Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich clashed with bereaved family members while attending the ongoing Knesset Finance Committee meetings to increase the 2025 state budget on Sunday, after he missed a prior meeting on providing financial support to the families.
The marathon meetings at the Finance Committee precede the second and third readings of a bill to increase the 2025 state budget by over NIS 30 billion, earmarked for the country’s defense budget. The first reading of the bill was passed last week in the Knesset plenum on Wednesday, and back-to-back Finance Committee meetings have since taken place on the matter.
While Smotrich attended the meeting on the budget increase on Sunday, he failed to participate in the meeting that came directly before it, which discussed the issue of providing financial aid to bereaved families who lost their loved ones serving in the IDF.
The family members called it “shameful and insulting” that Smotrich failed to attend the first meeting. His absence was said to be due to a “technical issue” at the Finance Ministry.
Later, when Smotrich arrived for the meeting on the state budget increase, bereaved family members and reservist representatives stayed to begin the discussion, slamming him for not being present earlier.
“When we’re discussing an increase in the budget of NIS 30 billion for the needs of the war, the things that I’m talking about [financial aid to bereaved families] are part of this discussion,” Itzik Buntzel, father of a fallen soldier, said regarding Smotrich’s absence in the previous meeting. “The families are collapsing, they don’t have money to go to the store.”
Smotrich defended his absence in the initial meeting, saying, “Was I supposed to know the statistics of the number of bereaved families?”
He said that it was the role of the Defense Ministry to present such numbers and attributed the main responsibility for treating bereaved families to the ministry’s victims’ division.
Regarding requests to increase grants for bereaved families, Smotrich said that it is the Defense Ministry that opposes legislation that would allow for a rise in funds to bereaved parents, claiming it could harm their reintegration into society.
'We f***ing need to do something!' IDF combat reservist warns
Combat reservist Micha Katz called on the attending MKs to take action, saying, “Look at each other and say, we f***ing need to do something. It can’t be that they’ll take my daughter away from me because I went to fight for my country.”
When Smotrich had no response, Katz signaled toward the silence, saying, “That’s exactly your answer.”
“I personally will burn this country down if you don’t stop the next person from killing themselves,” another combat soldier said. “Why are you killing us? Those of us who gave ourselves for the country, why won’t you give us this support?”
WHILE SMOTRICH was absent from the meeting, the bereaved families spoke on core financial issues they face.
Avshalom Peri, father of Afik Tery, who fell in Khan Yunis in March 2024, told the panel about the lack of sufficient government financial aid he received.
Peri said that a bereaved family receives only NIS 98,000 from life insurance, which is deducted from the soldier’s salary.
“I met with members of Knesset, ministers, from Left and Right, everyone I met, the first question I asked was whether they knew about the grant a bereaved family receives after a child dies in combat,” Peri told the panel.
“Everyone estimates a different inflated sum. When I tell them it’s only NIS 98,000, they don’t believe me, they think I’m not telling the truth.
“A minister once told me, ‘Do you know that families in the Meron disaster received NIS 2 million each? How can this be the amount for a fallen soldier?’ It’s shameful, it’s even insulting,” Peri said.
Peri said there are almost no benefits on the payslip for bereaved families. The only existing benefit is a 66% discount on electricity bills, which is also limited and depends on the number of family members.
He also said that bereaved parents and spouses who return to work receive no income tax benefit.
Dror Ashram, father of Sgt. Shay Ashram, a soldier killed on October 7, shared that he and his son have not fully returned to work since her death.
In the following budget meeting to increase the defense budget by NIS 30 billion, Smotrich pushed for the bill to be passed.
Addressing the budget increase, Smotrich stated that “these are solely war-related defense expenses, no coalition projects.”
The proposal for the bill states that an increase of the defense budget by NIS 28.8 billion is due to Operation Gideon’s Chariots in Gaza, along with Operation Rising Lion in Iran.
Smotrich told the panel that the initial 2025 state budget was prepared for various situations, but “the successes, with enormous help from above, resulted in higher costs.”
Speaking on Operation Rising Lion, Smotrich told the panel, “Many more targets were hit and many more successes achieved, completing the operation in 12 days. This required more munitions, more flight hours, and many additional targets for neutralization. The ‘value for money’ in the Iran operation is exceptional.”