Netanyahu seeking blockchain plan to prepare for possible sanctions

Judgment

Israel's bank supervisors and the prime minister's office must decide whether to fund a blockchain sanctions-resilience pilot before any friendly bank or exchange agrees to route around restrictions — the cost lands on taxpayers and regulated institutions, not on Netanyahu's political capital.

Basis

Netanyahu said blockchain could help Israel prepare for possible sanctions targeting its banking system, per The Block's report — a claim about preparedness, not a funded program. The mechanism is what constrains him: a ledger only insulates anyone if counterparty banks and exchanges accept the compliance and reputational risk of clearing the resulting flows, and if Israeli institutions can move value without touching correspondent accounts that US or EU regulators can freeze. The binding limit is therefore not cryptography but the handful of friendly jurisdictions willing to host nodes, custody keys, and on/off-ramps. Whoever writes the rules for those ramps absorbs the sanctions exposure, and the source supplies no budget, no owning agency, and no partner list.