| Cobretti2 said: wtf 15bn approved for gaza war? |
Some more details for the amended budget:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/1/16/israels-new-15bn-war-budget-whats-it-for-and-what-gets-cut
Three months into its war on Gaza, it was clear the funds assigned to the war efforts were not enough despite an emergency injection in December of nearly 30 billion shekels ($7.85bn), mostly funded through increased borrowing. On Monday, Netanyahu’s cabinet approved an increased budget for 2024, which allocates an additional 55 billion shekels ($15bn) for the war as well as increased funding for other departments.
The additional money will buy military hardware for starters as well as pay Israel’s 360,000 army reservists. Also included are funds to support the more than 100,000 Israelis evacuated from communities bordering Gaza and neighbouring Lebanon, where Israeli forces are clashing with Hezbollah, the Lebanese resistance group.
“We changed the priorities so that every reservist and every fighter and his family knows that there is a government that stands behind him and fully takes care of him,” Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said after the budget was approved.
As a country at war, safeguarding Israel’s internal security was a crucial consideration too. The far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who himself lives in an illegal settlement in Hebron in the occupied West Bank, had previously threatened to withdraw his support from any budget that stripped money away from his ministry. Ben-Gvir is leader of the Otzma Yehudit, or Jewish Power, party, which espouses anti-Palestinian policies. His department duly received an extra $534m in the new budget.
Israel’s war on Gaza has cost the country about $269m each day since it began on October 7.
The Bank of Israel estimated that war-related costs for 2023 to 2025 could amount to $55.6bn.
Funds probably will not dry up in the short term. Whatever the pressures on Israel’s finances as a result of its war on Gaza and raids on the West Bank, the Israeli state can likely rely on unwavering United States military and financial support.
In November, the US House of Representatives greenlit legislation to provide $14.5bn of military aid to Israel in addition to the $3.8bn given to the country each year. It has yet to pass the Senate.
Israel’s new budget also faces legislative scrutiny. It will now be referred to the Knesset, where three votes are required for it to become law.
The American tax payer will likely end up paying for the ongoing war on Gaza...
Then another $50 Billion or more to rebuild Gaza...
It's already going to be well over $100 billion wasted on this tragedy.
In comparison, what could solve the energy crisis (instead of making it worse)
The Fusion Energy Sciences program within the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, which funds most of the U.S. government’s fusion research, would receive $763 million for the coming year, $50 million (about 7%) above 2022 funding levels, and $40 million above what the Biden Administration requested.
The planet-warming emissions generated during the first two months of the war in Gaza were greater than the annual carbon footprint of more than 20 of the world’s most climate-vulnerable nations, new research reveals.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/09/emissions-gaza-israel-hamas-war-climate-change
