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Israel News for March 22, 2016

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Breaking News
Three explosions rocked Brussels, the capital of Belgium, today killing at least 23 people and injuring dozens. One of the explosions occurred in a subway, claiming the lives of ten victims. The two other blasts occurred at the airport, killing 13 and wounding 35. Brussels is under lock down. This story is currently unfolding.

For further reading click here.

AIPAC Lovefest
Over the last couple of days all of the US Presidential candidates, except for Bernie Sanders, addressed the AIPAC conference in Washington. Guess what? They all gave rousingly pro Israel speeches full of praises and pledges to always stand with Israel. Despite claims by Trump that he is the greatest supporter of Israel ever (since he was the grand marshal of the Salute to Israel parade), all the candidates proclaimed their allegiance to Israel loud and clear. All of the Republican candidates also pledged to “tear up” the Iranian nuclear deal. Cruz and Kasich attacked Trump for saying that he would be “neutral” in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, but it was too late. Trump had already changed his position and vowed not to be neutral.

So, based on the AIPAC speeches, the next President of the US will be the best friend Israel has ever had. That’s reassuring. Unless things change.

Gaza Sewage
Construction of a new water treatment plant was completed last year in northern Gaza with international funding. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it needs electricity to operate, and the Israel Electric Company has ignored requests by Gaza to connect it to the electrical grid. As a result, tens of thousands of gallons of sewage is dumped into the sea every day by the Palestinians, and part of it ends up at the Ashkelon desalinization plant and the beaches in the area.

A month ago, the plant had to be shut down twice due to the amount of pollution in the water. The plant’s management reported this to the Water Authority and the Ministry of Health, and initial checks revealed that there was a dangerous amount of E. Coli and other harmful bacteria in the water.

Because of this, the water supply from the plant to the National Water System was cut in half. The Water Authority calls this a “significant threat” to the water supply from the plant, especially because the pollution coming from Gaza is expected only to increase.

An official from the Water Authority said, “Today, while the north is suffering from a drought, and the water supply coming from the Sea of Galilee is almost zero, it is of even greater importance to keep the desalinization plants on line.”

The Coordinator for Government Activities in the Territories responded by saying, “Israel supplies electricity to Gaza. The allocation of this electricity is decided by the Palestinians. Gaza has unused power capacity which can be allocated to power the plant. We are leading an examination of possible options in order to solve the general energy shortage in Gaza.”

Officials at the Energy Ministry, which is responsible for the energy and water supply, claim that they were only made aware of the problem in the last few days. Minister Yuval Steinitz noted that, “we suffer from this pollution almost as badly as the Palestinians, and it is in our interest that this issue be dealt with.”

So basically, until the Palestinians in Gaza get clean water, Israel will be getting their polluted water, which will harm Israel’s water supply. It seems as though Israel has the ability to solve this problem, and possibly even score some points with the people of Gaza. But even without the points, it’s a matter of Israel’s national security to solve the water problem in Gaza.

For further reading click here.

Knesset Dead Beat
Knesset Member Oren Hazan, who has drawn criticism and rebuke from his Likud party members for missing important Knesset sessions and votes, is having some serious financial problems, and he’s asking for help.

Apparently, Hazan either doesn’t read traffic signs or just ignores them. He has accumulated around 4,000 shekels ($1,036) in parking tickets in Tel Aviv, and he’s now begging the TA municipality to waive the charges, claiming that he’s “swimming in debt” and unable to come up with the money. Unsuccessful in his bid for amnesty, Hazan turned to his father, a former Likud MK, to plead his case for him.

Before you shed a tear for Hazan and break into your piggy bank to help him out, you should probably know that MKs receive an annual salary of 400,000 shekels ($124,300), a free car, two assistants, an office in Jerusalem, foreign travel expenses, free mailing, and roughly, 112,000 shekels a year ($29,000) in budgeting for everything ranging from food to clothes to telecommunications.

Still feel sorry for him? With all due respect to the MK: get your act together, pay your bills and read the parking signs. In other words, grow up.

For further reading click here.

Israel News for January 26, 2016

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Terror Attack
Yesterday two Palestinian terrorists jumped over the security fence of the settlement of Beit Horon, which is located just off of Highway 443 in between Modiin and Jerusalem, and stabbed two women near a grocery store. They also threw three pipe bombs that failed to explode. When they attempted to enter the grocery store to stab more women and children, the cashier, Motti Shalem, blocked them using a large metal shopping cart.

