Israel's parliament, in a preliminary reading, passed a bill which if it becomes law will grant tax benefits to Israeli settlements on the occupied Golan Heights, DPA reported.
Some 67 of the 120 lawmakers in the Knesset voted for the bill, while 13 voted against, Israel Radio reported. The rest abstained or were absent.
The private bill, initiated by lawmaker Eli Aflalo of the opposition Kadima party, must pass three more readings before it becomes law.
Under it, 33 Israeli communities on the Golan - the strategic plateau which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war - would be added to a list of towns which receive tax benefits amounting to 13 per cent.
Kadima leader Tzipi Livni and a few other members of her party voted against the law, which they charged was "poorly" timed because of a recent verbal clash with Syria, and which they warned could further raise tensions with Israel's north-eastern neighbour.
In a recent exchange of threats, Damascus had hinted that if attacked by Israel, it would lash out at Israeli cities. Israel's controversial foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman of the ultra-nationalist coalition Israel Beiteinu party, then replied that if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad dared to attack Israel, he should know that "neither he nor the Assad family will remain in power."
Livni's Kadima rival, Shaul Mofaz, and his supporters voted for the bill in an explicit display of the split within the opposition party. The hawkish Mofaz, a former army chief of staff and defence minister, is vying for the party leadership.
Livni's spokesman had earlier issued a statement, accusing the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, of the nationalist Likud party, of "playing with fire" for turning down a request to postpone voting by several weeks until tensions with Syria had calmed.
One Likud lawmaker, Ofir Akonis, in turn accused Livni of turning her centrist Kadima party into a left-wing one and of following an "extremist line" by voting against the bill.
Legislator Haim Oron, of the left-liberal Meretz party, also slammed the bill, which he said failed to include also the Druze villages on the Golan.
Israeli lawmakers favour tax breaks for Golan settlers
