Clearly socialist-style meddling in the economy isn't just a matter for the history books. The state shouldn't be setting or fixing prices, and it shouldn't be protecting favored industries.

I am always tempted to buy imported which is cheaper and can for the life of me not understand why olive oil is so expensive in Israel. Zeita may be using underhanded methods to get whatever they want but the point they use to do it is true. Olive oil is extremely expensive in Israel and why is that?

Right. The state should not set prices or protect cartels. Remove taxes, tariffs and allow competition.

the high price of olive oil in israel is mostly due to the demarnds of kashrut the growers who have to keep it if thay want to sell there olives in isreal this costs a lot and no one gets rich growing olives most just make a modist living only

$12.40 a litre of olive oil in Israel!!!, Wow, i used to live in Israel but didnt remember the crazy price for this, Here in Spain, a good virgin olive oil you pay no more than $3.40 a litre!!! Maybe thats why we just pour it on our food!!, I suspect a pricing cartel going on here,

Whole Foods Market cost me about $25. That is health to the body unlike seed oils that are cheaper and plug up blood vessels and cause glaucoma. The extra expense is worth the cost to use olive oil in cooking and on salads. There is a book called "The Healing Powers of Olive OIl, A Complete Guide to Nature's Liquid Gold" by Cal Orey to give you some idea on how important olive oil is to the diet.

Why so expensive?. The usual, a bunch of bureacrats have decided what's good for their citizens and themselves. More shuffing of papers, more $ in their pockets. As if they couldn't let the free market decide. Why is the israeli consumer so stupid? They boycotted cottage cheese; let them do the same for olive oil. Did you know that tests run by world experts not long ago, discovered to their amazement that taste of heated olive oil ( from around the world ) and reg cooking oil have the same taste, they could not tell the difference. It's perfect for salads, but worthless for cooking. Without deriving any benefits, it makes it very expensive.

Let's hope that the price comes down, and that other "powers that be" will take the initiative to lower prices on other food products. This will help the average Israeli consumer make ends meet.

For many years I bought olive oil from Spain, which is half the price of local, but I don't see it on the shelves any more. Anyone know where to get it?

All the good-ol'-boy alpha males are ripping us off daily, whether it is cottage cheese prices, olive oil, etc. My supermarket lowered cottage cheese prices only to raise almost everything else. If they think I didn't notice, they are wrong. I've been shlepping to the shuk two weeks in a row and buying everything from there. It's fresher and cheaper, including the little grocery stores.