On December 22nd 2016 the Israeli Parliament passed The Supervision of Financial Services (Regulated Financial Services) Law, 5776-2016 – allowing the establishment of credit unions in Israel for the first time in half a century. The bill was brought as a governmental initiative – after a five years struggle of social activists who were determined to promote the idea of cooperative financial institution and its implementation. This all started with the social protest of 2011 which evoked the need for a major change in the highly centralized and very expensive banking system. OFEK cooperative society was established in 2012 setting a goal of starting a cooperative bank. During the five years since then, governmental committees have risen and faded and many statements have been made in favor of the idea only to collapse into concrete decisions that would prevent it.

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