That same bribed or supported government officials for their continuous profits.

Israel fights wars with billions of dollars while the Arabs fight wars with 1/100 of that. Israel tries to avoid enemy casualties and the enemy tries to maximize Israeli casualties. The Arabs try to wipe Israel off the map and Israel simply withdraws allowing the enemy to rebuild. Lapid will never get Israel out of the mud with these misguided principles.

There are people who live in such poverty that the cut in child allowances will take food out if their children's mouths. There are people who can't afford vegetables and fruits now - what will happen when the price is 18% higher? Lapid never knew one minute of deprivation - neither did Bibi. Shame that they are hurting so many people because of it.

They ALWAYS said that will cut the energy of the entire country , If they have to pay for the free energy that they are getting for ..... how long ?

and very very less from rich and hareidim and arabs. Still the budget is not balanced. About haredim and their leaders, even a child in Israel knows that they are liers and thieves. What's new?

Deri is just buying time. May be he is hoping the public will forget it and bear with it, as always. What if it will take years before they implement it??

It's not a bribe: it's a combination of the powerful unions owning the Labor party and extortion. Remember how the economy was tipped over from OK to disastrous when the ports, nurses and doctors all struck together to extort money from the poor people who actually work? Thank the 18% VAT and income tax increase on those three unions.

True the IEC did threaten to cut off our electricity. Imagine if they did, how long could we manage to live without electricity in our homes? in schools? in shops? in banks? (hospitals have their own generators, how long would those generators last?) We are being lead by weaklings. No union should be able to get away with ''murder.''

Israel didn't vote Meretz and got Meretz to lead her ,through Lapids party. Hatnua got few chairs and Livni is comanding the legal system of Israel. In other words,Olmert ,the crook,is in control. Is this democracy? Israel votes clean and instead gets filth?

I think he is carrying out what must be done right now and these reforms should have been voted a long time ago. He has energy and he uses it for the good of Israel as a whole. Applying pressures on Haredim so that they adopt ASAP the core curiculum and start integrating the workforce is not a kind of a "punishment" but simply justice. Destroying monopolies when they exist, one ate a time, is also a step forward.

Its all about him and what he can do blah blah blah. Listen up. Pony up and do the god damn job. If you want Israel to compete in the world you must unshackle the people to do what they do best. Give them the opportunity to get the contacts, to develop the products that will bring in huge export contracts. Government in most instances is an impediment to job creation. The government is corrupt bloated and inept. Stare pruning your own tree before you decide the others is getting too big. Cut the size of government and see how the people rise. Finally...stop funding peoples lifestyles. If people wish to be poor because they believe its their right...well they then have the right to be hungry as well. You cant sponsor stupidity.

If people had a scintilla of a brain, they would not be making children till such time they could afford them. The "POOR CHILDREN" mantra is bogus. Tie a cord around it and pretend. No one has to fund the lifestyle of those who wish to live in poverty by choice. You made the kid, feed the kid. The Jewish state has nothing from those who simply wish to mooch off her.

I suggest that you do some homework. Please check out the salaries that nurses (and doctors) get before you lump them with the port workers, never mind the IEC employees.

As I remember, the nurses who struck were given a 10% pay raise on 14000 per month and better. If I am mistaken and the striking nurses had a far lower salary, I apologize. There were two doctors' strike. In the first one, interns working in the periphery were given a pay raise, but apart from that, the head of the Doctors' union was accused (by press and interns) of only helping rich doctors get more private medicine patients. During the second strike by the interns, we were told that the interns were overworked and endangering lives. At the end of the second strike, no new intern places were made to reduce the workload but intern salaries in the center of the country were made equal to the periphery. A few months layer, reshet B announced that an oncology department in Tzfat was closing because interns preferred working in the center. If I am mistaken, I apologize and would appreciate you correct me.

Maybe you have forgotten the Netanyahu Austerity Package when he was Minister of Finance in the Sharon Government? It cost us all and after a few years all was well. Bibi and Steinitz and the BIG Experts who told us that we have the best economy in the world, broke it, bullshitted the people and called the allegations of a NIS40 Billion deficit in November last year "Hallucinatory"! Now it is NIS60 Billion! So, give us the answer please! Very easy to criticize and condemn isn't it?

So far, we have not heard a word about cuts to the settlements. How come? Isn't that the black hole where billions of unaccounted for shekels went during the last four years? And what percent of the settlers find themselves below the poverty level?

We need tough versions of the American Taylor law forbidding public sector employees from strike, at peril of termination. With that, and some other legal tools we could begin to defang Histadrut and scale down the fat cat salaries. There are hoards of trainable people that would gladly work for half of what these leaches earn.