Israeli parliament passes 2021 national budget

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s government approved the 2021 parliament budget just before the deadline to possibly avoid a new election.

The parliament is expected to undergo a voting session to gain approval for the 2022 budget and is hoping to finalize the package by early Friday. The 2021 budget test received a legislature vote of 61-59 for Bennett’s right-wing, Arab parties, centrist and Left-wing parties.

If a parliamentary ratification for the new package was not won by a majority, a new election would have been in place soon. The political stalemate in the nation had led to a delay in budget approval for over three and a half years with the government using a redistributed budget from 2019. Many economists have pointed out that this budget was not aiding economic growth.

The 2021 budget took a total of five months to gain approval after Bennett’s government came into power and replacing Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration. Bennett said on Twitter, “It’s a day for celebration for the state of Israel. After years of chaos, we established a government, overcame the covid-19 Delta variant and now, thank God, we passed a budget for Israel.”

©Photo: Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90