support all war efforts on the front and home front. If we end up with the predicted deficit in a war, it's not so bad.
Smotrich on the Finance Committee,
The Knesset members protested the fact that the finance minister announced that he had only come to convey a message and did not intend to answer questions at this stage, Knesset members entered many times, as did representatives of business organizations, and some of them were removed from the discussion.
"It was important for me to say, in order for us to bring the amendment to this budget quickly, time is a very central factor, we are bringing the addition to the war because there are needs. I made a decision on an expansionary economic policy that strengthens the economic fortification line. We need to be able to transfer the funds. The faster you approve, the more we can realize for health, well-being, whatever it takes."
Gafni on the Finance Committee,
According to him, not a single shekel was withheld for aid and compensation for the damage caused by the war, while opposition members were outraged and said it was a lie. MK Vladimir Belyak angrily told him: "That's not true. Since I will not be able to ask questions, I will correct the minister. It's a professional audit."
"In the framework law that you see now, there is 17 billion for security, and 8.8 billion for civilian needs, I repeat that there was no delay, we committed between NIS 6 billion and NIS 7 billion, we seized them at the moment within temporary sources, the addition that we are bringing releases all the budgets to the ministries, but there was no need to pay unpaid, not to hotels, not to evacuees, and for any need."
Regarding Knesset members' claims about the failure to publish the difference report as stipulated by law, the minister noted: "I and all the ministry personnel are working day and night, doing everything possible to manage the war, and perhaps we have not resorted to bureaucracy. I'm aware that we were wrong, but I'd rather be wrong to give the biggest outline to businesses than the state, and to take care of the South and the North, the public will judge whether we were okay or not."
MK Orit Farkas posed her question to the Minister of Finance: "Have you cut 70% of the coalition funds? We have to admit that we failed because priorities have changed. The public is not dumb. The reservists are collapsing and business is collapsing." The Finance Minister responded that "contrary to what has been said up to this moment, not a single shekel has been delayed." Gafni also responded and shouted: "Orit, go outside for coffee."
He added, "I am the finance minister and I thought it was wrong to work in the salami form, with the additional budget. The budget will be raised today and will be laid out on Wednesday in its first reading. We transferred hundreds of millions to the authorities. Until this moment, there was no need that we needed and was not paid: not for hotels, not for evacuees."
To Michal Shir's statement that it was the public that raised the money, he replied: "The people of Israel were revealed at the height of their glory and this is out of place. It is possible to return to Arkady Gaydamak's tents during the Second Lebanon War. Tens of thousands of people were in Gaydamak's tents. This unity is at the front and on the home front, and it was expected that it would be here as well. The citizens of the State of Israel, right and left, are watching us and are ashamed of us."
"I approved and asked the members to approve funds for Hapoel, football and sports. There is criticism only, for example, regarding teachers," said MK and Finance Committee Chairman Moshe Gafni. "I will no longer sit in a coalition in which there will be coalition funds. You told me that what doesn't go into the base of the budget can be transferred with coalition funds," he added.
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