Israel's economy is continuing to improve and the country has technically emerged from the brief recession into which it sank following the worldwide financial crash last year, Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer said Thursday, but warned that the country would continue to face difficulties for some time.
Fischer, who was interviewed on Voice of Israel government radio, told listeners that "The global financial crisis evoked substantially less damage here than in other countries in the world. We dealt with the crisis well, even though we didn't have the possibility to use the state's budget as a balancing element in the critical months... The Finance Minister also participated in the effort by establishing foundations for small and medium-sized firms."
Fischer added that although the Bank intervened in the dollar-shekel balance "when we saw that the financial crisis was heading this way," the Bank also stopped "once it was clear that the recession was weakening."