Israel nine days before the vote: billions in cuts to fund arms purchases
The government is set to approve NIS 2.6 billion in cuts to fund arms purchases. Opposition leader Lapid says billions are sitting in coalition funds.
Symbolic image · Photo: Clema12 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
Nine days before the 27 October parliamentary election, Israel's government was expected to approve 4.9% cuts to ministry budgets – NIS 2.6 billion (about $840 million) in total – for defence procurement, The Times of Israel reported. Opposition leader Yair Lapid said: 'Billions of shekels are sitting in coalition funds.' Defence officials warned that delay 'could undermine the necessary security response'.
A slur against opposition politician Gadi Eisenkot, widely seen as a racist reference to his Moroccan heritage, also caused outrage in the campaign. According to The Times of Israel, Eisenkot's Yashar party criticised Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's silence on the remark.