Salem recounted, “the two terrorists came from the direction of the fence, and must’ve breached it and got in. Then they stabbed a woman on the sidewalk, and another at the parking lot, and then tried to enter the store. Me and another guy pushed them back with a supermarket cart, and then they ran, and were shot by the security guard.”

One of the women stabbed, Shlomit Krigman, died of her wounds today. Krigman, 23, was from Shadmot Mehola in the Jordan Valley and lived with her grandparents in Beit Horon. She was laid to rest today in Jerusalem, near the resting place of Dafna Meir, who was murdered by a terrorist last week in Otniel. The other victim, a 58 year old woman, remains hospitalized with moderate wounds.

The attackers were later identified as Ibrahim Alan, from the adjacent West Bank village of Beit Ur al-Tahta, and Hussein Abu Ro’ash, from the Qalandiyah refugee camp, north of Jerusalem. One of them had posted on his Facebook page last Thursday that he planned on committing an attack the following week.

For further reading click here.

New Homes
Israeli planning authorities approved the construction of 153 new apartments in West Bank settlements last week, effectively putting an end to an informal construction freeze that has lasted about 18 months. This comes after Jerusalem’s local planning and building commission gave final approval last month for the construction of 891 units in the Gilo neighborhood of East Jerusalem.

Perhaps the Israeli government feels that the U.S. Administration is unlikely to protest during an election year?

For further reading click here.

Misplaced Rain
Israel has been hit with some massive rain storms this year, which should be a good thing for the country’s water supply. Unfortunately, according to The Hydrological Service of the Israel Water Authority, the level of the Kinneret, Israel’s main reservoir, has risen just 21 centimeters, a worrying figure as far as the Water Authority is concerned, especially given data from previous years, in some of which the level of the lake rose about 20 centimeters in just one rainy day.

A senior Water Authority official said,”We are already at the end of January, and the level is only 17 centimeters above the lower red line. That is not good, and it’s concerning. This year, as in the past few years, the main rain systems have been in the center and the south, and the north has simply not had enough rainfall.”

Unless February and March bring lots of rain to Northern Israel, officials say that this will be the third consecutive year that they will declare the Kinneret and the northern region dry.

But don’t get too alarmed just yet. Most of the water that is used in Israeli homes comes from five desalination plants. But still…

For further reading click here.

Uber Israel
Want to try using Uber in Israel? Forget about it, at least for now. But if PM Netanyahu gets his way, you might be able to Uber after all. The PM and Minister of Transport Yisrael Katz are fighting it out about letting the company operate in Israel.

Katz is adamantly against it, claiming that doing so would oblige the government to pay between 8 and 9 million shekels to taxi drivers. He said, “I don’t know where the myth of the strength of the taxi drivers comes from; they are not a strong group. With all due respect, we’re not talking about the vehicle importers. These are people who work, who have to cope with reality, and my job is to enable them to do so on equal terms. Whoever pays for a taxi license can’t have someone coming with their private vehicle to compete with them.”

The PM met with the Uber CEO during World Economic Forum in Davos, and the CEO expressed his criticism of Katz’s position. Netanyahu believes that letting Uber operate in Israel will lower transportation costs for Israeli consumers. He also feels that security concerns related to the possibility of terrorists using Uber as a means of luring victims into their cars are manageable.

The fight continues, while taxi cabs rule…for the time being.

For further reading click here.

Israel Investing
If you’ve always wanted to invest in an Israeli startup but never thought you’d have the means or the opportunity, your prayers might just have been answered. A new crowdfunding site called crowdmii (mii = made in Israel) is making it possible for supporters of Israel to invest in “Startup nation” companies seeking funding.

Crowdmii CEO Assaf Luxembourg said, “Israel-supporting organizations and communities around the world praise Israeli innovation and entrepreneurship, and are looking for ways to integrate them in their advocacy and Israel-support efforts. We call on them to embrace our campaigns and show not only how Israel helps the world, but also how the crowd can take an active part.”

Check out the site to see the companies and the innovative products and services they’re developing. Be a part of the startup nation!

http://crowdmii.com