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May 27, 2020 at 4:00 pm
The Families First Coronavirus Response Act of 2020 authorized the payment of Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT) food benefits to households with children who would have received free or reduced-price school meals under the National School Lunch Act, if not for a school closure. The P-EBT program will provide eligible households with the amount that would have been spent by the government for free breakfast and lunch which equals $5.70 per child. This can mean hundreds of dollars per child as schools in many states have been closed since the middle of March.
Some states are advising that parents do not have to do anything yet to receive the benefits and more information will be mailed to them while other states may require an application from parents or action by their scho...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:59 pm
A third of Americans are showing signs of clinical anxiety or depression, Census Bureau data shows, the most definitive and alarming sign yet of the psychological toll exacted by the coronavirus pandemic.
When asked questions normally used to screen patients for mental health problems, 24% showed clinically significant symptoms of major depressive disorder and 30% showed symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder.
The findings suggest a huge jump from before the pandemic. For example, on one question about depressed mood, the percentage reporting such symptoms was double that found in a 2014 national survey.
The troubling statistics were released last week in a tranche of data from the Census Bureau. The agency launched an emergency weekly survey of U.S. households at the end of April to ...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:53 pm
JERUSALEM (JNS) – Israeli intelligence agency Mossad Director Yossi Cohen used his international connections—some covert—to procure massive amounts of medical equipment and protective gear as part of the government’s efforts to compete in the global bidding war for supplies to contain COVID-19, Israeli media reported on Wednesday.
Among these connections are Persian Gulf countries with no diplomatic ties with Israel, according to a report by Ynet.
Since the onset of the coronavirus outbreak, the report says, Cohen has managed to purchase 2.5 million protective goggles (with an additional 5.5 million on the way); approximately 80 million simple surgical masks (with an additional 142 million on the way) and 1.3 million N-95 masks (with an additional 14 million on th...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:50 pm
Israel tried to save the political adviser to the president of Uganda who engineered the thaw in relations between Israel and Sudan, but she ultimately died of coronavirus, journalist Barak Ravid reported on Channel 13.
On Monday, a plane took off from Ben Gurion Airpot to Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, on which there was medical staff, equipment and medicines for the treatment of coronavirus, as well as a senior Israeli official dealing with Sudan relations, to treat political adviser to Sudanese President Najwa Gadah Aldam.
The other day she had contracted coronavirus and her condition had deteriorated rapidly. In talks with the Sudanese leader, Netanyahu heard about the situation and decided to help.
Initially, the plan was to fly Gadah Aldam to Israel for treatment, but it became c...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:45 pm
Yesh Atid-Telem Party chairman and Knesset member Yair Lapid officially became the leader of the Israeli opposition on Wednesday.
Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin made the formal announcement about Lapid’s new role at the opening of the morning’s parliamentary plenary session.
The 35th Israeli government was sworn in on May 17, after more than 500 days of political instability and three consecutive national elections. A fourth round was averted when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his key rival, Blue and White Party leader Benny Gantz, signed a national-unity coalition agreement on April 20.
A month earlier, Lapid and Moshe Ya’alon split from Blue and White in protest over moves by Gantz that indicated his intention to join Netanyahu in a coalition.
As leader of the ...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:43 pm
Researchers are finding evidence that patients who test positive for the coronavirus after recovering aren’t capable of transmitting the infection, and could have the antibodies that prevent them from falling sick again.
Scientists from the Korean Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studied 285 Covid-19 survivors who had tested positive for the coronavirus after their illness had apparently resolved, as indicated by a previous negative test result. The so-called re-positive patients weren’t found to have spread any lingering infection, and virus samples collected from them couldn’t be grown in culture, indicating the patients were shedding non-infectious or dead virus particles.
The findings, reported late Monday, are a positive sign for regions looking to open u...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:41 pm
Leaders of major European countries have been urging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to shelve his plan to apply sovereignty to large parts of Judea and Samaria and the Jordan Valley, Channel 13 News reported on Tuesday.
Netanyahu said he plans to present the move, endorsed by the United States as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “Peace to Prosperity” plan for the Middle East, as early as July 1.
According to the report, the European leaders urged Netanyahu to act on the Palestinian issue only in accordance with international law.
“In a friendly spirit, I ask that your new government not take unilateral steps. Such a move will undermine stability in the Middle East,” French President Emmanuel Macron reportedly wrote to Netanyahu.
...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:37 pm
European Union leaders on Wednesday proposed an $825 billion coronavirus rescue plan that would give Brussels major new powers that would be a step toward integrating the bloc into a federal state.
The plan would allow the European Union to raise money on its own, separately from its 27 member states, and give the funds to needy nations. If approved, it would be a major deepening of the integration of the European Union, which has been under strain since the crisis of 2008 over how to rescue member states’ economies.
The E.U. plan would offer $550 billion in the form of grants to struggling countries. The remainder would be in the form of loans with strings attached, which would mirror more closely measures of the past. The E.U. would impose taxes to pay for at least some of the ne...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:36 pm
The Palestinian Authority accused Israel on Tuesday of infringing on freedom of worship following restrictive measures imposed on services at the Meoras Hamachpela in Chevron.
Israel has imposed restrictions on the religious services of all faiths, as part of the limitations placed on public gatherings due to COVID-19.
The P.A.’s Wafa news agency claimed that the “Israeli occupation forces” prevented Palestinians from attending morning prayers at the Ibrahimi Mosque, the Arabic name for the Cave of the Patriarchs.
According to the report, the Israel Defense Forces has set up checkpoints, tightened its inspections along the roads leading to the site and prevented groups of more than 50 people from entering the mosque or gathering outside the compound.
Accordi...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:36 pm
Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz is “vastly experienced in the disappointments of south Lebanon,” Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said on Tuesday.
