A report published Tuesday by State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman warned that effective governance has broken down in the Negev, especially in Bedouin towns, as police stations lack the necessary manpower to fight crime.

The document riled National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who oversees police and has made the restoration of law and order to the southern desert region a major talking point.

“It’s on the prime minister to address the issue of the lack of governance in the Negev, a strategic issue with weighty implications for the State of Israel,” wrote Englman in the report, noting that the situation has only worsened since the agency’s last report on the topic five years prior.

The report revealed that as of 2024, police stations in the Negev were consistently understaffed — short a total of 205 officers — amid law enforcement’s unsuccessful efforts nationwide to enlist new recruits in recent years.

The lack of manpower in the south has led to an uptick in crime, especially when it comes to the collection of “protection” fees, a form of extortion in which criminals blackmail businesses into paying them money under the pretense of security services.

The rampant extortion “has created a situation in which contractors are afraid to apply for tenders and building projects have become more expensive by hundreds of thousands of shekels,” the report said.

From 2020 to 2024, police launched 1,743 investigations into the collection of protection fees, but only 319 were transferred to the State Attorney’s Office for an indictment to be filed. Another 94 cases are in the process of being closed, according to the document.

On top of protection, the region is also suffering from persistent lawlessness on the roads. According to the report, calls made to police........

© The Times of Israel