Strategic Assessment

For many years the Israeli government adopted a strategic policy aimed at dispersing the local population among different parts of the country. Nonetheless, over the past three decades the preference of the Israeli population for living in the greater Tel Aviv metropolitan area has grown, resulting in a gradual “abandonment” of the Negev and the Galilee. In order to deal with this problem, which poses strategic challenges to Israel on both the social-environmental and national levels, the government intends to encourage settlement in the Negev and the Galilee through a range of measures, especially economic incentives. However, given the enormous gaps between northern and southern Israel on the one hand and central Israel on the other in many aspects of life, such as employment, education, and health,  most families considering a move to the Negev and the Galilee regard these incentives as negligible. In light of this situation, this essay recommends implementing a gradual process that will first provide substantial investment in infrastructure affecting the quality of life for residents of the Negev and the Galilee in order to prevent their continued migration from the region. Only when this phase is completed can an attempt be made to encourage population groups from other parts of Israel to settle in these regions, not in order to benefit from a monetary incentive, but in order to improve their quality of life.