Israeli Foreign Ministry curtails propaganda activities in several languages (Shutterstock)

Israel's Foreign Ministry announced Tuesday that it was halting all global propaganda activities in three languages due to a lack of budget. Emmanuel Nahshon, deputy director general for public diplomacy at the ministry, made the remarks during a meeting in the Knesset (parliament).

The Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth quoted Nahshon as saying that "the Israeli Foreign Ministry has already suspended its propaganda and media activity on social networks in Spanish, Persian and Russian, all in the midst of the war."

According to the newspaper, an internal Foreign Ministry document said: "In the past month and a half, the Spanish-language digital team led by Gabi Chakrón has worked day and night to assist you in the work of public diplomacy."

The document pointed to "intensive activity in the digital arena with 1100,200 posts and tweets in Spanish that received more than 6 million offers on the platforms, which are managed from headquarters, during <> weeks of war."

"We were informed on Monday that the budget allocated to the Spanish language has run out (in addition to the Russian and Persian languages), and that the bodies responsible for granting financial approvals are not at all ready to discuss increasing working hours or covering the payment of hours when people have already worked," she said.

During the debate, MK Ze'ev Elkin, chairman of the media subcommittee, requested that about NIS 200 million ($52 million) be directed to the Foreign Ministry.

"If there is a title to this discussion, it is that Israel decided at the most important moment of the war to disrupt the activities of the Foreign Ministry. Propaganda is a war front. I don't think there's no solution to this. It's like telling the IDF: Don't shoot your weapons because it's costly."

"In war we have to act quickly, there is no time as in the normal situation. The problem must be solved, it is impossible to hinder the propaganda activity of the Foreign Ministry even for one day. You have to solve the problem quickly."

Opposition leader and former Foreign Minister Yair Lapid criticized the ministry's decision to halt its propaganda activities during the war. "Here are the things the Foreign Ministry can do without costing a single agora" (NIS = 100 agora). "Interviewing foreign networks, briefing foreign journalists, using the prime minister and ministers' communication accounts, and working with influential figures," he said.


Increased costs of war

To counter the rising costs of the war, Israel announced on Monday that it had borrowed about 30 billion shekels ($7.8 billion) since the war on the Gaza Strip began.

Israel's war on Gaza, which began after the "Al-Aqsa Flood" battle launched by the Palestinian resistance led by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) on the seventh of last October, led to a sharp increase in Israel's expenditures to finance the army as well as the payment of compensation to companies near the border, and the families of those killed and prisoners held by Hamas, at a time when tax income declined.

As a result, Israel posted a budget deficit of NIS 22.9 billion ($6 billion) in October compared to NIS 4.6 billion ($1.2 billion) the previous September, pushing the deficit over the last 12 months to 2.6 percent.

The Finance Ministry said it would continue to work "through all channels to fund government activities, including all needs imposed by the war and domestic economic and civilian assistance".

For the 39th day, the Israeli occupation army is waging a devastating war on the Gaza Strip, causing the death of more than 11,240 Palestinians, including 4630,3130 children, 29,<> women, as well as <>,<> wounded.

Source: Agencies