The government will extend benefits for evacuees from towns near the northern and southern borders until August 31, it said Sunday.
The decision applies to residents of southern communities located within 7 km. of the Gaza Strip border, and residents of northern communities located within 5 km. of the Lebanese border.
In a statement, the government clarified that the Tourism Ministry will continue to be responsible for contacts with the absorption facilities. The government also extended independent housing stipends for evacuees, and said it is “evaluating” a measure to extend unemployment compensation and unpaid leave to a range of up to 9 km. from the border, instead of the current 3.5 km.
To finance the benefits, the government announced a sweeping 1.03% budget cut to all ministries, as well as a NIS 525 million cut to funds allocated to a new labor agreement for high-school teachers that has yet to be signed.
Notable cuts include NIS 70m. in funds earmarked for transportation development; NIS 60m. in funding for the Education Ministry, out of which NIS 20m. is earmarked for development; and NIS 25m. from the Welfare Ministry.
Welfare Minister Yaakov Margi (Shas) said Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich (Religious Zionist Party) had pledged to find an alternative budgetary source for the evacuees by the end of the Knesset summer session on July 28.
Opposing the cuts
The cuts will also apply to some security bodies. These include a NIS 40m. cut in the National Security Ministry’s budget, NIS 25m. in “miscellaneous security expenses,” and NIS 4m. from the police and prison service’s budget.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir (Otzma Yehudit) said he would oppose the cuts, saying it was “unthinkable” to cut funding for internal security bodies during wartime, and pointed out that the Defense Ministry was not included in the cut.
According to Ben-Gvir, his ministry’s budget department head warned in advance of the implications of the cut, which included delaying the completion of construction of new prison facilities, slowing a buildup of civilian security first-response teams, and harming the abilities of the Fire and Rescue Authority.
A forum representing evacuees from the northern border towns criticized the decision to extend the evacuation.“Once again, the policy of uncertainty and short-term [decisions] continues. No extension of the stay in hotels will hide the fact that the State of Israel completely gave up on the Galilee and is unwilling to fight for it. It is time to move the security zone to Lebanon and not suffice with instant patchwork solutions that do not justify the nine months that we have been evacuated from our homes. It is time to win the war,” the forum said.
A number of opposition MKs criticized the budget cuts. The MKs, including Yesh Atid’s Vladimir Beliak and Labor’s Naama Lazimi, said that instead of the current cuts, the government should have cut some of the leftover 2023 budget, which the Knesset Finance Committee reallocated last week. Some of these reallocations included millions of shekels to ministries that the opposition MKs argued were unnecessary, including the National Missions Ministry and the Heritage Ministry.
The cuts made will impact public transportation development, welfare, and education, especially likely to impact all sectors.
Beliak added up the funds that were rolled over from the 2023 excess to 2024, saying that they amounted to over half of the amount needed to cover the extension of the benefits and adding that the other half could come from coalition funds.
“They are hurting the periphery, hurting the weak, hurting the students – as long as they keep the coalition cream for their friends. A profligate government.”
This is not the first time budget allocations made by this government have been criticized for being sectoral and prioritizing coalition money over all else.
The 2024 budget was found to have a more sectoral division of funds than previous budgets. “We found in this budget, that to a much larger extent than in previous coalition agreements, coalition resources were very sectorial,” former Bank of Israel governor Karnit Flug explained in May, referencing her research.
The budget adjustments made to handle the costs of the war were also seen as prioritizing coalition funds over all else.
“The fact that they didn’t cut coalition expenditures [after the outbreak of the war] that are very sectoral and are not based on professional work substantially undermines the trust in the government. This will make it much harder to come to the public and say, ‘look, there is an additional burden that you will have to incur,’” said Flug.
Israel’s Medical Association also criticized the cuts saying that “cutting funds in the Health Ministry is cutting the security of the country,” and adding that medical teams have been caring for soldiers and those wounded in the October 7 attack, as well as handling the normal healthcare needs of the country, and all while missing manpower and needing more budgets even before budget cuts.