Prime Minister Ariel Sharon last night bought the support of 14 Shinui MKs for the 2005 budget for NIS 700 million. The agreement with Shinui was signed at Sharon's Sycamore Farm last night.
The agreement states that NIS 700 million will be allocated to matters dear to Shinui, including increased budgets for universities, support for students and discharged soldiers, and allocations for culture and the arts, science, and the environment.
Minister of Finance Benjamin Netanyahu was updated by telephone during the negotiations. The allocations will not be added to the budget, but cut from the allocations for other ministries. The agreement raises the price for expanding the coalition and passing the budget to NIS 1.6 billion, compared with a NIS 700 million price-tag for elections.
Shinui promised to support the 2005 budget and economic arrangements bills in the second and third Knesset readings. However, it reserved the right during the second reading to vote against budget items allocating NIS 290 million to United Torah Judaism, the price paid for its joining the coalition. The allocations are mainly for independent yeshivot, and other Torah institutions.
After signing the agreement, Shinui chairman MK Joseph (Tomy) Lapid said, "Shinui's concern for carrying out the disengagement plan and pursuing the peace process tipped the balance, once Shinui was given the opportunity to support matters dear to us and important for the country."
Last night's agreement apparently ensures Sharon an absolute majority for the budget, but his problems as prime minister have not been completely resolved. Ambushes still lie ahead, in the form of the referendum bill and repercussions from a speech by the US ambassador to Israel to Foreign Ministry cadets, in which the ambassador denied that the US was committed to permanent Israeli control over large settlement blocks in Judea and Samaria. Sharon's aides, headed by Adv. Dov Weissglas, spread stories that the US pledged to support Israeli control over these settlement blocks in exchange for Sharon's decision to withdraw from the Gaza Strip and northern Samaria.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on March 27, 2005