Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on an official visit in far-off China these days, expressed his full support of his Finance Minister Yair Lapid (May 8), who is the target of keen arrows of criticism in Israel. But this move of the prime minister is not as innocent as it looks.

We are not talking about a prime minister who nobly rushes to the defense of the finance minister he appointed, but instead is a man motivated by cold, political profit-and-loss considerations.

This is the hardest hour for the new finance minister. The brutal cutbacks in the proposal he presented this week (May 7) of the 2013 budget, brought down anger on Lapid from all directions, but mainly from the direction of the middle class. That is the same group that elevated Lapid to his present rank, and has become his primary casualty.

From the moment of disclosure of one of the harshest budgets that was submitted in recent years, it took Netanyahu more than 24 hours until he released a short, laconic endorsement statement from Beijing: “I give my full support to the finance minister. We need to pass a budget.” That is all. Without a word of empathy for Lapid, who has served barely a month and a half in his position and is forced to confront a huge budgetary deficit (about 40 billion shekels [$11.3 billion]) — created by the previous Netanyahu government.