Two years have passed since the war began, and Israel remains vigilant on the military front. Yet alongside the visible fronts in the South and North, there is another front that has been neglected for decades and has only worsened since October 7: the social front.
The clearest indicator lies in one number: a 23% increase in requests for aid compared to last year. This figure has risen year after year, proving that poverty in Israel is not only failing to decline – it is expanding. Tens of thousands of additional families turned to aid organizations this past year.
No longer is it only the “weaker strata of society.” Today, it includes young families at the start of their journey, full-time workers, and reservists who returned to a civilian life that collapsed economically.
An indictment against the state
This surge cannot be viewed in isolation. As we opened new aid centers and distributed hundreds of thousands of food packages, the Knesset and government cut food vouchers for the needy by half, reduced education budgets for at-risk youth, and raised taxes that hit the weakest households hardest. Every food package distributed is, in fact, an indictment against a state that abandoned its citizens in their most difficult moments.
The comparison is striking: The Bank of Israel estimates the cost of the war over the past two years at roughly NIS 250 billion. According to the National Insurance Institute, lifting all Israeli families above the poverty line would require about NIS 16.5b. annually. Had even half that sum – some NIS 125b. – been invested in fighting poverty, Israeli society could have been transformed from the ground up.
Instead of curbing the soaring cost of living, the government chose to do too little. VAT hikes, as well as rising electricity and water prices, were not accompanied by relief measures or safety nets. The burden has fallen squarely on Israel’s citizens. Political priorities are consistently placed above social ones, and the gap between lofty declarations about “supporting families” and the reality on the ground is widening.
An Israeli failure
Two years of fighting have shown that Israel knows how to mobilize billions for security. Yet it fails to secure its citizens’ social safety. National resilience cannot be claimed when nearly two million Israelis – including 872,000 children – live in poverty. Military security and social poverty are not separate issues; they are intertwined.
A weakened, divided society cannot provide the strong home front needed to prevail on the battlefield. The question is not whether Israel can fight poverty – it can. The real question is whether it has the will to put the social front on the same level of urgency as the security one.
The writer is CEO of Pitchon Lev.