Commuters cautiously return to railways after 3-month halt
Commuters returned in modest numbers to the railways on Monday morning, as trains renewed operations for the first time in almost three months due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Trains are currently limited to 500 passengers and would-be travelers must reserve a seat online from 48 hours ahead of their journey.
Entry to train stations is conditional upon making a reservation, temperature of travelers is checked upon entry to stations and masks must be worn at all times during the journey, Israel Railways emphasized repeatedly prior to renewing services.
While passenger demand may yet exceed the new limit on train capacity, no such fears materialized on the first day of railway travel. Fewer than 100 tickets were reserved on some rush hour services, including on the popular Tel Aviv-Jerusalem route. Passengers reported surprisingly light footfall at train stations across the network.
“Returning the train with a unique model demonstrates our desire, on one hand, to look after public health and, on the other hand, ensure economic continuity,” Transportation Minister Miri Regev told reporters at Tel Aviv’s Hahagana station on Monday .
“I call on the public to adhere to Health Ministry instructions. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu always talks about the accordion model. Whatever we have opened, we can close, and vice versa.”
Cyber Minister David Amsalem (Likud) on Monday spoke in the Knesset about the need to immediately implement Trump’s plan .
“Israel is at one of its most important junctions since the state was founded,” Amsalem said. “We have a historic, unprecedented opportunity to apply sovereignty in Judea and Samaria, and we have to take advantage of it.”
Responding to charges from the Joint List that annexation would make Israel an apartheid state, Amsalem asked Arab MKs if they had ever seen a Jew wandering in Ramallah or Jenin.
However, Likud Central Committee chairman Haim Katz took issue with the fact that the Trump plan would leave more isolated settlements as Israeli enclaves within Palestinian territory.
“We are against enclaves, we are against isolated settlements. If we have to fight, we will fight,” Katz said.
Katz added that if necessary, he was willing to bring the matter back to the Likud central committee for a vote.
The destruction of 21 Gazan settlements during the 2005 Disengagement has only underscored the need for the Likud’s support for sovereignty, Katz said.
Katz spoke in a meeting with Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, a right-wing opponent of the Trump plan due to it allowing for the creation of a Palestinian state. He also fears in particular that the Trump plan would lead to the destruction of 15 settlements where at least 15,000 Israelis live.
US support is “not worth” the price of watching the destruction of those communities, said Dagan. He himself
HOW DO members of Congress hope to help? Back in late February, on the eve of the AIPAC conference and before the pandemic fully arrived on America’s shores, Sens. Gary Peters, a Democrat from Michigan, and Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas, sent a letter to Secretary of Defense Mark Esper urging the creation of a permanent working group with Israel that would share defense capabilities and requirements. It could coordinate joint research and development.
The goal was to complement the US 2018 National Defense Strategy, which envisions America needing to confront major states, not just fight terrorists. That in essence boils down to the US confronting Iran, Russia and China this century. The senators foresaw a US-Israel Operational Technology Working Group. How that would work, however, was unclear.
The problem for the US is that new technology is slow to be incorporated. This is because militaries are conservative and the whole nature of how the US develops new weapons borders on being sloth-like with layers of bureaucracy.
For instance, Washington worked on experimenting with new stealth drones and the sleek Zumwalt-class stealth ships, but canceled most of the ships. If America has fielded a stealth drone, it is so classified and expensive that probably very few were built. After all, the US is still flying U-2 spy planes 60 years after they were built and long after everyone thought they would be put out to pasture.
Congress’s bipartisan support for this working group would seek to illustrate how much of an ideal partner Israel is for innovation that will benefit both countries. The senators pointed out that the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2020 had mandated a report by March 1 on cooperative research and development opportunities.
THERE ARE added reasons to make more formalized relationships with the US through means such as this. It creates more layers to the alliance with Israel, especially at a time when support for the Jewish state may be eroding in some sectors of the US. Bipartisan support for Israel was a hallmark of the relationship – and this is symbolic.
The US appears to be drawing down forces from the Middle East, perhaps from Syria or eventually Iraq and even its commitment to the multi-national forces in Sinai. Upping other aspects of the relationship, in key technological plug-ins – where Israel has excelled at sensors, UAVs, missiles and other technological add-ons that fit well with the larger platforms made by the US – is a way the relationship can be symbiotic.
This summer will tell whether the working group gets more support and ends up in the NDAA or if it remains an idea on the sidelines. Either way, there will be initiative and increasing the discussion about the need for more rapid advancement of technology to confront emerging threats.
It is no surprise that CENTCOM chief Gen. Kenneth McKenzie has voiced concern about swarms of small drones as a threat. Rafael in Israel recently used lasers to take down several drones. Meanwhile, the US Navy recently successfully tested a high-energy laser weapon as part of its Solid State Laser Technology Maturation