Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, March 25, 2020

03/25 Links Pt2: The virus spreading faster than coronavirus: Antisemitism; AJC Starts #BeAMensch Initiative to Promote and Encourage Kindness

From Ian:

The virus spreading faster than coronavirus: Antisemitism

As for the BDS movement, they have been relatively quiet on the question of whether or not they would use a (hypothetical) Israeli vaccine, but at least one pro-BDS Press TV journalist, Roshan Salih, tweeted he would rather be infected by coronavirus than use an Israeli product. Apparently, hating Israel is more important than living to some of these BDS activists. When Salih was mocked on social media, he reverted to another conspiracy claiming “Israel’s troll army” attacked him online.

No less hateful than the conspiracy theories and hate speech, there has also been a litany of outrageous comments exploiting the coronavirus pandemic to smear the state of Israel. From journalists, to organizations like Human Rights Watch (HRW), to Jewish extremist groups like IfNotNow, to Palestinian NGOs, comments which pre-emptively assume that Israel is failing to assist the Palestinians are spreading faster than the coronavirus itself.

Another popular talking point in these crowds has been using the pandemic to talk about occupation. “Students for Justice in Palestine” held a campus event on the topic in the US - before American universities were ordered shuttered. Regardless of one’s position on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, if your response to a global pandemic is to bash Israel you can’t be surprised when your motives are questioned. After all, the line between condemning policy and outright antisemitism has been repeatedly crossed in such statements. Last week a former HRW employee, Sarah Whitson, tweeted that Israel is only “missing a tablespoon of blood” in its oppression of Palestinians, a classic antisemitic trope about bloodthirsty Jews. Whitson later deleted the tweet saying it was being “misunderstood” but carried on bashing Israel. It’s no coincidence that statements like this “accidentally” come out when those who hold deeply ignorant and antisemitic views use words like “Israel” or “Zionism” as socially acceptable replacements for the words “Jews” and “Judaism.”

The plague of antisemitism is an ongoing problem on social media, as social media provides uncensored and sometimes anonymous platform to broadcast to the entire world. But this global pandemic has shown, in just a matter of days, that antisemitism today flourishes not just from the usual neo-Nazi or radical Islam fringes, but from the general public – world leaders, journalists, human rights activists, and more. Once again, irrational obsession with Jews demonstrates that antisemitism is not a marginal problem but all-too-mainstream.

Jonathan S. Tobin: The Zionist Congress election and the truth about American Jewry

It’s been derided as irrelevant and a relic of the distant past that ought to have been junked decades ago. But the World Zionist Congress election that has just concluded generated more interest and participation than it has in decades.

Just as interesting is a clear shift in the results from elections that just wrapped up on March 11 showing an increase in support for Orthodox slates and groups that identify with Israel’s Likud Party and other right-leaning groups. While the increased participation is a healthy sign for the Zionist movement, the gap between these results and polls of American Jewish opinion illustrate something else.

The Zionist Congress is significant because it helps control a nearly $1 billion budget that can support projects in Israel. Americans make up about one-third of those who will attend the gathering, which was scheduled to be held this summer.

Those who voted for the Congress may well be representative of the opinion of Jews who remain affiliated with synagogues and care deeply about Israel. But that distance between that segment of the population and the far larger group of Jews who are not motivated to take part in a Zionist Congress election is greater than ever. Though the vote produced a result that was surprisingly encouraging for most of those who consider themselves part of the pro-Israel community, it may also show that those who answer to that label are actually a minority of those Americans who consider themselves, by one definition or another, Jewish.

The vote that was held online from January through March generated a turnout of 123,629 votes. That may not sound like much when you consider that the Jewish population in the United States is about 7.5 million, according to the generous estimate of the Brandeis University Steinhardt Social Research Institute with the same study claiming that if you define it solely by religion, there are only 4.4 million American Jews.

That notwithstanding, the voters are a significant sample of the opinion of Jews who care enough about Israel and Zionism to pay a modest fee to register and declare support for the Jerusalem Program of the Zionist movement.

