Finance minister eyes IDF budget cuts despite army outcry
Kahlon convenes treasury officials to discuss implementing recommendations, as authors defend report against military ire
Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.
Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon convened senior ministry officials on Wednesday morning to review recommendations to rein in the IDF budget, a call that has provoked a storm of protest from military officials.
Kahlon intends examine ways to implement at least some of the conclusions of the Locker Commission, Israel Radio reported.
Among other things, the commission, headed by Maj. Gen. (res) Yohanan Locker, a former military liaison to Prime Minister Netanyahu and a former senior air force staff officer, suggested capping the Defense Ministry budget at NIS 59 billion ($15.4 billion) per year for the next five years.
Speaking to Army Radio, Defense Ministry Director-General Dan Harel attacked the report, which also calls for deep cuts in the army’s spending plan and a sharp reduction in the duration of compulsory service.
Harel complained that members of the commission had all but ignored the defense establishment’s attempts to sit down with them.
“We prepared a plan for 14 meetings. They cut us down to four,” Harel said. “They didn’t agree to meet with us, I personally chased after Locker for four months.”
“I think the committee didn’t want to hear from the Defense Ministry,” he said.
Locker Commission member Ben-Zion Zilberfarb, a former director-general of the Defense Ministry, defended the panel’s methods and said that there were time constraints on getting their work done.
“No one came with foregone conclusions,” he insisted to Army Radio. “Aside from two major generals, we are all people with civilian careers.”
“We came to learn; if we’d have budgeted 14 meetings for everyone, the work wouldn’t have been completed for another five years,” he continued. “We had limited time according to the allotted period, and we met with all the relevant entities in the first phase of the committee’s work.”
Another committee member, Migdal Insurance CEO Anat Levin, also rebuffed criticism, saying the report takes into consideration all of the threats facing Israel.
“The committee was presented with the challenge that is being demanded of the IDF,” she said. “This whole report deals with the threats that were presented and the security concept and objectives required.”
Commissioned by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2014, the report also proposes cuts to the Defense Ministry’s famously generous pension plans and the reduction of the term of service for noncombat soldiers from three years to two by 2020.
Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon has vehemently expressed his opposition to the findings, calling them “imbalanced in the extreme and totally divorced from the realities surrounding and within Israel.”
Mitch Ginsburg contributed to this report.
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