The Knesset voted to allocate an additional NIS 30.8 billion ($9.2 billion) to defense spending on Monday, in response to security and civilian costs incurred from Israel’s 12-day war with Iran in June and the ongoing war in Gaza.
The vote passed by a slim margin of 55 lawmakers for and 50 opposed, with many members of the opposition not in attendance.
The supplementary budget allocation is intended to cover increased defense spending, including for personnel, security operations, and related costs, raising overall government expenditure from NIS 756 billion ($228 billion) to NIS 787 billion ($237 billion) for 2025.
The Knesset also voted to raise the maximum overall deficit to 5.2 percent of GDP, up from the current cap of 4.9%.
“The army and its needs during wartime must stand above all disputes,” said Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, speaking in the Knesset plenum.
The legislation was passed, even though the ultra-Orthodox Degel HaTorah faction of the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) party and some members of the party’s Agudat Israel faction opposed the measure.
Earlier on Monday, Hebrew media reported that the Degel HaTorah faction’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Dov Lando, instructed party members to oppose the bill, due to the ongoing conflict between the state and Haredi parties over drafting yeshiva students.
The rabbi has accused the government of declaring “war on yeshiva students” after it failed to pass a draft exemption bill, leading UTJ to quit the coalition in July.
According to an i24 News report, Degel HaTorah chairman MK Moshe Gafni was conditioning the party’s support on the allocation of NIS 52 million ($15.6 million) for ultra-Orthodox schools, even though the coalition already approved an additional transfer of NIS 40 million ($11.9 million) in state funding to ultra-Orthodox schools that do not teach the state curriculum, over the objections of the Attorney General’s Office earlier this month.
Smotrich condemned the notion that the government would “harm the defense budget during wartime.”
“I call on the ultra-Orthodox members of Knesset: Wake up. While tens of thousands of reservists are spending the holidays away from their homes, you do not undermine the war and Israel’s security,” the finance minister wrote in a post on X.
In response, Gafni’s office said, “Smotrich should not lecture us on morality, after he has spent an entire month blocking all budget transfers to government ministries just because additional funds for his settlements ministry were not approved.”
The settlements ministry is led by MK Orit Strock from Smotrich’s far-right Religious Zionism party.
While the Ashkenazi UTJ party voted against the legislation, the Sephardic ultra-Orthodox Shas decided to vote in favor, announcing in a statement before the vote that the legislation “addresses the most essential needs for continuing the fighting — the procurement of munitions and the salaries of reservists. These are truly life-and-death matters, and therefore Shas will vote in favor of the proposal.”
Ahead of the vote, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir was threatening to oppose the bill, over the same issues raised during the first reading of the bill earlier this month.
At the time, Otzma Yehudit was threatening to oppose the budget increase unless NIS 80 million ($23.9 million) in funds intended for the Settlements and National Projects Ministry, controlled by a Religious Zionism lawmaker, was instead transferred to the Negev, Galilee and National Resilience Ministry, headed by his party’s Yitzhak Wasserlauf.
However, the party agreed to vote in favor of the legislation after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intervened, and an agreement with the coalition was reached for an additional NIS 160 million ($48 million) to be put toward reserve service days for members of the police.