Freeing the Captives

Review of 'Genius and Anxiety' by Norman Lebrecht

Why the Jews? By a liberal definition of tribal membership (meaning those with at least one Jewish parent), there are around 17 million Jews in the world—about the population of Kazakhstan. An ancient civilization, Kazakhstan boasts a 99.5 percent literacy rate, but while it has produced writers and scientists, their names are not exactly household words.

Contrast this with the Jews. They invented monotheism, Hollywood, gefilte fish, relativity, and free will (Adam chose to eat the apple). Over the centuries, Jewish über-achievers range from Marx, Freud, Proust, Kafka, and Einstein to Mahler, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Gershwin, and Dylan; to Disraeli and Leon Blum; to Jonas Salk (polio vaccine) and Paul Ehrlich (chemotherapy); to Silicon Valley titans such as Sergei Brin and Larry Ellison; to Kirk Douglas, Steven Spielberg, and Seinfeld. Not to mention Groucho. Or Helena Rubinstein and Estée Lauder, who cooked up modern cosmetics.

So how did the Jews, who make up .2 percent of mankind, “change the world?” This is the question Norman Lebrecht asks in the subtitle of his new book, Genius and Anxiety. “I am not about to make a case for Jewish exceptionalism,” he answers, “nor do I believe that Jews are genetically gifted above the average.” Instead, he ascribes Jewish seichel to “culture and experience rather than DNA.” It’s all due to numeracy, literacy, and critical reasoning—the stuff of Talmudic study.

Lebrecht keeps referring to the causal role of the Talmud throughout his book, suggesting that even Freud and Einstein, who had never set foot in a yeshiva, were somehow formed by Talmudic sages who kept arguing ad infinitum for some 300 years at the beginning of the first millennium following the destruction of the Temple. But it is a long trip from Babylon and Jerusalem to Vienna and Berlin, from the Talmudic giants to the secularized, even areligious Jews of the 19th and 20th centuries, many of whom (or their parents) had converted to Christianity.

So let’s posit, as Lebrecht suggests we should, that somehow the ancient masters of pilpul handed the art of disputation down through the generations. After all, Freud’s father, Jacob, a wool merchant, was a Torah scholar.

But if “like father, like son” is the transmission belt, there are two problems.

Coronavirus has much of the world on lockdown. But that should not stop the Jews from being “a light unto the nations.” A beautiful example, in this regard, found expression in a Bild interview with Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. Kurz publicly credited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with spurring him on to take measures to counter the effects of the virus in Austria.

Another example of being a light for the nations is former refusenik Natan Sharansky, who shared tips with the world on coping with isolation. Sharansky spent nine years in a Soviet prison, much of the time in solitary confinement, for the crime of wanting to make Aliyah to Israel. Who better to speak on the subject of how to manage confinement than a prisoner of conscience?

While we are not Netanyahu or Sharansky, each of us, in our own way, has something to contribute to this effort of living under lockdown, to being a light unto the nations. I don't like to talk about it, but I have had some experience with hardship. I once lived on a small settlement I don't like to remember, called Metzad, where we had no shops or sidewalks, water was delivered daily (except when it wasn’t and the water ran out), and electricity was spotty at best.

For electrical power, the community depended on a generator designed for a much smaller load. My husband Dov had charge of the generator, and this was a losing proposition from the beginning. The generator couldn’t handle our needs, and the power was always cutting out, plunging us into darkness, and depending on the weather, into extremes of heat and cold . I was always trying to decide whether or not the food in my fridge was still safe, after another hours’ long power-out.

As the community grew, the generator failed more often and the power-outs were a constant. This meant that Dov had to run out, sometimes several times a night, in all kinds of weather, knocking on doors to get people to turn off their heaters, and directing them to go to lights and refrigerators only.

