Government policies on Israel’s water shortage have been made by clerks who are turning Israel into a “State of Clerkistan.” Knesset Member Ofir Akunis (Likud) charged. The MK, who is chairman of the Knesset Economic Affairs Committee, asserted that "what happened to the water is a tragedy and a 20-year government failure."
He told the annual Sderot Conference that the government has been living in a “dreamland” since the heavy rains in the winters of 1990-1992 filled the country’s reservoirs. “It's not possible to see Israeli society in Excel tables of the clerks at the Ministry of Finance at Kaplan Street 3 in Jerusalem,” he stated. Finance Ministry director-general Yarom Ariav replied, “If there weren't Ministry of Finance clerks, it would be necessary to invent them, because someone has to balance the short-term perspectives of the MKs.”