Israeli minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir attends a plenum session on the state budget in the assembly hall of the Israeli parliament, December 16, 2024. Photo by Chaim Goldberg FLASH90
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and his Jewish Power faction voted against the state budget for 2025 on Monday, causing yet another coalition crisis amid plans to fire Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara.
Ben Gvir unexpectedly voted against his own coalition after a meeting between coalition leaders, which was meant to continue discussions on Baharav-Miara’s dismissal, was canceled.
According to Kan News, four coalition party chiefs pulled out of the meeting that was set to be held in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, causing concern that it would violate the prime minister’s conflict of interest arrangement that prevents him from having any connection to the effort of firing the attorney general.
Baharav-Miara publicly opposed numerous measures in the government’s planned judicial reform. Coalition members have called to fire her several times in recent years, accusing her of hampering the rule of the elected government. For Ben Gvir, the issue is personal, as the attorney general has urged Netanyahu to consider replacing Ben Gvir over “alleged improper interventions in police activities.”
According to government regulations, a minister who votes against the government budget is considered to have resigned. Despite this, sources from Netanyahu’s Likud party would likely not dismiss him, and instead sanction Jewish Power in other ways.
Despite Ben Gvir’s rebellion, the 2025 budget, which is made up of several bills that are voted upon separately, passed its first readings with slim majorities on Monday night.
After the coalition heads’ meeting was canceled, Jewish Power announced it would vote independently in response to the coalition’s parties acting “independently in a variety of areas.”
In addition to the “refusal” to discuss the firing of Baharav-Miara, the statement also cited “negotiations for an irresponsible [hostage] deal” and “harming the budget of the national security ministry and its [subordinate] bodies” as reasons for the rebellion.
Among several other accusations and condemnations, an exchange of blows developed between Jewish Power and the Religious Zionism parties, which are both on the far-right of Israel’s political spectrum and usually work together.
However, in recent days, party chief and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich stated that he doesn’t believe the contentious plans of the judicial reform plan, including the dismissal of the attorney general, should be revived at this moment while the war continues.
Justice Minister Yariv Levin recently demanded to revive the reform push as part of a dispute over the election of the new High Court president.
“Some people choose to play childish politics and oppose the state budget and threaten to overthrow the right-wing government just before Trump [takes office],” Religious Zionism stated.
“The dismissal of the attorney general should be done for professional and practical considerations. Making the issue political, so to speak, ‘in return’ for voting in favor of the budget is the surest way to destroy the move and lead to its disqualification at the High Court. It’s a shame that some are willing to risk the move to change the advisor for a petty political spin on the backs of their partners.”
Ben Gvir, in turn, accused his former partner Smotrich of playing “games,” and charged him with acting as a right-wing politician in public while he “saves the attorney general from dismissal, stops the judicial reform, and saves the Palestinian Authority from economic collapse.”
Smotrich later praised the approval of the budget, “even without Ben Gvir, who joined the Arab Knesset members and the opposition,” and who he said “endangers the right-wing government in the middle of a war.”
He added that Ben Gvir and his party “seem to have completely lost their direction,” and accused them of voting against “a critical budget for victory… and are jeopardizing a historic opportunity for the future of the settlements in Judea and Samaria.”
In response, several opposition leaders slammed the coalition leader’s public clashes. National Unity party chief Benny Gantz said they “are busy bickering with each other over the budget vote.”
“And all this for what? Not to ensure a better budget for the citizens of Israel, not to change priorities, or to add, God forbid, a few hundred million for the reconstruction of the north and south, to add a budget for education, growth engines and the economy, not to the health system or the security system, but simply because of Ben-Gvir’s whims and the personal score he has to settle with the attorney general,” Gantz argued.
