You bug me, I bug you: 5 things to know for June 22

1. All aboard the coronavirus train: Israel Railways relaunched its services on Monday after a three-month hiatus due to the coronavirus. Whether over fears of the virus, or because fewer people are commuting to work, the trains are mostly empty on Monday morning.

• The trains resume as 183 new COVID-19 cases are reported in the past 24 hours, down slightly from previous daily tallies last week. Testing, though, is also down to 8,219 on Sunday, compared to about 15,000 on some days last week.
• The cases are spread across the country, and have affected some hospitals. In Ichilov Medical Center in Tel Aviv, 17 medical workers have contracted the virus, and 56 are in quarantine, forcing the shutdown of two medical wards, the Yedioth Ahronoth daily reports.
• The Haaretz daily leads its coverage with the Health Ministry order to hospitals to reopen its coronavirus wards. It also spotlights a Foreign Ministry official’s warning that if the infection rates continue to rise, vacation-hungry Israelis can kiss their hopes for a jaunt abroad goodbye.
• “There is no doubt that observing the rules, social distancing and hygiene are important,” says Ilan Fluss. “If we don’t do it, and the trends we’ve seen over the past few weeks continue — Israelis will have trouble flying abroad.”

2. Tracking the virus: A Channel 12 television report on Sunday night features leaks from the so-called coronavirus cabinet, which sees the Shin Bet security service chief Nadav Argaman oppose the renewal of a controversial surveillance program to track virus carriers and those exposed to them.

• The High Court of Justice has ruled that Israel must legislate the Shin Bet surveillance, which is based on sensitive personal data, if it wants to resume the program. Argaman has opposed anchoring the program in law, likely because it would open up questions about its secretive monitoring methods that are generally reserved for counterterrorism operations.
• But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is insistent that Israel revive the program to keep tabs on the trajectory of the virus, the recordings show.
• Also in favor of continued government surveillance is Health Minister Yuli Edelstein. Edelstein, a former Soviet prisoner in the gulag, on Sunday opined that “it is preferable that the information remain in the hands of the Shin Bet rather than a private company, who only the devil knows what its interests are.”
• Speaking to Israel Hayom, in comments featured on its front page on Monday, Edelstein adds that a failure to renew the surveillance would be “irresponsible.”
• Likud MK Avi Dichter, a former Shin Bet chief, also backs the surveillance. “There is no choice, we’re on the cusp of the revival of the outbreak. The Shin Bet tool has proved to be efficient. More than one-third of coronavirus patients were discovered from these figures. Only 10% were located by the Health Ministry’s epidemiological investigations,” he tells the Kan public broadcaster on Monday.
• The coronavirus cabinet of top ministers is to meet again on Monday to discuss the issue.

3. And tracking the journalists: The coronavirus cabinet leaks are strongly denounced by Netanyahu, who calls for an investigation.

• “First of all, I would like to start with the grave incident of the recording of a coronavirus cabinet meeting that was broadcast in the media. In all my years as prime minister, I do not remember such a thing, neither from a cabinet meeting nor from the coronavirus cabinet, a discussion with the head of the Shin Bet. This is very grave. This cannot be ignored. I ask all the relevant authorities, including the attorney general, to enable a thorough investigation. We cannot allow such a thing to take root. We cannot allow this to recur.”
• Netanyahu’s call to investigate the leaks comes on the heels of a separate scandal emerging from the Knesset Channel. According to Hebrew media reports, the public parliamentary channel has sent its journalists for polygraph tests to weed out the mole and is in the process of firing some members of staff after a shelved interview with Yesh Atid MK Ofer Shelah losing his cool on air is leaked.
• The interview sees Shelah call an interviewer “a piece of nothing” and storm out of the studio, while asking that the footage be erased. Shelah, incidentally, is a former journalist himself.
• “Still unable to calm down from the incident at the Knesset Channel,” tweets Channel 12’s political analyst Amit Segal. “Our public funds are being used for polygraph tests for journalists. This is not what a media outlet looks like, this is intimidation.”
• Separately, according to AFP, Amnesty International said Monday that software developed by Israeli security firm NSO Group was used to attack a Moroccan journalist, the latest in a series of allegations against the company. The Israeli firm told AFP that it was “deeply troubled by the allegations” and was reviewing the information.

4. Annexation stuck at the station: In the pro-Netanyahu Israel Hayom, Mati Tuchfeld reports that Netanyahu is giving his coalition partner Benny Gantz an ultimatum.

• “Netanyahu to Gantz: Applying sovereignty or elections,” reads the headline.
• “Netanyahu has clarified to his partner that if there is no sovereignty, there is no government,” he reports.
• Netanyahu and Gantz clinched a unity government agreement in May after three consecutive elections that failed to yield a coalition. Under the deal, Netanyahu can begin to annex portions of the West Bank from July 1, with US backing. But Washington has clarified that Gantz and Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi must be on board.
• The prime minister was “surprised” by Gantz and Ashkenazi’s opposition to the move, reports Israel Hayom.

5. All about the money, money: Yedioth, meanwhile, plays up Netanyahu’s request for retroactive tax benefits worth hundreds of thousands of shekels as part of the unity government deal signed with Alternate Prime Minister Gantz.

• The benefits would cover the cost of income tax Netanyahu owes due to upgrades to his vehicle, renovations at his private home in Caesarea, and other expenses dating back to 2009.
• Under the terms presented in a draft document to the Knesset Finance Committee, the tax bill will be picked up by the state, and is estimated to be worth hundreds of thousands of shekels.
• “For this, there’s money?” it writes in the front-page headline, alluding to the economic crisis gripping the country amid the pandemic.
• Gantz, meanwhile, told the committee that he was waiving the right to an official residence granted him as the alternate prime minister and will continue to live at his private home.