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Battling COVID: Weekly Update

Tuesday, January 26, 2021

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A medical worker prepares a COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center in Jerusalem, January 13, 2021. (Yonatan Sindel/ Flash90)

Analyst: 'It could prove more effective than Pfizer thought'

In week after 2nd Pfizer vaccine shot, only 20 of 128,000 Israelis get COVID

By Nathan Jeffay

Figure represents 0.015 percent of people, indicating vaccine is hitting 95% efficiency rate predicted by clinical trials; top immunologist hails ‘exciting results’

A medic in a coronavirus ward at Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem (courtesy of Hadassah Medical Center)

Israel sees 60% drop in hospitalizations for age 60-plus 3 weeks after 1st shot

By Nathan Jeffay

An Israeli student receives a COVID-19 vaccination, at a Kupat HolimLeumit center in Tel Aviv, on January 23, 2021. (Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90)

Israel expands vaccination campaign to teens aged 16-18

By AFP and ToI Staff

Tayebeh Mokhber is injected with the Coviran coronavirus vaccine produced by Shifa Pharmed, part of a state-owned pharmaceutical conglomerate, in a ceremony in Tehran, Iran on December 29, 2020. (AP/Aref Taherkenareh)

Iran says 30 volunteers have no side effects from 2 doses of a homemade vaccine

By ToI Staff and AP

Trial now to be increased to 300 volunteers; Tehran hopes to have 3 local COVID-19 vaccines available to public by June, having banned Western vaccines

The Palestinian Ministry of Health crews conduct random checks through blood in the town of Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, on January 14, 2021. For the first time, preventive medicine will contact citizens to complete hundreds of checks during blood sampling, to avoid violating the curfew measures. The blood test helps measure anti-bodies. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)

Senior PA health official: We’re hesitant about using Russian vaccine

By Aaron Boxerman

A healthcare worker prepares a dose of Chinese-made Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine, in Belgrade Fair turned into a vaccination centre, on January 25, 2021. (Andrej ISAKOVIC/AFP)

US, China face off in Middle East contest of coronavirus vaccine diplomacy

By Guillaume LAVALLÉE

Palestinians sit as PA Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh opens a hospital for COVID-19 patients in the West Bank city of Nablus, on January 16, 2021. (Nasser Ishtayeh/ Flash90)

Israeli immunity hinges on Palestinians getting COVID shots too, doctors say

By Aaron Boxerman and Nathan Jeffay

Epidemiological interest is clear, say officials, warning that herd immunity cannot be reached otherwise, but legal experts conflicted over whether Israel is ultimately responsible

Editor's NoteVaccinating the Palestinians * Michael Leven’s philanthropy campaign

By David Horovitz

BlogIsrael, Palestinians, and COVID vaccines: A reality check

By David Harris

Yehuda Meshi-Zahav (L) with his father Menahem Meshi-Zahav (R), in an undated photo. (Courtesy: ZAKA spokesperson)

Father of ZAKA emergency rescue chief dies of COVID-19, days after his mother

Amid lockdown violations in ultra-Orthodox communities, Yehuda Meshi-Zahav has said rabbis have ‘blood on their hands’ for disdaining COVID rules

Yehuda Meshi-Zahav with his mother Sarah in an undated picture. (Courtesy Mendy Hachtman)

Blood on rabbis’ hands, Haredi emergency chief says after mom’s COVID death

By Nathan Jeffay

United Torah Judaism MK Moshe Gafni speaks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (right) in the Knesset on November 24, 2015. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90/File)

Under Haredi pressure, PM said to agree to soften bill hiking lockdown fines

A woman takes a photo at the deserted departure hall at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport in Lod, near Tel Aviv, on January 25, 2021. (Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP)

Israel halts all commercial flights in bid to keep virus variants at bay

The order, in effect until January 31, marks the first time since the start of the pandemic the Jewish state is barring entry to its own citizens and new immigrants