Some people invariably cheated, and this meant that Dov couldn’t get the generator back up. Dov knew exactly how many heaters it would take to put us over the top and overwhelm the system. The cheaters meant that everyone suffered, most of all Dov, who would have to get out of bed, get dressed, go down to the generator, try to coax it into coming back on, and if that failed, he’d have to run from house to house, and beg people to obey his directive to go to lights and fridge only.

Now my husband is not a patient man, God bless him, and he would sometimes get quite angry and even yell at people. He was wildly underappreciated, and did not even receive a salary for his service to the community.

Dov begged the Jewish Agency to provide us with a generator able to handle a larger number of people, and they’d give him one, but the gears ground too slowly, so that by the time we’d get the new generator, our community would have already grown beyond its capacity, too. We were started off with a 44 KW generator for 18 families, then upgraded to 120 KW for 28 families with 70 kids, then once again to 230 KW for 35 families with 220 kids. As a result, we residents were often restricted to lights and a fridge, only, as we shivered and sweated in our asbestos/concrete/cum cardboard caravans.

In front of our caravan on Metzad.

Losing power, meantime, was not just about being hot and cold in the dark eating spoiled food. It meant also that we were unsafe. Metzad was surrounded by hostile Arab villages, one in particular known for the extreme cruelty and violence of the residents. We had to keep the lights on to keep us safe, to prevent those who might sneak in from murdering us in our beds.

Basic needs and safety aside, Dov and I had other challenges. We had a lot of babies during this time period. So neither of us ever slept. It was either the generator, a crying infant or toddler, or a sick elementary school child (sometimes all of these at once) interrupting our sleep. Add in two intifadas and the Gulf War, assorted terror attacks, and many difficult pregnancies, and you can see it’s a lot.

It was, however, a difficult time for me for personal and emotional reasons, as well. I didn’t fit in with the community, which left me feeling very isolated. I couldn’t just take a day to run into town to get away from it all, because we had no public or private means of transportation for much of the time we lived on that mountaintop. As for moving away, well, we had no money to leave and anyway, somehow, my husband didn’t want to. So there was that disagreement about where we should be. It was all very stressful.

The Susita was the only blue and white car ever made. The parts were Ford Anglia, but the body was Israeli fiberglass construction. The car was more a curiosity than an efficient conveyance. Israelis would constantly pull alongside us, motion us to roll down the windows and offer to buy it off of us (when it worked).

There were always terrible gas fumes wafting about us as we drove, and the ride was NOISY and ROCKY. I went into labor every time Dov started the motor and the contractions never stopped until he parked. I was always afraid I'd give birth in that crazy car.

But I learned things up there on that mountain. I learned to make do with very little, in a time and place where even water and electricity were undependable and sporadic. I learned that when people suck, like whether it’s hogging electricity or hoarding toilet paper, refuge can still be found in books and food.

I survived. You will, too. You hang on when things are tough, because something in you loves life, craves life, in spite of everything. So you persist.

A lot of this is coming back to me now, the feeling of that time, in our current situation of being in the midst of a global pandemic, this coronavirus COVID-19. This struggle is the same as that, where basic resources are undependable, the work, both physical and mental, is as hard as can be, the isolation almost total, the fear hanging over our heads.

But my old and ugly history is the reason I feel well-equipped to handle the coronavirus lockdown. I feel completely equal to the task of living through this crazy plague. It’s like I had a trial by fire, and I already know how to do this.

That doesn’t mean I like it, but I can totally cope. We can do this. Even if it gets very hard.

None of us like it. Who wants to be tried by fire? But all of us know the truism: what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. That has to be the aim right now, not to be killed, so we can all come out stronger, even better for our travail.

And while we feel incredibly isolated, we are doing this all together, almost the whole world, at one and the same time. For me, at least, it’s hard not to contemplate that the messianic era may be coming quite soon. After all, we’re in the home stretch: the final 300 years of the world’s existence.

Things could get bad. They may get scary. But the main thing is not to let the fear become overwhelming.

Humor helps a lot. I mine the internet for funny corona memes and videos and share them with my friends.

