Political Appointment, Weak Performance: One of the Most Important Tkuma Budgets Is Going Unused

The appointment of Hadass Shon Levi as head of a team in the Tkuma Directorate at the start of 2025 was led by former Prime Minister’s Office Director-General Yossi Shelley. Before Shelley brought her into public service, she was a politician and was ranked 70th on Likud’s Knesset list. The performance of the unit she has headed over the past year and a half suggests that those who raised an eyebrow at her appointment had reason to do so. The team she leads, which handles economics and business, employment and energy, had used only 25% of a budget of about NIS 2 billion for the period from 2023 to 2028 by the end of 2025, and most of the money was spent during the period when Michal Frank headed the team. By comparison, the Tkuma Directorate had used about NIS 11 billion by the end of 2025, or 67% of the budget. The team responsible for education, health and welfare had used about 52% of the five-year budget. The construction and infrastructure team had used about 82% of the five-year budget. It is true that her area of responsibility is especially relevant to development and growth efforts, while in its early days Tkuma focused on rehabilitation. But even these mitigating circumstances do not hide the fact that, except for Shon Levi’s team, the other teams had not used less than 50% of the five-year budget. In addition, Shon Levi is the only one who has still not approved a work plan for 2026. The team has seven people, but three employees have resigned in recent months, two of them senior. At first, Tkuma’s offices were at the Soreq Nuclear Research Center near Yavne. At the beginning of the year, Tkuma inaugurated new offices in Sderot, and that move may also explain some employee departures. But people who spoke with Calcalist and employees who work with Tkuma describe her as unprofessional, not thorough and not in-depth. Not exactly the kind of manager who can rally employees to the far south. Nevertheless, in April of this year she was appointed a director and state employees’ representative on the Israel Airports Authority board. It is hard to explain why someone who is supposed to devote most of her time to developing the economy in the Gaza border region finds time for this role. The contribution to her resume is understandable, what is not understandable is what benefit Tkuma and the Gaza-border communities will derive from it. Shon Levi entered public service thanks to Yossi Shelley, whom one can describe as her sponsor. When he was appointed Director-General of the Prime Minister’s Office at the start of 2023, he made her his chief of staff. Six months later he promoted her to deputy director-general in the Prime Minister’s Office and head of the ministry’s Interior, Planning and Development Department. This came after she had served as chief of staff to the director-general of the Road Safety Authority and as monitoring and control officer at the Transportation Ministry, and before that had been chair of the student union at Ariel University and deputy chair of Likud Youth. As a deputy director-general in the Prime Minister’s Office, she was responsible for the plan to rehabilitate the north, which had still not been carried out months after she left the ministry. After the October 7 massacre and the need to act efficiently to rehabilitate the Gaza border region and return residents, the Tkuma Directorate was established and made a point of choosing experienced managers with no political affiliation. However, Moshe Edri, who founded and managed the directorate, resigned in August 2024. His replacement, Aviad Friedman, was appointed only six months later, in March 2025. During the interim period, Yossi Shelley ran Tkuma while also serving as Director-General of the Prime Minister’s Office. He used that period to appoint Shon Levi as head of a team in Tkuma. She replaced Michal Frank, who had just resigned, but in order to meet the threshold requirements, the status of the role was downgraded, while Frank had served at the level of deputy director-general, Shon Levi’s position was defined as deputy director-general. Tkuma Directorate responded: “The multi-year program is in the process of implementation and execution, and significant progress can be seen in a variety of areas in the rehabilitation and growth of the region. The economic programs require time for planning and completion. The head of the directorate, Aviad Friedman, greatly appreciates the work of the economics team led by Hadass Shon Levi.” According to the directorate, Tkuma’s move to Sderot was “an essential step intended to strengthen the directorate’s presence in the region. As in any significant organizational process, the move led to the departure of several employees for various reasons, and at the same time new employees were recruited to the directorate as well as to the economics team. Hadass Shon Levi joined the directorate after passing all the required examination and approval procedures by the Civil Service Commission.”