The Ministry of Finance is preparing an across-the-board cut in government spending even before the election on October 27 in order to add billions of shekels to the defense budget.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered that the state budget should be reopened in order to add tens of billions of shekels to the defense budget and to secure NIS 400 billion for a rearmament program over the coming years. The move is not likely to go ahead, however, because of objections from the opposition and the linkage that it is making to relinquishment of budgets allocated to coalition party programs. The government cannot unilaterally reopen the state budget in an election period.
It now seems that another solution has been found for adding billions of shekels to the defense budget for urgent procurement. The amount of the defense demand is not yet known, but the supplement is believed to be for urgent security needs such as the purchase of combat helicopters, a deal that fell through because of budget constraints.
Israel’s defense budget has tripled since the outbreak of war in 2023. When the government approved the state budget last November it amounted to NIS 111 billion, and by the time it was passed in the Knesset during Operation Roaring Lion against Iran it had jumped to NIS 143 billion. Last month, a further NIS 15 billion was transferred to defense from the budget reserve.
Defense establishment sources said that the "across-the-board" cut was spin by the Ministry of Finance, and that its scope, NIS 2 billion, was a drop in the ocean in comparison with a gap of NIS 40 billion in 2026, which the ministry had fudged. "The cut has no connection to the purchase of an Apache helicopter squadron, which the Ministry of Finance torpedoed. The payments for that were due to begin towards 2030."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on October 13, 2026.
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