The Israeli Parliament has approved the state budget in a preliminary vote years after two years of a political stalemate. On September 2,  the lawmakers voted 59-54 in favour of the proposed budget, a spokesperson for the Parliament, or Knesset, said in a statement. The vote means the budget still needs to pass two additional rounds of votes before it gets final approval, according to reports.

As per the statement issued earlier by the Finance Ministry, the state budget for 2021 will be about USD 135 billion and about USD 141 billion for 2022. The approval is widely considered as a major landmark to the cross-partisan coalition government headed by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who succeeded the country's longest-serving leader Benjamin Netanyahu in June. The budget proposal was approved in early August by Bennett's cabinet.

It would go now to discussions at a Parliament committee, which will prepare it for the second and third round of votes at the Knesset plenum. The budget needs to be approved by the Knesset by a November 5 deadline, otherwise, Parliament will be automatically dissolved and new elections will be called. During the past two years of political stalemate and four elections, Israel used a version of the state budget for 2019, which was approved in March 2018.

Albanian Prime Minister Appoints Albania’s First Mainly Female Cabinet

New Zealand police kill a violent extremist" inspired by Islamic State - PM says 'terrorist attack'

Guidelines for international travellers: RT-PCR mandatory on arrival from 7 more nations