Archive for month: July, 2021

News Update

A Palestinian man, 41, attempted to attack an IDF patrol with an iron bar near the village of Beita (West Bank) yesterday. The troops fired warning shots into the air, but when the attacker continued rushing towards them they fired, killing him.

The Human Rights Watch NGO yesterday accused the IDF of carrying out attacks that “apparently amount to war crimes” during its 11-day war against Hamas in Gaza. The international human rights organization issued its conclusions after investigating three Israeli airstrikes that it said killed 62 Palestinian civilians. It said “there were no evident military targets in the vicinity” of the attacks.

The HRW report also accused Palestinian factions of apparent war crimes by launching over 4,000 unguided rockets and mortars at Israeli population centers. Such attacks, it said, violate “the prohibition against deliberate or indiscriminate attacks against civilians.” The report, however, focused on Israeli actions during the fighting. The IDF has stated that it took extensive precautions to prevent civilian casualties and blames Hamas for placing military targets within civilian population centers.

Israel announced that it will issue 16,000 additional work permits to Palestinians living in the West Bank allowing them to work in the construction and hotel industries in Israel. The new permits will bring the number of Palestinians allowed to work in Israel to 106,000, with another 30,000 Palestinians authorized to work in Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

PM Bennett, DM Gantz and Finance Minister Lieberman have agreed on a NIS 58 billion defense budget for 2022.

Ninety MKs, from all factions in the Knesset, signed a letter today asking Unilever, which owns Ben & Jerry’s, to immediately revoke the company’s decision not to sell its products in the Israeli settlements. The letter called the decision hypocritical and said, “This is shameful, abusive behavior and above all a decision that excludes large sections of the very public that Ben & Jerry’s world management ostensibly seeks to support.”

The Health Ministry reported over 2,000 new covid cases, for the second day in a row. The infection rate stands at 2.4% of those tested. At least 153 patients are in serious condition, of whom 28 are ventilated. According to the Health Ministry’s analysis, 102 of the severely ill patients are aged 65 and over, 76 of whom are fully vaccinated. At least 39 of severely ill are between the age of 40 and 65, while 16 of them are fully vaccinated. Six of severely ill are below the age of 40, and only one of them is fully vaccinated.

The Health Ministry is expected to recommend a third vaccine dose, which has already begun to be administered to those with compromised immune systems and the elderly. The third dose could begin to be administered as early as next week.

Idit Harel Segal, a 50 year old kindergarten teacher from northern Israel, has donated a kidney to a 3-year-old Palestinian boy from the Gaza. To read more, click here.

News Update

Syrian media reported that Syrian air defenses intercepted Israeli missiles over Homs province early Thursday. The strike destroyed several Hezbollah weapons depots. It was the second Israeli airstrike into Syria this week.

The IDF captured two suspects who crossed into Israel from Lebanon yesterday. The IDF said the two were most likely migrants looking for work.

At Israel’s request, the US administration will delay reopening the American consulate in Jerusalem, which is meant to serve Palestinians.

Israel has established a commission to investigate allegations that NSO Group’s controversial Pegasus phone surveillance software was misused. The Israeli company’s software has been implicated in possible mass surveillance of journalists, human rights defenders and 14 heads of state.

Unilever’s chief executive said that the company was “fully committed” to Israel and has invested over $300 million in the country over the past decade. He said that the decision made by its subsidiary Ben and Jerry’s to not renew its Israeli franchisee’s license because it continued to sell product in the West Bank was made by the company’s independent board, over which he had no oversight.

The U.N.’s Human Rights Council announced yesterday that former United Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay will head an international commission of inquiry into alleged crimes committed during the latest conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

Rabbi Elyakim Levanon, the rabbi of the Samaria Regional Council area, was driving to his home in Elon Moreh last night when his car was attacked by Arabs near the village of Huwara. The Arabs began throwing items at his vehicle and pursued it for some distance, and at one point, an Arab managed to intercept the vehicle and smash the front windscreen with a metal rod. The rabbi was able to escape uninjured.

The Health Ministry reported Thursday that the efficacy of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine in preventing infection has dropped to 39%, while the effectiveness in preventing severe illness is 91%. The data suggests that the efficacy of the vaccine declines over time. 5,770 fully vaccinated people have been recently diagnosed with COVID, after 1,152,914 tests were conducted. Of those, 495 patients were hospitalized, 334 were hospitalized in a serious condition, and 123 died.

Israel’s national jiu-jitsu team won 11 medals, including 3 gold, 2 silver and six bronze, at the European Championship in Germany this week. Nest stop is the World Championship in Abu Dhabi.

News Update

The IDF announced yesterday that it arrested, along with the Shin Bet and police, between 20 and 30 students who were part of a Hamas terror cell at Birzeit University near Ramallah.