Humor aside, it also helps to remember that young people will still be here, even if we are not, to find a vaccine and a cure for COVID-19. I try to be productive, to keep busy and so should you.

And should that involve reading trashy novels while eating potato chips and ice cream, I promise that your secret, will always be safe with me.

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A survey just done by the respected Palestinian Center for Public Opinion (not online as of this writing), performed between March 12-15, asks, ”Do you believe that a foreign power/other force is deliberately causing the spread of Coronavirus, or do you think that it is a natural mutation?”

51% answered “No,nobody is behind it, it’s a natural mutation” - but 47% said "Yes, it is deliberately spread” by a foreign power.

68.3% of Palestinians did support cooperation between the Palestinian and Israeli authorities in managing the crisis.

Over 70% of Palestinians said that they had already been personally impacted economically by the coronavirus.

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03/25 Links Pt1: Israel announces 4th, 5th deaths in pandemic; Health Ministry: Coronavirus Spread Matches "More Optimistic Scenario"

From Ian:

Israel announces 4th, 5th deaths in pandemic; 2,170 diagnosed with coronavirus

The Health Ministry on Wednesday morning said that five people have now died in Israel in the coronavirus pandemic.

Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer announced the death of a 76-year-old man, Israel’s fourth fatality from COVID-19.

The man reportedly had serious health issues before he contracted the virus. He was not immediately named.

According to Hebrew media reports, the fifth victim was an 87-year-old man who arrived at the Mayanei Hayeshua Medical Center in Bnei Brak on Tuesday with breathing difficulties. He was tested after he died and diagnosed with the coronavirus.

The Health Ministry announced Wednesday afternoon that the number of people diagnosed with coronavirus in Israel is now 2,170, an increase of 240 since Tuesday, which had seen the largest single-day jump in cases since the crisis began.

According to the ministry, 37 people with COVID-19 are in serious condition, and 54 are in moderate condition. Another 1,876 people have mild symptoms.

There have now been 58 Israelis who have recovered from the virus.

Israel Health Ministry: Coronavirus Spread Matches "More Optimistic Scenario"

Health Ministry Deputy Director-General Itamar Grotto said on Monday that although the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Israel keeps climbing steadily, the figures match the ministry's "more optimistic" predictions.

"There are no exponential leaps [in numbers of cases]," Prof. Grotto told Ynet. "I hope we will maintain this level of new cases. This is how we know that the steps we've taken are starting to be effective."

"We'll have to wait a couple of days to see whether these steps are working. In another two weeks, they will start affecting the rate of severe illness and mortality rates."

Grotto said that the number of coronavirus tests conducted by health authorities, which stands at a few thousand a day, is increasing and will even double by next week.

"I think we've definitely reached our goal," Grotto said. "Now, our next goal is to maintain these figures for the next couple of days and then reach 7,000-8,000 tests a day."
"We hope to reach at least 7,000 this week and then double that figure by next week."

The Health Ministry's official goal is to reach 5,000 tests a day until next week and 10,000 within two and a half weeks, but according to the ministry's data, only 3,230 coronavirus tests were conducted in the last 24 hours. Professor Grotto estimates that over 30,000 tests for the pathogen have been conducted in Israel so far.

Grotto repeated his earlier estimate that up to 20,000 Israelis could die from the coronavirus if the spread of the disease spins out of control, but that number would be still a negligible number out of the total mortality rate.

New virus rules keeping people within 100 meters of home go into effect

The government on Wednesday announced a raft of new restrictions that came into effect from 5 p.m. for a seven-day period, including a prohibition on people venturing more than 100 meters from their homes, apart from under certain circumstances, and the shuttering of synagogues.

