Sneh: Budget fails to address security threat to home front - Haaretz

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Wed., December 26, 2007 Tevet 17, 5768

Israel Time: 04:03 (EST+7)

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		Former deputy defense minister MK Ephraim Sneh (Dan Keinan)

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Last update - 17:33 25/12/2007

Sneh: Budget fails to address security threat to home front

By Shahar Ilan, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: defense, security

The defense budget fails to offer adequate measures to tackle the threat Iran poses to the home front, former deputy defense minister MK Ephraim Sneh said on Tuesday.

Sneh told reporters at a press conference that he cannot put up with what he sees as neglecting the safety of the home front, and that he intends to vote against the budget unless large funds are allocated to it.

"This is unacceptable," Sneh said. "The root of evil is the advancement of a macroeconomic policy of reducing government expenses at the expense of the security of the State of Israel. The citizens of Israel should know that there is a twisted priority scale. They are much less safe than they could be," he added.

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Sneh listed a number of areas that he says suffer from insufficient budgeting, after the Home Front Command received less than a quarter of its initial demands. These include the suspension of gas mask distribution for an unlimited period of time, the lack of budget for stepping up the protection of houses around the Gaza Strip, and the decision to abort the acquisition of a new fleet of bulletproof buses to operate in the West Bank.

"The most elementary aspects of the home front are neglected," Sneh said. "The IDF is short of hundreds of millions of shekels to carry out its basic functions."

Sneh said the budget shortage adds up to roughly NIS 1.5 billion, and that the responsibility lies with the politicians, not the IDF. "Last night I voted against the budget in the defense budget sub-committee," Sneh said, "and I am going to do the same on Thursday night unless these flaws are corrected."

Sneh said that last year, when he was still deputy defense minister, he fought for extra-budgetary funds well into 2007, and that he is adamant to prevent this from happening again.

He also said that the defense budget was cut from NIS 49.4 billion in 2007 to NIS 48.3 billion in 2008.

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1.	General Dr. Sneh is Israel`s "Dr. Strangelove", rejecting peace	13:16	\|	Ivar	25/12/07

2.	To #1 Ivar - Wake up! We have no partners for peace.	14:23	\|	Jewboy	25/12/07

3.	You said it right, "WE have no parthers for peace"	14:36	\|	Ivar	25/12/07

4.	There must be something good about the budget	14:52	\|	Yonatan	25/12/07

5.	There must be also something good about Sneh	16:23	\|	MR	25/12/07

6.	Jewboy, Ivar is fully awke	16:48	\|	MR	25/12/07

7.	budget	17:03	\|	marcel	25/12/07

8.	To #`s 1 and 3 - Ivar, you are hardly peace partners	17:49	\|	Jewboy	25/12/07

9.	To #1 and #3 Cont`d - Enough with the medical analogies	17:54	\|	Yossi	25/12/07

10.	To #1 and #3 - The Pals have made their own bed!	18:08	\|	Yossi	25/12/07

11.	naive proposal	19:31	\|	MARK ASHKENAZI	25/12/07

12.	Yossi, neither will red herrings heal the patient	19:35	\|	Ivar	25/12/07

13.	Yossi`s country "given to us" as given an inch, taking a mile	19:56	\|	Ivar	25/12/07

14.	# 8 there is a clear reference	20:51	\|	Kris	25/12/07

15.	To Ivar - You share the Palestinian Dillusion	21:15	\|	Jewboy	25/12/07

16.	To Ivar	21:18	\|	Yossi	25/12/07

17.	Kris and Ivar ... An education on the facts is long overdue	22:44	\|	Yossi	25/12/07

18.	Ivar	00:23	\|	MR	26/12/07

19.	Better spend the money now to prepare for war - no one else will	00:39	\|	Marwan مروان خوري	26/12/07

20.	Exactly what is that threat?	02:21	\|	Mark Lincoln	26/12/07

21.	Yonatan - budgets	02:59	\|	Mark Lincoln	26/12/07

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