Israeli Superstar Gal Gadot tries to cheer us up but the knives are out: “Nothing like rich famous people singing “imagine no possessions” in their mortgage free homes as the rest of society queue at Lidl for broken biscuits”

Posted on March 19, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

DAILY BEAST
Celebrities Sing ‘Imagine’ to Console the Little People
by Tom Sykes
March 19, 2020

If you’re a wise celebrity, now is the time to tuck yourself inside your Hollywood Hills hideaway, lock the gates, and keep your privileged lifestyle and stash of in-beta retrovirals as quiet as you can until the 2021 Oscars season. It’s most definitely not the moment to try and burnish your credentials as a compassionate humanitarian by singing John Lennon’s “Imagine” in a celebrity mash-up to lift global spirits. However, in an extraordinarily ill-thought-out piece of COVID-19 marketing, a roll call of celebrities whose publicists really should have known better have done exactly that. READ MORE

DEADLINE ‘Imagine’ That: Gal Gadot’s Sweet Gesture Devolves Into A Social Media Feeding Frenzy As hard as it may be to conceive, there are worse things than being confined to your home. Like having to listen to celebrities sing along to John Lennon’s Imagine as you contemplate killing for toilet paper. Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot meant well, bless her heart, by organizing the online songfest. The problem is that many on the internet were not in the mood for treacle, and let the participants have it with both guns. In a video first posted to Instagram, Gadot explained that she was in “day six” of her self-quarantine and “feeling philosophical” about the pandemic.

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“AIPAC vs J Street: Pro-Israel Lobby Loses Ally as Progressives Score Win in Illinois”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JEWISH INSIDER
Pro-Israel groups react to Rep. Dan Lipinski’s primary loss in Illinois
by Jacob Kornbluh
March 18, 2020

Following incumbent moderate Rep. Dan Lipinski’s (D-IL) loss last night to progressive challenger Marie Newman, critics are questioning why pro-Israel groups didn’t spend more money to aid his primary campaign. Newman, who lost to Lipinski by a small margin in 2018, received 47% of the vote to Lipinski’s 45%, according to unofficial results. Rush Darwish, a Palestinian-American activist who went after the eight-term congressman and Newman for their support of Israel, came in a distant third with a little over 6%. Turnout yesterday was slightly higher than 2018 despite concerns that the campaign would be overshadowed by the growing threat of COVID-19. READ MORE

JNS Anti-Israel Democrat upsets House incumbent; neo-Nazi fails in Republican primary Democratic Majority for Israel chose not to endorse Lipinski in part due to his pro-life stance and opposition to the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. However, Republican Jewish Coalition spokesperson Neil Strauss told JNS that “Newman’s win goes to show that, without fail, supposedly pro-Israel groups on the left will throw a pro-Israel candidate under the bus for a more liberal, anti-Israel candidate. Pro-Israel Democrats need to take notice that their party is no longer a pro-Israel party.

HAARETZ AIPAC vs J Street: Pro-Israel Lobby Loses Ally as Progressives Score Win in Illinois Marie Newman – who was supported by Sanders, Warren and AOC – managed to oust incumbent Dan Lipinski and supports conditioning aid to Israel

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Dan Hotels pitches in: “In addition to the Dan Panorama, the Dan Hotel in Jerusalem will begin accepting coronavirus patients”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

ALGEMEINER
Luxury Tel Aviv Beachfront Hotel Being Converted Into Coronavirus Clinic
by Benjamin Kerstein
March 16, 2020

A luxury beachfront hotel in Tel Aviv is being turned into a clinic for coronavirus patients, the Israeli news site N12 reported Monday. Officials from IDF Home Front Command, emergency medical service Magen David Adom and the Israel Police are already at the Dan Panorama Hotel in Tel Aviv and making arrangements to isolate and secure the building in order to prevent infection when the patients arrive. A special sterile area has been set up, a CCTV network has been installed to monitor patients, and signs have been put up warning of possible infection. READ MORE

ARUTZ SHEVA Israel leads in the battle against coronavirus Israel took the danger seriously from the start and has done everything possible to contain it. If only my country, Italy, had been as wise. Now, as announced last night, the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) will track down coronavirus patients and the route they took until they went into isolation or hospitalization. The technology will enable the Shin Bet to identify the people who were within range of the patient and those who were exposed to the virus can be informed, directly to their phones, that they must go into isolation or be tested.

JEWISH PRESS Israel Closes the Border, Bars Entry to Non-Citizens in Fight Against COVID-19 Israel has closed its borders to non-citizens, according to a notice from Population and Immigration Authority. Citing a recommendation from the Ministry of Health, ministry spokesperson Sabine Haddad said that after two weeks of restricting the entry of passengers who were not citizens of Israel or its residents, stricter measures were needed to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus

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“It is worth noting that Egypt, which has a shared border with the Gaza Strip, did not send any test kits or disinfectant materials to the Palestinians living there”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

GATESTONE
Israel Helps Palestinians Prevent Coronavirus; Arabs Betray Them
by Khaled Abu Toameh
March 16, 2020

While Israel is working overtime with Palestinians to curb and prevent the spread of the coronavirus, the Arab states appear to be doing what they do best when it comes to helping their Palestinian brothers: nothing at all. In the past few days, Israeli authorities delivered 200 coronavirus testing kits to the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. In addition, Israeli and Palestinian professional teams have been working together to prevent the spread of the virus. The Israeli authorities have also delivered another 200 coronavirus testing kits to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip…READ MORE

