The government is expected on Tuesday to discuss diverting some NIS 568 million from the five-year plan for developing Israel’s Arab society to fund Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) activity and the work of the police and other enforcement bodies against organized crime.
Ahead of the discussion, the Mossawa Center for the Rights of Arab Citizens appealed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara, demanding that the move be stopped. It said it is considering legal action if the proposal is approved.
The proposal now on the government’s table has broader significance than the amount alone suggests. If approved, it would signal a shift in the government’s priorities toward Arab society: Resources intended for economic development, employment, and narrowing gaps would instead be directed to enforcement, intelligence, and security activity against criminal organizations.
The budget is to be taken from government decision 550, which was approved in 2021 to reduce economic and social gaps between Arab society and the rest of the population. The plan includes budgets for employment, vocational training, education, transportation, infrastructure, industrial zones, and strengthening local authorities.
According to a statement from Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs, the combined budget allocated to the Shin Bet and the police will amount to about NIS 567 million.
The sum now being brought for approval differs from the amounts mentioned in recent weeks. Earlier, amounts ranging from NIS 1 billion to NIS 1.3 billion were discussed, and an internal government document examined the possibility of diverting up to NIS 1.4 billion from the five-year plan’s budgets. The proposal to be discussed now is smaller in scope and stands at about NIS 568 million.
The money is intended to finance expanded intelligence and enforcement capabilities against criminal organizations, weapons smuggling, arms trafficking, extortion, and criminal takeovers of tenders and local authorities. The plan also includes strengthening intelligence units, expanding Lahav 433 operations, and developing technological tools to deal with criminal organizations.
The Shin Bet inclusion could help solve criminal cases in Arab society
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Social Equality Minister May Golan are presenting the inclusion of the Shin Bet in the move as a necessary step in light of the number of people murdered and the low rate of solved cases in Arab society.
Government sources clarify that the service is not supposed to replace the police in investigating routine criminal offenses and that its activity will focus mainly on weapons smuggling, criminal organizations, and incidents with a security connection. So far, the full scope of the powers to be exercised and the exact division of the budget among the Shin Bet, the police, and other bodies have not been made public.
In the urgent letter, Mossawa argued that the government seeks to finance the fight against crime with funds intended to address the social and economic conditions that allow it to spread.
According to Salem Abbasi, head of the socioeconomic unit at the center, diverting budgets intended to address long-standing discrimination undermines the principle of equality, the binding status of decision 550, and the social and economic goals set out in it.
“The decision will lead to widening gaps, weakening prevention mechanisms, and deepening the structural conditions that fuel crime and violence,” Abbasi wrote.
In his view, cutting employment, training, and development programs could increase idleness, weaken local authorities, and reduce the options open to young people exposed to the influence of criminal organizations.
One of the central claims in Mossawa’s appeal concerns an alternative funding source. According to information that the center says it received from the National Security Ministry, there is a remaining budget balance of about NIS 750 million under government decision 549, the dedicated plan to fight crime and violence in Arab society. The center argues that these funds could cover enforcement needs without cutting into the civilian development budget designed to narrow gaps.
Another claim concerns the way the proposal was advanced. According to the letter, on June 14, acting Prime Minister’s Office Director-General Drorit Steinmetz committed that the discussion on diverting the budgets would take place only in the final quarter of the 2026 budget year.
Mossawa says this created a legitimate expectation among government ministries, authorities, and the bodies implementing the programs. According to the center, the discussion was ultimately moved to an earlier date without sufficient professional discussion, without a corrective, reasoned decision, and in violation of the timetable presented to the relevant parties.
“The government’s conduct is tainted by bad faith, extreme unreasonableness, and arbitrary governance, alongside ultra vires action, breach of a governmental promise, and harm to the right to equality,” said Suha Salman Musa, co-director of Mossawa. “The attempt to harm the budgets of decision 550 is dangerous, unequal, and irresponsible.”
The government justifies the move, among other things, by saying that a large portion of the budgets under plan 550 has not yet been implemented. Documents prepared ahead of the discussion argue that execution rates are below plan and that part of the money can be diverted without harming essential projects. Professional officials reject that conclusion and stress that, in infrastructure and development projects, years can pass between budget approval, the signing of commitments, and payment.
Social organizations and professionals are also criticizing the portrayal of the budgets as unused funds. Data from the Knesset Research and Information Center show that, by the end of 2024, billions of shekels had been allocated under decision 550, but many projects involve an inherent gap between allocation, commitment, and payment.
Money that has not yet been transferred in practice may already be earmarked for tenders, planning, or works in the implementation stage, and diverting it could delay or cancel them.
Shin Bet enters the realm of police responsibility
Beyond the budget debate, there is also a dispute over expanding the Shin Bet’s activity into a field that until now was under police responsibility.
The Shin Bet Law assigns the service the task of thwarting terrorism, espionage, and threats to state security, and its inclusion in the fight against civilian crime raises legal and public questions. The government says the Shin Bet’s activity will be limited to cases with a security connection, mainly in the areas of weapons smuggling and criminal organizations.
Critics of the move fear an expansion in the use of the service’s intelligence tools against Israeli citizens and a blurring of the line between security activity and criminal enforcement.
The government discussion concerns the budget transfer, but approval of the proposal is not expected to end the dispute. Mossawa has already said it is considering petitioning the courts, and any possible legal proceedings would center on the legality of the diversion, the government’s priorities, and the scope of the Shin Bet’s authority in the fight against crime in Arab society.