Finance Ministry boosts wartime hasbara budget by NIS 63 million

NOVEMBER 26, 2023 19:15

New Hope MK Ze'ev Elkin is seen at a meeting of the Knesset Arrangements Committee. (photo credit: NOAM MOSKOWITZ) — New Hope MK Ze'ev Elkin is seen at a meeting of the Knesset Arrangements Committee.

(photo credit: NOAM MOSKOWITZ)

As part of the extra budget, the Foreign Ministry will receive NIS 10 million, as well as NIS 20 million from the Diaspora Affairs Ministry.

The Finance Ministry has approved additional budgets totaling NIS 63 million for the benefit of wartime hasbara (public diplomacy), Hasbara Committee chairman MK Ze’ev Elkin announced yesterday.

Last week, the Foreign Ministry announced that it was suspending all hasbara activities because it didn’t have the budget to keep them going. The decision was made after the ministry was forced to shut down its Spanish hasbara, which followed the stalling of Persian and Russian hasbara.

As part of the extra budget, the Foreign Ministry will receive NIS 10 million, as well as NIS 20 million from the Diaspora Affairs Ministry. A further NIS 33 million will be allocated to supporting civilian organizations that have been working on hasbara throughout the war.

“The hasbara field is a significant wartime front, where the battle is for public opinion and the standing of international leadership to allow the fighting to continue under the correct circumstances until Hamas is overthrown,” said Elkin during the meeting.

He added that the funds that had thus far been made available for hasbara had not been enough to realize the hasbara goals set for the war.

Ze'ev Elkin is seen speaking at the Environmental Protection Ministry in Jerusalem, on May 18, 2020. (credit: YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90)

Ministry was shut down two weeks into the war

“I’m glad that, as the result of debates that were held in the committee and with the finance minister, the decision was made to assign a significant addition to hasbara in the 2023 budget, and especially to dramatically raise the aid to civilian organizations that have been working in the field since October 7,” Elkin said.

When the war started, Israel had four ministries that were given the responsibility for hasbara: The Foreign Ministry, the Diaspora Affairs Ministry, the Public Diplomacy Ministry, and the National Diplomacy Ministry.

The Public Diplomacy Ministry was shut down two weeks into the war, after former minister MK Galit Distal-Atbaryan resigned, saying that her ministry was redundant. Her budget was then redistributed to aid the war effort and evacuees from the South.