Illustrative - Haredi schoolchildren outside a school in the city of Ashdod, January 22, 2021. (Jack Guez/AFP)

Gantz threatens to block cabinet lockdown talks in spat over Haredi enforcement

Workers from Chevra Kadisha Kehilat Yerushalayim, getting dressed with full protective gear to prepare a body before a funeral at a morgue for people who died from COVID-19, at the Sanhedriya Cemetery in Jerusalem, January 25, 2021. (Yonatan Sindel/ Flash90)

Health Ministry recommends extending lockdown, as daily deaths hit new high

A Purim carnival in February 2019, one of the many activities created by the Lod Garin Torani community in Lod. (Courtesy Lod Garin Torani)

In Lod, a community brings ‘love thy neighbor’ to a special needs bachelor pad

By Jessica Steinberg

Ephraim Portnoy

Why do I have to be scared to publish this?

To those who claim the violence against Covid enforcement came from people on the fringe of Haredi society, I ask, who are we fooling?

Nathan Lopes Cardozo

This is not my Judaism!

How dare these apparent representatives of the Haredi Judaism I hold dear so disgrace the very Torah they claim to uphold!

A Holocaust survivor shows his prisoner number tattooed on his arm. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Ahead of Holocaust Remembrance Day, Israel says 900 survivors died of COVID-19

179,600 people defined as Holocaust survivors live in Israel, around 850 of them aged 100 or more, according to Central Bureau of Statistics

An anti-Semitic cartoon published on Telegram on March 15, 2020, likening Jews to the coronavirus using the image of the Trojan horse. (Diaspora Affairs Ministry monitoring team via ADL/courtesy)

Israel predicts rise in anti-Semitism, as virus-related hate is spread online

A Palestinian resident of East Jerusalem's Beit Hanina neighborhood gets vaccinated against the coronavirus at a Clalit Health Services clinic there, on January 12, 2021. (Ahmad Gharabli/AFP)

Several US Democrat lawmakers call out Israel for not vaccinating Palestinians

A bus set alight by an ultra-Orthodox mob in the city of Bnei Brak, January 24, 2021. (Israel Police)

Police, firefighters stood by for an hour as ultra-Orthodox mob torched bus

Ignoring pleas by Bnei Brak residents, fire crew stationed down the street refused to intervene, citing police orders; fire burned through power lines, approached buildings

A bus set alight by an ultra-Orthodox mob in the city of Bnei Brak, January 24, 2021. (Israel Police)

Driver recounts ‘nightmare’ after Haredi mob torches his bus at lockdown protest

Israel's Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef attends the traditional selling of hametz (food containing leavening) of the State of Israel to a non-Jew before the upcoming Passover holiday, on March 29, 2018. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)

As 4 cops hurt in fresh clashes, chief rabbi slams ‘delinquent’ Haredi rioters

Ultra-Orthodox demonstrators clash with police as they protest against construction work for the Jerusalem Light Rail in their neighborhood in Jerusalem, January 25, 2021. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)

Haredi protesters endangered light rail passengers’ lives, operator says

By Stuart Winer and ToI Staff

CityPass says vandals who poured cement on Jerusalem tracks during protest took violence to a dangerous level; 10 arrested in clashes with police

A police officer shoots in the air during a clash with ultra-Orthodox rioters protesting the enforcement of a lockdown ordered due to the coronavirus, in the city of Bnei Brak, January 24, 2021. (Screen capture: Twitter)

Cop shoots in air after ultra-Orthodox rioters surround and shove police

In this December 20, 2017, photo provided by Joel Friedman, Rabbi Avrohom Pinter makes a speech at Canvey Island,in Essex, southeast England. (Joel Friedman via AP)

Site of mass Haredi wedding in London: A school whose principal died of COVID

By ToI Staff and Agencies

Hospital staff wearing safety gear, as they work in the coronavirus ward of Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem on January 19, 2021. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Over 1,000 virus deaths recorded so far in January, as toll hits 4,419