The regulations permit Israelis to leave their homes only for the following activities:

1. Going to work and coming back, within previously specified regulations on who is allowed to work;
2. Stocking up on food, medicine and necessary goods and to receive essential services;
3. Receiving medical care;
4. Donating blood;
5. For legal proceedings;
6. To attend a demonstration;
7. Going to the Knesset;
8. Receiving care in a social work framework;
9. A short walk of no more than 100 meters from one’s home either as an individual or with others from the same residence for an undefined “short period of time”;
10. Helping a person with a medical problem or other difficulty that requires support, such as old age or physical infirmity;
11. Going to an outdoor area for prayer, a wedding, funeral or circumcision with fewer than 10 people at a distance of two meters apart. A woman can go to immerse in a mikveh provided that she has coordinated her arrival in advance;
12. Taking children to educational frameworks for those whose parents are essential workers (in accordance with previous orders);
13. Taking children whose parents do not live together from one residence to another;
14. Transferring a child whose sole caregiver is required to leave for an essential purpose.

In addition, public transportation was reduced to around 25 percent of services and taxis will only be permitted to take one passenger unless the second is an escort for medical reasons. All passengers must sit in the back seat of the vehicle with the windows open.

The entire #CoronaVirus strategy in 2 minutes! Simple, yet effective breakdown by #Israel's Defense Minister @naftalibennett: pic.twitter.com/hDEUzijW0x
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) March 25, 2020

Pallywood from Linda Sarsour's charity

I wrote yesterday about Baitulmaal, the Hamas-linked charity that Linda Sarsour is raising money for to supposedly help ready Gaza for a coronavirus outbreak.

I included this photo from their website of Baitulmaal members on the ground in Gaza, apparently aiding a disabled man.

This photo seems to be a staged photo of a healthy man who is posing with crutches.

A reader who has had nine separate leg and foot injuries and who has had to re-learn how to walk each time saw a number of issues with how this supposedly disabled man was holding his crutches.

The Crutches- the crutches are way up in the man’s armpits. Unless he is much taller and really leaning forward (he isn’t) no one has ever fitted the crutches to his height. Now Palestinian medicine is not so hot but one has to assume when he was given the crutches they fitted him for his height. Note too they are angled forward, which is common when you stop and want to rest but if the crutches were directly lined up with his feet, they would be higher than his armpits and would have to be angled outward. They are 6-7” in front of his feet meaning they would be at least 2-3” higher up his armpits if they were vertical.

The Arms- the man’s arms are bent such that if he straightened his arms, his feet would be 6’ off the ground. His arms are thin and do not show the biceps and shoulders from extensive use of crutches, definitely a rookie.

Fingers and Handle The Right Hand- no one has 2 fingers off the handle around the vertical bar. Some like me will use one finger for better control, most people, especially first time users have all their fingers on the handle. Left Hand- has one finger looped, why one finder on one hand and two on the other? This makes no sense. I get that he has stopped so they can take his picture but one does not hold crutches like that if you need them to balance (which is the whole point of crutches).

Conclusions: the man using crutches appears to be pretending to use the crutches or he has just recently gotten them and no one has bothered to fit them to him. It is possible the image distorts his posture but his feet are not that far back from the forward position of the crutches. It is possible this is a healthy man posing with crutches.

This all rings true. The man is putting virtually all his weight on his supposedly injured legs.

If Baitulmaal is faking photos of its own accomplishments in Gaza, it is probably lying about many other things.

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Syria's Ministry of the Interior has threatened to arrest anyone who says anything about the coronavirus that doesn't come directly from the government.

Up until this week, Syria denied having a single case of Covid-19 in the country. In reality, reports indicate that the epidemic is in full swing. Apparently, the government realized that its denial of any cases caused people to not take the threat seriously, so they announced a single victim - a 20 year old woman who traveled from another country - and with it a set of sweeping measures to quarantine areas of the country,

Even pro-Syrian commentators have expressed skepticism at the official Syrian position. Everyone knows that many people are still crossing between Syria and Iran where the virus is widespread and also severely underreported.

Apparently, in the northwest of the country where there are a million refugees in camps, there have already been many cases but not testing kits to confirm. The Kurdish autonomous zone has closed itself off.

