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Secrets of the Israeli treasury

In an interview with Al-Monitor, Knesset member Stav Shaffir of the Labor Party reveals the treasury’s concealed budget transfers to the settlements, but her Google generation isn’t fooled by lack of government transparency.
Labour party candidate Stav Shaffir poses on Rothschild Avenue in Tel Aviv, the site of a 2011 protest against high housing costs, December 5, 2012. The leaders of a grassroots social protest movement that swept Israel in 2011, one of them Shaffir, have shot to the top of a rejuvenated Labour party that polls say will at least double its power in a Jan. 22 general election that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud is forecast to win. Picture taken December 5, 2012.  REUTERS/Amir Cohen (ISRAE
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Stav Shaffir, who turns 29 in May, is the youngest member of the Knesset. Yet she rounds out March with an impressive record of parliamentary achievements. First, she established a new parliamentary lobby to defend the rights of people renting apartments, and became one of the lobby’s leaders. This was followed by a decision from the Housing Cabinet, led by Finance Minister Yair Lapid, to adopt her proposed “fair rental” law. 

Shaffir was a main hero of summer 2011's tent protests, which erupted because of the housing crisis facing her and her fellow students. Since then, she has become an especially prominent Knesset member for the Labor Party, notably on the Finance Committee, where she operates as a guerrilla warrior for social issues. Like a girl in a candy store, Shaffir is amazed at the secrets she discovered when she decided to “follow the money.” According to her, she found most of it across the Green Line.

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