When you are the chairman of the Knesset Finance Committee, the person who ‘signs the checks’ for the State of Israel, it is not too difficult to exact revenge by using the authority of the position, and this is just what MK Moshe Gafne is accused of doing.

According to Chadashot News report on Sunday evening, Gafne is holding up the allocation of NIS 1.3 billion intended for the nation’s public transportation, a budgetary allocation that has been anticipated for months. The report states there is much anger among government officials, who report Gafne is taking revenge for continued light rail construction in Bnei Brak on Shabbos. Gafne denies he is delaying the budgetary allocation, blaming the Finance Ministry, but government officials say otherwise.

The delay in the funds is causing chaos. The Subsidy and Budget Department announced Sunday that public transportation operators will not receive the full subsidy. The argument: “Recently there have been delays in the transfer of budgetary requests to the Ministry of Transport in the Finance Committee, which include subsidies for all public transport operators.”

In response, the Forum of Public Transport Companies sent a letter to Gafne, in which the companies warned that without the subsidy they would find it difficult to continue their regular activity. The Forum warned that “non-payment of the full amount of the subsidy may rapidly deteriorate to harm the operation of public transportation and severely harm the public transportation service to the traveling public, and therefore we request you to act as soon as possible to find a solution to this situation.”

In response to Chadashot report, the Ministry of Transportation sought to clarify that there would be no cuts in public transport services in December.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)