Threatening to arrest anyone who admits that the epidemic is already out of control in Syria is a classic honor/shame move. To Syrian leaders, appearing strong and impervious to a virus is literally more important than the health and safety of millions of people, and Syrian insistence that it does not need outside help will kill tens of thousands - all to maintain a sense of "honor" that no one believes.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Last night I livestreamed a point by point rebuttal of a Twitter thread by the hate group IfNotNow.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Gaza closes its wedding halls. (They look REALLY nice.)

Gaza had closed all its wedding halls because of the coronavirus crisis.

Here is what one of them looks like.

Just like Buchenwald.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

03/24 Links Pt2: Coronavirus claims 3rd victim in Israel, an 87-year-old man from Jerusalem; 400,000 People Worldwide Tune in for Livestreamed Concert by Idan Raichel

From Ian:

Coronavirus claims 3rd victim in Israel, an 87-year-old man from Jerusalem

Jerusalem’s Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center announced Tuesday evening the death of an 87-year-old man from the coronavirus, Israel’s third fatality in the pandemic.

The man was brought to the hospital earlier this week from the nursing home where he lived, after testing positive for the virus, the hospital said. He had a series of underlying medical problems, including diabetes and dementia, it added in the statement.

The man was not immediately named.

He was the second resident of the Nofim Tower assisted living facility in Jerusalem to succumb to the illness. The first was Aryeh Even, 88, who passed away on Friday.

Earlier Tuesday, a 67-year-old woman, named as Malka Keva from the coastal city of Bat Yam, died of the coronavirus in Holon’s Wolfson Medical Center, the hospital said.

Keva suffered from “a serious preexisting medical condition,” according to the hospital. Several years ago, she fell ill with cancer and had been in a weakened state when she contracted the virus.

On Tuesday morning, the Health Ministry reported that the number of diagnosed cases of coronavirus in the country had risen to 1,656, an increase of 214 from the previous night.

What the US can learn from Israel’s handling of coronavirus crisis

While the United States has one of the largest and most powerful militaries in the world, most Americans don’t interact with the military in their daily lives.

In Israel, the IDF plays an important part in the country’s day-to-day life and has even been called to help when other countries faced natural disasters.

In places like Europe, militaries have stepped up their role augmenting police and security forces, and it looks like in New York and California this may be the case as well. Floating military hospitals are going to help treat the overflow of ill citizens and the National Guard has been put on call in many states.

Militaries by their nature prepare for any contingency, and, as we are seeing unfold across the globe, are taking an active leadership role.

As Abraham Ronen, a security expert from ActPro LTD Consulting & Project Management states, “The military is an integrated and familiar part of Israeli society. The challenge we are currently facing is how active a role the IDF will play in taking responsibilities from the police and other security forces, particularly as the coronavirus is also impacting other players in the region.”

It WILL be ok

For Israelis, optimism that all will be fine (“yihiyeh b’seder”) is not some vague hope that things will work themselves out. It means things will be okay because people will actively figure out solutions.

Given Israel’s security situation, one would think that its citizens would be in a constant state of depression or panic. The reality is that living with purpose, close family and peer connections (which are being tested to an extreme these days because of self-isolation) and finding meaning in struggle have made Israel’s citizens among the world’s happiest.

People in Israel understand hardships will happen, but that ultimately they will prevail. That is a lesson many in the United States are learning now.

No one knows where this will lead. But both the United States and Israel are learning more every day about the virus. The examples above prove ways in which we can be proactive on a national scale to battle the COVID-19 crisis.

Jonathan “Yoni” Frenkel heads a digital marketing agency, YKC Media, that focuses on engaging millennial and tech professionals through content. He’s been involved in the New York-Israeli tech community for many years and previously held roles as a nonprofit professional at both the IAC Dor Chadash and AIPAC.

Palestine Today has a remarkable article:

The director of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque Omar Al-Kiswani said that the Endowment Council’s decision to temporarily suspend the prayers at the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque began to be implemented at dawn today, Monday 23/3/2020, and it is meant to preserve the lives and prevent the spread of the Corona virus among the worshipers.

