Israel’s government has passed a revised 2023 budget that retains discretionary spending for religious schools and other priorities sought by coalition partners, despite warnings that doing so would burden the economy as the nation presses its war against Hamas.
All the members of Benny Gantz’s opposition party, which joined the government to run the war, voted against the revised budget. So did Economy Minister Nir Barkat, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, writing on X that the government was conveying a message of "anti-economic growth.”
Netanyahu rejected such complaints. "We have challenges ahead but because we have built a strong economy here, we are able to pass a budget to accommodate all needs of war,” he said.