On Monday, July 27, the Mossawa Center sent a letter to members of the Knesset Finance Committee urging them to reject a proposed transfer of NIS 496.9 million from Government Plan 550, which is designated for the development of Arab society, to the Israel Security Agency, or Shin Bet.

The Finance Committee is scheduled to discuss the proposed transfer on Wednesday, July 29.

The Center cited official data from the Ministry of National Security showing that the ministry has utilized only NIS 748.4 million of the NIS 1.5 billion allocated to it under Government Resolution 549, which was adopted to combat crime and violence in Arab society. This amounts to approximately 50 percent of the plan’s total budget.

According to the Mossawa Center, these figures raise a fundamental question for the Finance Committee: Why is the government cutting funds from education, employment, planning, and public services before fully utilizing the budgets originally allocated to the police and to efforts to combat crime?

The Center added that some programs included in Resolution 549 have not been implemented, while other programs related to combating organized crime and upgrading police technology have been subjected to substantial cuts.

It also noted that, in an official letter dated June 14, 2026, the Prime Minister’s Office stated that the conditions were not yet in place for transferring funds from Plan 550. The office called on government ministries to accelerate implementation and set the final quarter of the year as the appropriate time to reassess any unspent balances.

The Mossawa Center said the government had failed to explain what had changed within one month to justify transferring hundreds of millions of shekels from development budgets to the police and the Shin Bet.

Salem Abbasi, Coordinator of the Economic and Social Unit at the Mossawa Center, said:

“The government’s failure to implement the budget allocated to combating crime must not be financed with funds intended to reduce socioeconomic gaps. The government must first fully utilize the budgets allocated under Resolution 549 and finance any additional security needs from the general state budget.”

The Mossawa Center called on the Finance Committee to reject the proposed transfer and to demand a detailed report on the implementation of Resolution 549, as well as the outcomes of previous budget transfers, before approving any further cuts to funds designated for Arab society.