"The IDF is accelerating its military plans to contend with Iran, the budget that was approved allows us to contend with the variety of challenges," IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Tuesday.
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The IDF chief also thanked the members of the committee and its chairman, MK Ram Ben Barak: "We feel there's a deep understanding here for the challenges of the day, and the work is deserving of recognition not in the least because of your insistence to … keep the IDF above the political fray."
MK Ben Barak discussed the issue of raising IDF soldiers' monthly wages, saying that career soldiers are "dear to our hearts and important to the security of the country. The quiet we all enjoy is not free. At the same time, we need to find a supplementary solution for raising the salaries of the soldiers in mandatory service. To that end, I intend to draft, together with [Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman] and [Defense Minister Benny Gantz], a plan to raise their salaries as soon as possible."
He added: "Above all other challenges is the black cloud, which brings a curse to the Middle East – Iran. The number one exporter of terror in the world. There is not one terrorist act on the globe whose fingerprints don't lead back to the ayatollah regime in Iran.
"The IDF and defense establishment work 24/7 overtly and covertly in an ongoing campaign against Iran and its proxies. Our job as the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee is to make sure the IDF's multi-year work plan provides an answer to the primary challenges according to the political echelon," Ben Barak said.
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