Israel News for 1-22-2020
News Update
Three terrorists infiltrated into Israel from Gaza near Kibbutz Kissufim yesterday. An IDF force intercepted the terrorists and opened fire on them. The terrorists threw at least one grenade at the soldiers. All 3 terrorists were killed. No soldiers were injured.
Israel’s state-owned electricity utility said it was ending power cuts to the Palestinian Authority, after the PA paid over half of its outstanding debt for electricity — 920 million shekels.
In a speech yesterday launching his election campaign, PM Netanyahu pledged to annex the Jordan Valley. Now, right wing politicians including Defense Minister Naftali Bennet, Avigdor Lieberman, Transportation Minister Bezalel Smotrich and many others are calling on the PM do carry out his pledge immediately. Blue and White leader Gantz issued a similar challenge to Netanyahu, tweeting: “You can apply Israeli law in the Jordan Valley in a cabinet decision within two hours, without any Knesset discussion. Let’s see you.”
Netanyahu also stooped to new lows when he mocked Gantz’s slight stutter. He actually imitated the stutter, to applause and laughter from his audience.
For the first time since the Degania Dam on the Jordan River just south of the Kinneret was built in 1964, it has been opened for the free flow of water into the lower Jordan River. The Water Authority announced that Mekorot National Water Company will initially allow a flow of 1,000 cubic meters an hour (8.76 million cubic meters a year), and will gradually increase the flow to 30 million cubic meters a year.
The water flow from the Kinneret is part of the multiyear plan to revive the ecology along the lower Jordan River, which has suffered for decades from the pouring of brackish water and sewage into the river. The program begun today includes the construction of sewage treatment plants to improve the quality of the water flow into the lower Jordan River from Tiberias and its environs.
