A taxing situation

The Cabinet is expected to vote on Monday on the contentious issue of Israel’s budget for the coming year and if the past few days are any indication, this won’t be an easy task.

The current debate on the budget focuses on the 4-billion-shekel cut to the defense budget. The front page of Israel Hayom has an unattributed quote from the IDF that the budget cuts will “turn the clock back on the IDF by years.” The paper reports that the defense establishment agreed to staggered cuts over the years and Netanyahu is inclined to allow for limited cuts, as long as it doesn’t harm the competency of the IDF.

Naftali Bennett seemed to agree with his coalition partner, Yair Lapid, on the defense cuts. Israel Hayom quotes the minister of economics and trade as saying, “Threats against Israel are real, but Israel has been threatened for 65 years and will always be threatened, so the discussion today is not economic but ethical, and it is time that the Defense Ministry go under the knife on this simple, public issue.”

Amos Harel of Haaretz also weighs in on the defense budget cuts with an analysis of the Defense Ministry’s concern over their impact. Harel reads into a presentation that defense officials gave Sunday to the Cabinet about all the security threats that Israel faces and understands why the Defense Ministry is afraid of the cuts.

“If the politicians would risk making a decision regarding which security threats were less likely to materialize, it would be a lot easier to cut the budget,” writes Harel.

Maariv reports on one of the more surreal aspects of the budget debate — the ultra-Orthodox draft could now fail because of budget cuts. The paper reports that, on Sunday, at a meeting of the Peri Committee — tasked with creating a plan for drafting the ultra-Orthodox — a representative of the Finance Ministry stated that there is no money for incentives to implement a plan.

“The Finance Ministry representative made clear to the commission that there will not be the budget to fund the economic incentives designed to increase recruitment of the ultra-Orthodox into the army and civil service,” the paper reports. One member of the panel asked the representative, “Then what are we doing here?”

Yedioth Ahronoth follows up on its own report that, as part of the tax cuts, there will be property taxes paid on graves. Aside from Yedioth’s playful headline, “Rolling in their graves,” the paper reports that Finance Ministry officials clarified that people will not pay taxes on their graves, but rather that burial societies will lose their tax-exempt status. However, burial societies are now warning that the cost will get passed on to the public, costing people hundreds of shekels a year.

A sadly familiar story

While the front-page stories might have been filled with budget woes, the photos were of grieving family and friends after a murder-suicide in Bat Yam. As Yedioth reports, a Border Police officer in Bat Yam shot and killed his wife after she told him she wanted to leave him. Before killing himself, he called his brother-in-law, “I killed your sister, come take the kid.” The child, who is almost 2 years old, witnessed the entire episode. Yedioth reports that since January of 2013, 10 women have been killed by their husband, prompting WIZO Chairwoman Gila Oshrat to call on Netanyahu to establish a department to deal with domestic violence.

In a step to improve mental-health care across the country, Haaretz reports that the country’s HMOs will be opening 39 mental-health clinics across the country in July. This will allow for better patient care, as the current number of patients needing mental-health services is expected to rise by the end of the year. In the new system, mental-health professionals will see and prescribe medicines to patients, rather than the current system where general practitioners prescribe medicines for patients with mental illness.

Rivlin tells all

Maariv obtained a tape of former Knesset speaker Reuven Rivlin discussing the current state of politics to a group of Bar-Ilan students. Some of the highlights include Rivlin believing that Lapid can be a serious contender for prime minister. He also came out against making a referendum necessary for approving a peace agreement with the Palestinians. “If we move to a referendum, we make a serious mistake when it comes to the ability of a government to govern,” Rivlin explained. “The elections are a binding referendum, which gives the power to a parliamentary democracy.”

While there is no decision on a referendum, Israel Hayom reports that opposition leader Shelly Yachimovich visited Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The meeting was only announced after it had concluded and the two spoke about ways to restart the peace process. “This is the time to respond to the mediation efforts of the US for the resumption of talks,” Yachimovich said. “The opposition will serve as a safety net for them if significant steps towards a political settlement are taken.”

Finally, there may be one threat the IDF has overlooked: insecticide. Yedioth reports that paratroopers on maneuvers in the south were taken by surprise when a plane spraying insecticide to kill locusts accidentally sprayed them. The soldiers were all taken to a hospital to be examined and all were released unharmed.

Locusts from Egypt have been a problem over the past few months and the Agriculture Ministry has been spraying large areas in the south to prevent the locusts from damaging crops in the Negev. A ministry spokesperson said that a command center has been established between the IDF and the ministry to better coordinate the crop dusting.