The IDF released photos identifying a large weapons warehouse belonging to Hezbollah in the southern Lebanon village of Ebba, just 25 meters from a school where 300 students, from first to twelfth grade, attend.  The army said that this was one of thousands of similar targets whose positioning is intended to endanger the lives of innocent Lebanese citizens.

An IDF drone crashed in Lebanon due to a technical malfunction. The IDF said that there was no danger that information was leaked.

PM Naftali Bennett spoke with South Korean President Moon Jae-in and the two had agreed to continue expanding cooperation in the fields of industrial technology, information technology, communications and the development of start-ups

A spokesman for Turkey’s ruling party said that Turkey and Israel are working towards improving their strained relations following a phone call between Turkish president Erdogan and Israel’s president Herzog earlier this week.

An investigation into the May riots in mixed Arab-Jewish cities revealed that police faced a major shortage of weapons and equipment. The police subsequently has have purchased a sufficient amount of weapons to maintain order for 35 consecutive days in case of extreme violence.

Defense Minister Benny Gantz named Brig.-Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi as the IDF’s next military advocate general (MAG), which would make her only the second woman to hold the rank of major general in Israel’s history.

Tisha B’av will be observed Saturday night and Sunday. Tisha B’av, the 9th day in the month of Av, commemorates the date that both the first and second Temples in Jerusalem were destroyed, first by the Babylonians in 586 BC and then by the Romans in 70 AD. The day is observed with fasting and reciting lamentations.

The Talmud attributes the reason for the destruction of the Second Temple to baseless hatred. The political and social situation in Israel at the time of the destruction was rife with infighting and strife. Instead of focusing on fighting the Romans, the various Jewish factions fought and killed each other before finally uniting to face the Romans, when it was already much too late. Had the Jews been united, perhaps the destruction, even the war itself, could have been avoided.

The destruction of the Second Temple marked the start of a close to 2,000 year period of statelessness and exile, filled with persecution and massacres, and culminating in the ultimate horror of the Holocaust.

We have returned to our homeland, reestablished our sovereignty over it and made it thrive. Now we have a second chance to correct the mistakes we made the first time around. If we can unite and exist in harmony, we can remain invincible in our land forever. That is the message, and challenge, of Tisha B’av, and why we continue to commemorate the day of our greatest defeat (seriously, what other nation commemorates defeat?).

Will we learn our lesson and correct the mistake of Tisha B’av? That’s a question that only we can answer.

May this be the last Tisha B’av we commemorate, and may we come together as one family, one people, in unity and harmony, to continue to build our homeland and our destiny in peace.

For more information about Tisha B’av click here (Chabad.org).

BIG NEWS

Starting next week, IsraelAM will be published in Modiin, Israel. That’s because we are moving there on Monday! So there probably won’t be an email on Monday, but after that, your Israel news will be coming directly from the Holy Land!

News Update

PM Naftali Bennett met secretly with Jordan’s King Abdullah II last week at the king’s palace in Amman. The two leaders discussed Israel supplying more drinking water to the drought-hit kingdom. It was the king’s first meeting with an Israeli prime minister in 3 years.

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid met with Jordanian FM Ayman Safadi at the Allenby Bridge Border Crossing on Wednesday. They discussed several economic issues and agreed to increase Jordan’s potential exports to the West Bank from $160 million to $700 million a year. Israel also agreed to sell Jordan an additional 50 million cubic meters of water this year. After the meeting Lapid tweeted, “The Kingdom of Jordan is an important neighbor and partner to the State of Israel, the Foreign Ministry will continue to will continue to hold an ongoing dialogue in order to preserve and strengthen relations, we will expand economic cooperation for the benefit of both countries.”

Defense Minister Benny Gantz ordered security forces to seize Hamas cryptocurrency accounts. Hamas has been waging an online campaign to raise donations for its military wing.

The Biden administration is reportedly reluctant to allocate a budget for the Abraham Fund, probably as a result of massive domestic government spending. The fund is a $3 billion commitment by the U.S. to develop an initiative meant to promote regional, economic cooperation in the Middle East as part of the agreements. The freezing of the fund can negatively impact the economic cooperation between Israel and the UAE.

The U.S. Congressional Budget Committee has approved the budget for the reopening of the American Consulate for the Palestinians in Jerusalem.

Israel drew criticism from the US after it demolished the home of the terrorist who murdered a 19 yr. old yeshivah student in May. In a statement after the home was destroyed, the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem called on “all parties to refrain from unilateral steps that exacerbate tensions and undercut efforts to advance a negotiated two-state solution” of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “This certainly includes the punitive demolition of Palestinian homes. As we stated numerous times, the home of an entire family should not be demolished for the actions of one individual.”

The Health Ministry announced today that all travelers, including those vaccinated and recovered from COVID-19, would be required to self-isolate for up to 24 hours upon arrival to the country, starting next week, until they receive a negative covid test.

Japanese venture capital firm Softbank is appointing former Mossad director Yossi Cohen to head its activity in Israel. SoftBank is considered the world’s leading technology fund. To read more, click here.