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“The unimaginably bizarre situation meant that for years this man lived with the dissonance of being both a Hamas operative and an admirer of Judaism”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM POST
The top Shin Bet official who ‘converted’ a Hamas supporter to Judaism
by Yonah Jeremy Bob
March 14, 2020

Move over, Fauda. One could hardly imagine a more surreal scene. There he was, a top Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) official having smuggled a member of Hamas from the West Bank into Tel Aviv. And the purpose was to help make him feel like he was on the path to converting to Judaism so that he would keep giving them leads to bust terror cells. No, this is no Purim joke. READ MORE

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Amid coronavirus pandemic, Microsoft Israel “recruiting software engineers, product managers, and data analysts, among others”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

CTECH
Mid-Pandemic, Microsoft Israel Wants to Hire 200 New Employees
by Meir Orbach and Hagar Ravet
March 15, 2020

As Israel yet again escalates its coronavirus (Covid-19) fighting measures and employers in various industry sectors prepare for extensive layoffs, Microsoft Israel is bucking the trend. The company announced Saturday its intention to hire an additional 200 employees for its research and development center in Israel. The positions the company is recruiting for include software engineers, product managers, and data analysts, among others. In December, Israeli entrepreneur Assaf Rappaport stepped down as Microsoft’s head of research and development in Israel. Last month, Michal Braverman-Blumenstyk was appointed as the new head. READ MORE

JNS Israel authorizes mass surveillance to stem the spread of COVID-19 In a controversial move meant to help stem the spread of the COVID-19 virus, Israel’s government approved a motion early on Tuesday to allow authorities to use sophisticated surveillance technology to track the movements of Israelis diagnosed with the disease. According to the new protocol, Israel’s Shin Bet security agency will now utilize this technology to track down all those to have come within a few meters of known COVID-19 patients and send reports directly to their phones, notifying them of their exposure and obligating them to either self-quarantine or get tested for the disease.

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The Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland replied, “You are already infected with a virus. It’s called Hatred.”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

ALGEMEINER
Journalist for Tehran Regime Mouthpiece Mocked for Saying He’d Rather Get Coronavirus Than Use Israeli Vaccine
by Staff
March 12, 2020

A journalist for the Tehran regime’s official English-language mouthpiece was widely mocked online on Thursday after he said he would prefer getting the coronavirus over using an Israeli-produced preventative shot. Roshan Salih — of Press TV — tweeted a Haaretz article about an expected announcement by an Israeli research center that it had developed a vaccine for the disease currently spreading around the world with the comment, “I’d rather take my chances with the virus than consume an Israeli vaccine.” The Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland replied, “You are already infected with a virus. It’s called Hatred.” READ MORE

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1978 Coastal Road Massacre “Official PA daily promoted false information, for example that the Israeli victims were “soldiers” when they were in fact families on vacation with their children”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

PALESTINIAN MEDIA WATCH
Ignoring Corona and Israel health care aid, PA praises murderer of 37 Israelis
by Nan Jacques Zilberdik and Itamar Marcus
March 15, 2020

March 11, 2020, marked the 42nd anniversary of the most lethal terror attack against Israel, when Palestinian terrorists hijacked a bus and murdered 37 Israelis, among them 12 children, in 1978. Despite the current Corona crisis and the daily contacts and aid that the Palestinian Authority is receiving from Israel, the PA and Fatah still found it important to highlight the attack and praise its leader Dalal Mughrabi. In its official daily, the PA praised terrorist Mughrabi’s “daring, courage, well-developed national sentiment, and devotion to Palestine and Fatah” while she studied “military courses and received lessons in guerilla warfare” in Lebanon prior to the attack. READ MORE

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“Israeli Nobel Prize winner Michael Levitt has predicted that no more than ten Israelis will succumb to COVID-19”

Posted on March 15, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

JERUSALEM POST
Nobel laureate: surprised if Israel has more than five coronavirus deaths
by Donna Rachel Edmunds
March 18, 2020

No more than 10 people will die in Israel as a result of the novel coronavirus disease known as COVID-19, Nobel Prize laureate Michael Levitt predicted on Wednesday as the government continued to impose additional restrictions on the general population. Levitt said that fears in Israel over the coronavirus were disproportionate to the threat, and that the number of cases in the country was uncertain due to reporting variances. “I will be surprised if the number of deaths in Israel surpasses 10,” he said, adding that the Jewish state was “not on the world map for the disease.” READ MORE

CTECH Corona Is Slowing Down, Humanity Will Survive, Says Biophysicist Michael Levitt Nobel laureate and Stanford professor Michael Levitt unexpectedly became a reassuring figure in China at the peak of the coronavirus pandemic. Now he assures Israelis: statistics show the virus is on a downturn

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“Blue and White leader says he has ‘not received a serious reply’ from the PM on offer to start negotiations to form emergency coalition amid pandemic”

Posted on March 12, 2020 by ArchitectGuy

TIMES OF ISRAEL
Gantz: Unity government needed now, I’m waiting for Netanyahu to okay talks
by Raoul Wootliff
March 13, 2020

…On Thursday evening, Netanyahu reached out to his political rivals to form an emergency government to fight the spread of the virus, inviting Gantz for talks. In a prime-time televised speech from the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, the premier called on the Blue and White leader to take the step following a year-long political deadlock during which neither has succeeded in forming a governing coalition. “It would be an emergency government for a limited time, and we will fight together to save the lives of tens of thousands of citizens,” Netanyahu said in his statement to the press, during which he issued dire warnings of a high potential death toll from the virus and announced that Israeli schools would be shut down starting Friday. READ MORE

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