Speaking to Hezbollah’s Nur radio station in an interview marking 20 years since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon, Nasrallah said that “the term ‘Israel is weaker than cobwebs’ was coined back then, with the Israeli military’s downfall.”
Gantz, a former Israel Defense Forces chief of staff, commanded the military’s Lebanon Liaison Unit until Israel withdrew from the Lebanese security zone in May 2000.
Speaking about the 2006 Lebanon War, Nasrallah, whose organization is Iran’s largest proxy in the Middle East, said, “The fighting spirit with which we defeated...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:29 pm
With June just a few days away and the conclusion of the virtula school year nearing, Gov. Phil Murphy said today that he is optimistic summer camps could reopen this year as long as the coronavirus outbreak continues to slow in New Jersey. He also put day care centers in the same category.
NJ.com reports:
“I have a high degree of confidence, assuming that the numbers keep going in the right direction, that we can have summer camp activity. We’re just not there yet,” Murphy said at his daily COVID-19 briefing in Trenton.
Parents and camp operators “should continue to hold out hope” programs will occur. The governor also said he’s increasingly confident day care will resume, saying there’s a big demand for the state to release guidelines abo...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:26 pm
Gov. Larry Hogan is expected to announce new developments in Maryland's reopening.
The governor has scheduled a 5 p.m. news conference.
With the exception of Baltimore City and Montgomery and Prince George's counties, all Maryland jurisdictions that had local stay-at-home orders have lifted them and all have allowed stores, barbershops and hair salons to open at reduced capacity.
Prince George's County has targeted June 1 for a modified phase 1 reopening.
Though Maryland has seen an uptick in hospitalizations over the last two days, hospitalizations have trended downward since May 6. Deaths have largely plateaued. Read more at WBAL
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May 27, 2020 at 3:20 pm
‘Need’ is a deviously simple word to translate. In the last few months, we have discovered that its translation is certainly not all that obvious.
What is ‘essential’?
Despite the many things we thought we simply could not survive without; we have managed famously and are still here to tell the tale.
The world-renowned Chazzan, Yitzchok Meir Helfgot, whose mellifluous voice resonates with the sweet music of the angels, is recovering from a difficult bout of COVID-19. He retold the apocryphal story of a man who after being released from a long stay in the hospital on a ventilator, was presented with a huge itemized bill for services rendered and began to cry. He explained that he was not crying over the bill, but rather over his newly gained appreciation for the p...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:15 pm
Baltimore, MD - May 27, 2020 - We, the undersigned, believe our community needs to support Mary Miller for Baltimore City Mayor. She has extensive business experience from her years as an executive at T. Rowe Price and she also has intimate knowledge of the government from her time leading a group in the U.S. Treasury Department after the last financial crisis. A poll came out recently showing her tied for the lead with Sheila Dixon. Click here for more info from that poll.
Click here for more about Mary and visit her website to watch her present her plan for our city - https://electmarymiller.com/splash
Below the signers is a quote from our former shomer Shabbos Treasury Secretary Jack Lew. We think Baltimore City has been going in...
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May 27, 2020 at 3:14 pm
It isn’t easy to be a parent. It’s challenging to be a parent to a special needs child.
It’s difficult enough to be a parent during the COVID-19 pandemic, with illness and lockdowns disrupting our routines and taking away the support systems we’ve come to lean on while we raise and educate our children. It is beyond difficult to be a parent to a special needs child under those same circumstances.
Take all the challenges parents have, and multiply them exponentially. Then, you will only be able to scratch the surface of how tough things are for them right now. While all children thrive on routine and stability, these children – and their parents – need it to survive. And right now, there is neither.
For nearly two decades, Agudath Israel of Ame...
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May 27, 2020 at 2:59 pm
Mashiach can only come from a seed other than the one that gave birth to Kayin
Rav Aaron Lopiansky, rosh yeshivah of the Yeshiva of Greater Washington, recently published Seed of Redemption, his English adaptation of Rav Yosef Lipovitz's Nachalas Yosef on Megillas Rus. Just in time for Shavuos.
When Nachalas Yosef was presented to Rav Gedaliah Nadel, one of those closest to the Chazon Ish, "he read it breathlessly from beginning to end, sobbing uncontrollably. [When he finished], he said, 'it is 500 years since a sefer of this kind was written; undoubtedly, it was written with ruach hakodesh,'" according to an eye-witness account.
Nachalas Yosef weaves the words of Chazal together in a seamless tapestry, not as isolated comments. The commentary demonstrates that Chazal�...
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May 27, 2020 at 12:42 pm
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday officially declared that Hong Kong is no longer autonomous from China, days after Beijing moved to impose new national security legislation on the territory.
“Beijing’s disastrous decision is only the latest in a series of actions that fundamentally undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy and freedoms and China’s own promises to the Hong Kong people under the Sino-British Joint Declaration, a U.N.-filed international treaty,” Pompeo said in a statement.
Chinese government officials, citing national security, announced that the National People’s Congress (NPC) will review legislation that would criminalize anti-government movements, like the recent years-long pro-democracy protests. Pro-democra...
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May 27, 2020 at 12:10 pm
President Rivlin to the farmers:
“The responsibility of the State of Israel is not to allow any dreams to crumble. No family should lose their source of income. We cannot leave anyone behind.”
“Agriculture is in my heart. I am doing everything I can to help and to raise consciousness. I promise you that I will continue to do so until the end of my term in office, and afterwards.”
“If we don’t bring the gleam back into the eyes of the farmers, there will be no next generation and that will be the end of a wonderful Israeli enterprise. Every year, more and more growers leave and the average age of Israel farmers is 63, according to the Ministry of Agriculture,” members of the Sa’ada family, flower growers from Moshav Maor told the president ...