Health Ministry says California mutated strain detected in Israel as man returning from LA infects four others; another flyer from Dubai reportedly gave virus to 180 people

Illustrative: A traveler approaches a medic to be sampled while testing for the COVID-19 coronavirus disease, upon arrival at the rapid testing center in Ben-Gurion International Airport, near Tel Aviv, on January 24, 2021. (JACK GUEZ / AFP)

Health officials: UK variant running wild, hitting children at a worrying rate

By Stuart Winer

Jerusalem residents walk in downtown Jerusalem on January 21, 2021, during the 3rd lockdown due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)

Military task force warns that Israeli COVID variant could emerge

Illustrative: A nurse stands in the children's ICU for coronavirus patients at Jerusalem's Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem on January 22, 2020. (Courtesy/Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem)

Hadassah hospital opens Israel’s first pediatric ICU for COVID-19 patients

Jerusalem sees surge of ‘very sick’ children in recent weeks; 4 of 8 available beds at new unit already filled, including a 10-day-old baby

A kindergarten pupil in Ashdod has his temperature taken by the Thermoguard device (courtesy of Thermoguard)

With kids unvaccinated, Israeli tech aims to prevent school outbreaks

By Nathan Jeffay

Illustrative: Children wearing face masks study in a classroom of the Kramim school in Jerusalem on their first day back to classes on November 1, 2020 (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)

Increased child infection rates cast doubt on school reopenings

Illustrative: Volunteer Malka Rodrig unpacks meals at a kosher food drive-thru distribution site, July 29, 2020, at the Greater Miami Jewish Federation building in Miami. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

US Jewish philanthropists give more during pandemic but struggle with allocation

A healthcare worker tends to a COVID-19 patient in the intensive care unit at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center during the coronavirus pandemic in San Jose, California, January 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

In LA and Arizona, COVID death surge overwhelms the Jewish community

More Headlines

A pregnant woman wearing a face mask and gloves holds her belly as she waits in line for groceries in Waltham, Massachusetts, May 7, 2020. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Senior health official: UK virus variant putting pregnant women at greater risk

Illustrative: Courtney Senechal unpacks a special refrigerated box of Moderna COVID-19 vaccines as she prepared to ready more supply for use at the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center in Boston, Massachusetts, December 24, 2020. (Joseph Prezioso/AFP)

Moderna says its COVID-19 vaccine is effective against UK, South Africa variants

By AFP and ToI Staff

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu receives a coronavirus vaccine at Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, on December 19, 2020, becoming the first in Israel to get the vaccine (AMIR COHEN / POOL / AFP)

Facebook suspends Netanyahu’s chatbot for seeking to ID unvaccinated Israelis

A man at the Mahane Yehuda market in Jerusalem on January 10, 2021, during a third nationawide coronavirus lockdown. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Standard of living dives as middle class pummeled by virus — government report

Fake money bills with pictures of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Shaul Elovitch at a protest against Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu outside PM Netanyahu's house in Jerusalem, July 3, 2020. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Bank of Israel criticizes Netanyahu’s proposed cash handouts to Israelis

People wear protective face masks due to the coronavirus outbreak as they walk outside the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, December 17, 2020. (Miriam Alster/FLASH90)

Netanyahu backs reopening art, culture events in two weeks

Illustrative: A United Airlines commercial jet taxis away from Terminal C before lift-off at Newark Liberty International Airport, July 18, 2018, in Newark, N.J. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

Haredi passengers said to refuse to wear masks on flight from New York to Israel

Larry King attends a screening of the environmental documentary "Planet in Peril," Monday, Oct. 8, 2007, in New York. (AP Photo/Diane Bondareff)

Larry King, broadcasting giant, dies at 87 after hospitalization with COVID-19

By ANDREW DALTON

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