Bezalel Smotrich
Bezalel Yoel Smotrich is an Israeli politician and lawyer who has served as the Minister of Finance since 2022. The leader of the Religious Zionist Party, he previously served as a Knesset member for the Jewish Home and Yamina, leaving in 2023 after resigning under the Norwegian Law, allowing him to remain a minister in the government while his seat in the Knesset could be taken by another candidate from his party.
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Stories...
Aug 14, 2026
Far Right
The Religious Zionism party leader remains a central coalition figure while the Gaza offensive and West Bank tensions continue.
He is the ideological guarantor for RZ voters that the government will hold the line on security and settlements.
Aug 14, 2026
Center
The finance minister is celebrating the return of settlers to Ganim and trying to distance himself from settler violence in Kussra.
Yesh Atid sees Smotrich's settlement push and his coalition budget priorities as fueling occupation instability and eroding the security establishment's authority.
Aug 14, 2026
Lean Left
Promotes rapid settlement expansion and a new annexation push in the West Bank as part of the coalition deal.
Labor and Meretz treat him as an open advocate of endless occupation and see his budget policies as deliberately destroying Palestinian life.
Aug 13, 2026
Far Left
Finance minister pushing settlement sovereignty legislation and directing coalition funds to hardline causes in the new state budget.
Hadash condemns Smotrich as an annexationist who uses his budget powers to entrench occupation and crush any chance of a Palestinian state.
Aug 13, 2026
Lean Left
Finance Minister Smotrich is drafting the 2025 budget and advancing settlement funding and the legalization of outposts.
He is denounced by the left for colonizing the West Bank and starving state services to fund settlement expansion and Haredi coalitions.
Aug 12, 2026
Far Left
Israel's finance minister declared Israel will not allow the creation of a Palestinian state and framed West Bank actions as security measures.
Reformists use his remarks to expose Israeli rejectionism and warn that hardliners in Tehran exploit this to justify a perpetual security state.
Aug 12, 2026
Center
Finance Minister Smotrich called the Peace Now report on creeping annexation a certificate of achievement and promised this is only the beginning.
Smotrich's open embrace of de facto annexation is exactly the far-right agenda Yesh Atid warns is destroying Israel's democratic future and any two-state prospect.
Aug 12, 2026
Lean Left
Finance Minister is courting settlers by making annexation legislation central to the coalition budget debate.
He symbolizes the refusal to end occupation, and his budget cuts to social services outrage Labor/Meretz.
Aug 10, 2026
Lean Left
As Finance Minister he is authoring a settlement-friendly budget and encouraging outpost legalization.
Labor/Meretz see Smotrich as the strategic brain of creeping annexation, turning the Finance Ministry into an engine of occupation.
Aug 10, 2026
Far Left
The Finance Minister is in the news for advancing a budget that expands settlement funding while cutting social services and public sector wages.
Hadash criticizes him for driving apartheid and class war, turning state money toward settlers and the religious right instead of workers and Palestinians.