Al-Kiswani said in radio statements that only certain numbers of endowments employees, the guardians of the blessed mosque and some workers will be present, where the full prayers will be held and he will be entrusted in front of the mosque with those present .

Sounds reasonable so far. Only limited numbers of people, worship only outdoors, all to help save lives. This is mature behavior.

But then he had to add this:

On the other hand, the director of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque held the occupation fully responsible for the lives of worshipers inside Al-Aqsa if the occupation forces opened the doors of the Moroccans to the settlers.

If Jews happen to also be in the general area - they never go anywhere near the Muslim worshipers - then the Jews are suddenly the ones responsible for the Muslims' health, and not the Muslims themselves.

This sort of thinking is automatic, and no one questions how the mere presence of Jews some 20 or 40 feet from the Muslims makes Israel "fully responsible for the lives of the worshipers."

But it is consistent with what we see - Jews must be blamed if possible, and only if there are no Jews to blame can a secondary party be sought to take the scapegoat place.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

102 year old Holocaust survivor dies of the coronavirus in Brooklyn

In the middle of a Haaretz article on the New York Orthodox community and the coronavirus, it quotes Gershon Schlesinger, CEO of the ParCare Medical Centers in Brooklyn:

Schlesinger said that several members of the Orthodox community with pre-existing conditions had passed away from COVID-19. One of them was a 102-year-old Holocaust survivor of the Satmar Orthodox Jewish sect in Williamsburg. Liba Ettel Silberstein leaves behind some 1,200 grand and great grandchildren, according to her great grandson Moshe Klein.

An Israeli hareidi site fills in some details.

Lita Ettel was born in 1917 in the city of Terszell in northeast Hungary to David and Gital Glick, the youngest of ten children.

She was the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust. She came to the US and married Rabbi Natan Dovid Silberstein in 1946, and raised a family with eight children.

When she was young, when her twins Abraham and Elazar about to have their Bar Mitzvah, she had terminal cancer and was in very critical condition. Her husband was a disciple of the Satmar Rebbe, Rabbi Yoel Teitelbaum and he came in and asked for a blessing for her but the Rebbe did not want to promise anything, saying it was a decree from heaven. Rabbi Natan Dovid refused to leave without a blessing. The Rebbe's wife heard this, came into the room and insisted that he give a blessing that should include a long life for Liba Ettel, which he did.

It turned out to be effective, as Liba Ettel recovered fully and ended up a matriarch to great-great-grandchildren, over 1200 descendants in all.

Even a couple of weeks ago, on Purim, she was healthy and walked by herself, remembering the names of all her the family and praying.

A week ago she was not feeling well, and over the weekend the condition worsened and she succumbed.

"The funeral took place only with the participation of her sons and daughters and a limited number of grandchildren who were in close contact with her, and with God's help when the corona crisis passes, a reunion will be made with the whole family." her grandson Rabbi Moshe Klein, of Monsey, told the website.

Klein added that "she would deliberately read the entire the book of Psalms every Shabbos and pray for her grandchildren, we would go on Friday nights to be blessed and welcomed by her."

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

03/24 Links Pt1: 67-year-old woman dies of COVID-19, becoming Israel’s 2nd fatality; Natan Sharansky: 5 Tips to Get Through the Coronavirus Quarantine

From Ian:

67-year-old woman dies of COVID-19, becoming Israel’s second fatality

A 67-year-old woman died of the coronavirus Tuesday afternoon in Holon’s Wolfson Medical Center, the hospital said, confirming Israel’s second fatality in the global pandemic.

The woman suffered from “a serious preexisting medical condition,” according to the hospital.

Israel’s first fatality from the virus, 88-year-old Holocaust survivor Aryeh Even, was buried overnight Saturday in a funeral service that was capped at 20 mourners. All present were required to stand at a two-meter (6.5 ft) distance from one another.

Hours before the announcement of the latest death, the Health Ministry reported that the number of diagnosed cases of coronavirus in the country has risen to 1,656, an increase of 214 from the previous night.

