\n
On Sunday (Jan. 25, 2025), the government is expected to approve a total allocation of 550 million shekels for the years 2026\u20132027 for what it defines as the \u201creinforcement of security components.\u201d According to the draft decision<\/a>, the additional funding is earmarked for the following purposes:<\/p>\n a.<\/strong> 100 million shekels for the fortification of buses and transportation services for settlers. These funds are to be added to the Defense Ministry\u2019s budget for \u201csecurity components,\u201d which in recent years has totaled approximately 1.25 billion shekels (about 500 million shekels in ongoing expenditures and roughly 750 million in long-term commitments).<\/p>\n The additional funding for \u201ctransportation fortification in Judea and Samaria\u201d<\/strong> \u2014 including the armoring of buses and transportation services to settlements \u2014 comes on top of a budget that in recent years stood at approximately 43 million shekels annually. The government is now seeking to double that amount by adding another 50 million shekels per year.<\/p>\n \u201cPaving of security roads.\u201d<\/strong> One of the central mechanisms enabling the establishment of illegal outposts and settler takeover of vast areas in the occupied territories is the opening of new dirt roads<\/a>. These roads allow settlers to establish additional outposts, gain rapid access to large areas, and expel Palestinians from them. Over the past two years, Peace Now has documented the construction of more than 222 kilometers<\/strong> (about 138 miles) of new roads paved by settlers in the West Bank, roughly half of them on privately owned Palestinian land. These roads are built under a security pretext, without planning approval or building permits, at a cost of millions of shekels.<\/p>\n Until now, funding for these projects has come from budgets transferred by the government through the Settlement Division as part of its support for settler farms<\/a>, from funds allocated to settlement local authorities under the rubric of \u201cland patrol units,\u201d and from other, unidentified sources, likely including local authorities themselves. The government is now seeking \u2014 to Peace Now\u2019s knowledge, for the first time \u2014 to allocate a dedicated budget for the construction of such roads. It should be noted that the explanatory notes to the draft government decision state that part of the funding is also intended for road construction in the Southern parts of Israel and in the Golan Heights.<\/p>\n \u201cSecurity components for communities.\u201d<\/strong> The draft decision does not specify which communities are involved or what security components are to be funded. The Defense Ministry finances security measures in hundreds of communities considered threatened or located along confrontation lines, some within Israel and others in settlements in the West Bank. As noted, this budget has stood in recent years at approximately 1.25 billion shekels and is allocated according to priorities set by the Defense Ministry. A significant portion of the funding is directed to settlements. The government is now seeking to increase this budget by an additional 325 million shekels over the next two years.<\/p>\n Peace Now: Under the pretext of \u201csecurity components,\u201d the government has already invested hundreds of millions of shekels in illegal outposts and violent settler farms in the occupied territories. It is now seeking to further expand this budget, deepening Israel\u2019s security and economic entanglement in the occupied territories. It is now clear to all \u2014 especially after Oct. 7 \u2014 that the settlements constitute a security and economic burden on Israel, yet the government continues to serve only its settler base.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On Sunday (Jan. 25, 2025), the government is expected to approve a total allocation of 550 million shekels for the years 2026\u20132027 for what it defines as the \u201creinforcement of security components.\u201d According to the draft decision, the additional funding is earmarked for the following purposes: a. 100 million shekels for the fortification of buses… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10728,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[2519],"class_list":["post-56783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-settlement-watch","tag-budget"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56783"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56784,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56783\/revisions\/56784"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacenow.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nb.<\/strong> 125 million shekels for the \u201cpaving of security roads.\u201d
\nc.<\/strong> 325 million shekels for security components in communities.<\/p>\n\n