Daily Briefing Apr. 28 - What the what is happening in Israeli politics & COVID?

Tune in Sunday through Thursday to hear ToI editors and reporters quickly catch you up on what’s important today

Welcome to The Times of Israel’s Daily Briefing: Your 15-minute audio update on what’s happening in Israel, the Middle East, and the Jewish world, from Sunday through Thursday.

Today’s panel comprises senior analyst Haviv Rettig Gur and health reporter Nathan Jeffay, along with host Amanda Borschel-Dan.

The past 24 whirlwind hours have seen what can only be described as chaos in Israel’s political sphere. Rettig Gur breaks down this fast-changing situation, in which the cabinet (illegally?) voted and approved a new justice minister, despite the protestations of Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit. This morning, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu backed down and agreed to allow Blue and White Head Benny Gantz serve as acting minister, but the High Court may have its own say today.

Next, Jeffay describes a newly developed precise, scalpel-free form of diagnosing early skin cancers, which could be a gamechanger for high-risk individuals.

This week, amid fears of the spread of the new Indian variant, some 150 Israelis who flew in from India and Mexico refused COVID testing at Ben Gurion Airport. Likewise, Jeffay describes visits he’s recently made to ultra-Orthodox communities in which youth are refusing the COVID vaccine. Is this a new wave of noncompliance?

Finally, we discuss two new studies involving the coronavirus vaccination — one troubling and one optimistic.