So far, 49 people have recovered from COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, the ministry said in its morning update.

Of those being treated, 30 are in serious condition.

Over 71,000 Israelis are in quarantine, down from nearly 75,000 reported on Monday morning. In total, over 135,000 have spent time in self-isolation, almost 6,000 more than the number reported on Monday morning.

Coronavirus cases climb to 1,656, up 214 from Monday night

The number of diagnosed cases of coronavirus in the country rose to 1,656, the Health Ministry reported Tuesday morning, showing an increase of 214 from the previous night.

So far, 49 people have recovered from COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, the ministry said in its morning update. One person has died.

Of those being treated, 31 are in serious condition.

Over 71,000 Israelis are in quarantine, down from nearly 75,000 reported on Monday morning. In total, over 135,000 have spent time in self-isolation, almost 6,000 more than the number reported on Monday morning, meaning more people are leaving isolation than entering it.

The rise in cases came alongside a boost in the number of tests for the virus, with 3,743 people tested in the previous 24 hours. On Monday morning the ministry said it had tested 3,230 in the previous 24-hour period.

Tuesday’s increase followed what appeared to be the biggest single-day jump on Monday, when the ministry reported 371 new cases for a total of 1,442. The ministry generally sends out two updates a day, in the morning and at night, and Tuesday’s 12-hour surge of 214 since the previous report could indicate the record will again go up by the end of the day.

Israel is in 21st place on a list of cases by countries hit by the virus, according to data from the John Hopkin University virus website, which collates information on the global pandemic. China remains at the top, followed by Italy, the US, and Spain.

Israel is reportedly set to announce drastic new restrictions on public movement it hopes will help stanch the spread of the virus, though policy experts expect any effect to only be seen in 10 days or more.

Israel may order elderly into full lockdown — report

As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assesses tightening social distancing measures aimed at stemming the coronavirus outbreak, the government is reportedly considering imposing a full lockdown on elderly Israelis.

The measure would forbid all men aged 70 and up and women aged 65 and up from leaving their homes, Channel 12 reported Monday.

COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus pandemic sweeping the globe, has the most adverse effects on the elderly and those with underlying conditions, while younger people often experience only milder symptoms.

As of Monday afternoon, the virus had killed over 15,000 people and infected over 350,000 worldwide, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Other options being considered by the government include closing all shops except food stores and pharmacies or placing further limits on what kind of workers can go to their place of employment.

“There is no choice but to step up the measures. This is still not a curfew — but it is the closest there is to it,” a source with knowledge of the deliberations was quoted as saying.

Natan Sharansky: 5 Tips to Get Through the Coronavirus Quarantine

My name is Natan Sharansky. I was born in the Soviet Union and at the age of 29 I was arrested for my Zionist activity. I spent 9 years in prison, half of it in solitary confinement and 405 days in a punishment cell. So I have some experience of spending time in solitary confinement and I want to give you 5 tips to get through the quarantine.
Tip 1: In prison I always had to remind myself I am part of a huge, global battle. You also should remind yourself that we are at war with a very dangerous, though invisible, enemy. And whether we will succeed in the battle depends also on your behavior.
Tip 2: In prison, I didn't know when I will be released or if I will be released at all. Don't build your future plans based on the hope that in the next few days, or the next few weeks, it all will be finished. It does not depend on you. So try to build plans which fully depend on you.
Tip 3: Never give up your sense of humor. I remember how in prison I enjoyed telling anti-Soviet jokes to my prison guards.
Tip 4: Don't give up on your hobbies. I knew how to play chess without the board and in the punishment cell I could play thousands of games in my head. You can enjoy singing, playing music, drawing, or whatever you like to do.
Tip 5: Feel your connection. Remember that you are not alone. We Jews, for thousands of years, were scattered all over the world. But we always had this feeling that we are part of a great people, with our mutual past, with our mutual future, and with our mutual mission. Think about it. Feel your connection. Together we will succeed. Am Yisrael chai [The people of Israel live].