Israel's government approves 2025 state budget

The cabinet approved the Finance Ministry’s proposal for the 2025 budget on Friday after the agreement reached to cancel a plan to freeze government allowances.

The budget will now begin its progress through the Parliament. In all, the budget includes a roughly 40-billion-shekel package of tax hikes and spending cuts to try to rein in a budget deficit now running at 8.5 percent of GDP.

As part of the agreement among ministers that enabled the cabinet’s approval of the budget, benefits paid to the elderly, people with disabilities, Holocaust survivors and families of fallen soldiers will not be frozen as was proposed, with the exception of child allowances.