The political Purim masquerade
Have Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rivals found a way to beat him by outdeceiving him?
Purim is the one day a year on the Jewish calendar where Jews are encouraged to wear costumes and hide who they really are.
Ironically, many politicians are encouraged by their political strategists and campaign teams to do that all year long, especially during elections.
It often happens that the candidates who do that best emerge victorious against their rivals. But deception is a big risk, because it is so easy to get caught.
Rightly or wrongly, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has obtained a reputation over time as an expert at breaking promises and the art of deception before and after elections without paying a price for it. The 30 seats some polls give his Likud party on March 23 after breaking his promise to Benny Gantz on a rotation in the Prime Minister’s Office that was the basis of the outgoing government are the latest proof that he is not being held accountable for undeniable deception.
His political base is said to appreciate how he has used those abilities to help Israel on the world stage, as well as his political rivals at home. After 21 lies were counted in Netanyahu’s interview with Channel 12 anchor Yonit Levi, the prime minister was lavished with praise in Likud whatsapp groups and social media.
In this space last week, the Post’s Lahav Harkov revealed the Likud’s strategy for winning next month’s election. Sources close to Netanyahu’s opponents revealed that their strategy for defeating the ruling party is simply to outdo him at his own games of political subterfuge.
The election started with Gideon Sa’ar leaving Likud after months of masquerading in the Knesset as a loyal MK honoring faction discipline. Instead, he was quietly crafting his strategy for the political upheaval he was planning.
He worked behind the scenes during the night that the outgoing government was toppled to ensure that the deadline for passing the state budget would not be extended and the current election would be initiated. His loyalists stayed home or voted at the last minute with the opposition.
Sa’ar’s departure created a rival party on the Right that provides an alternative for Likud voters who are sick of Netanyahu or upset with his handling of the coronavirus crisis and any number of other issues.
But to defeat Netanyahu, a new subterfuge was needed. That required right-wing parties that could attract voters who don’t have anything against the prime minister.
There already was one in Yisrael Beytenu, which takes pro-Netanyahu voters – mostly Russian-speaking immigrants – from the pro-Netanyahu camp to the anti-Netanyahu camp. But three elections proved that was not enough.
Naftali Bennett’s Yamina is filling that role.
Bennett makes a point of refusing to be assigned to either of those political camps. He admits that he wants Netanyahu replaced, but he unequivocally refuses to rule out joining a government led by him. This enables him to woo pro-Netanyahu voters and anti-Netanyahu voters together.
Netanyahu has taken two steps to fight against this strategy. First of all, by forcing Shas, United Torah Judaism and the Religious Zionist Party to affirm their loyalty to him, he took away possible coalition partners for the anti-Netanyahu camp that get the same number of seats as Yesh Atid.
Then Netanyahu has made a point of constantly equating Bennett and Sa’ar with Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, because without those three parties, there cannot be an anti-Netanyahu coalition without Lapid. It is obvious to voters that if Yesh Atid is the second-largest party, Lapid would be seen as the anti-Netanyahu camp’s candidate for prime minister.
After polls indicated that Netanyahu was succeeding in hammering that message home, Bennett needed to take action. He announced nonchalantly in a radio interview on Wednesday morning that he would not enter a government led by Lapid.
Bennett made a point of delivering the bombshell in a radio interview and not a press conference or a political rally, because he is trying to keep his image as a professional who deals with the coronavirus and the economy, and not politics.
He never intended to join a government led by Lapid, who is extremely unpopular among Yamina’s voter base, and perhaps saying it in the key days closer to Election Day could have helped. But a source in Yamina admitted that Netanyahu’s messaging was eroding the party’s support and said “moneytime could have been too late.” Bennett wanted to get out the message that he does not believe Lapid could form a government even if given a chance.
SO WHO can form a government? Speculation has been building that Sa’ar and Bennett have been conspiring for months.
They would attack each other throughout the campaign, but after the votes were counted, they would join forces to form a faction led by whichever party won more seats that would outflank Yesh Atid as the largest in the anti-Netanyahu camp. Lapid would be forced to join under Sa’ar or Bennett. Together, they would receive 61 recommendations to form a government and would be given the mandate to build a coalition by President Reuven Rivlin.
Sources in both Yamina and New Hope confirmed that such an option has been discussed, but said Bennett and Sa’ar are far from coordinating strategy. Their criticism of each other was genuine and harmful, and even if they could join forces, they will have a very hard time deciding who gets to be prime minister.
New Hope gets more seats in the polls. But only Bennett has an option of joining Netanyahu, which is a powerful card he can play.
Bennett intends to play the card to demand at least to go first in a rotation in the Prime Minister’s Office, if not the entire term. He is counting on Lapid and Sa’ar, preferring that to another coalition with Netanyahu in power.
Sources close to Bennett said that, while Sa’ar’s tactics of being an anti-Netanyahu party brought him more votes than Yamina, Bennett’s strategy of playing both sides will help him win the real game, which will be played after the election is over.
Bennett’s goals are deposing Netanyahu, keeping the Right in power and preventing another election. He will get all three whether he or Sa’ar forms the government. No matter which one becomes prime minister, their deceptions will have emerged victorious.
If that happens, the week of Purim will be remembered in retrospect as the time when an upheaval was advanced by defeating Netanyahu at his own game.
Largely ignored by the global media, the fighting in Yemen between the Saudi-supported government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and the Iran-supported Ansar Allah (Houthi) movement, is currently at its most intense since 2018. The Houthis (named after the clan that established and leads the movement) are besieging the city of Marib, located in a gas-rich region of the country. The offensive matters because of the impact it is having on the lives of the people of Yemen, including more than a million displaced persons who live in Marib. But it is also important because of what it indicates regarding broader changes under way in the strategic balance and direction of the Middle East.
The Marib region contains an oil refinery and supplies gas to all of Yemen. It is the last area in Yemen’s North still controlled by the Hadi government. Its loss would thus represent a major strategic blow to the government’s cause. The Houthis, who launched the current phase of their insurgency against the government in 2014, control the Yemeni capital, Sana’a.
The Houthi insurgency followed the toppling of the Western-backed, long-standing regime of president Ali Abdullah Saleh in 2012. Saleh, abandoned by his former Western backers, allied with the Iran-supported Houthis against the new government, and together they took the capital. The Houthis then turned on Saleh and killed him in December 2017. Evidence has since emerged to suggest that this killing was carried out under the direct orders of then IRGC/Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani.
A Saudi-led and United Arab Emirates-backed intervention to prevent the conquest of the entire country by the Houthis commenced in 2015. Yemen is of strategic importance because at its southern tip, the Bab el-Mandeb (Gate of Tears) Strait controls access between the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea.
This is a choke point for vessels making their way from the Persian Gulf toward the Suez Canal. A massive volume of natural gas, oil and petroleum-based products on the way to the canal and to European and US markets makes its way through the strait every day. In all, around 9% of all seaborne-traded crude oil and refined petroleum products pass through the strait.
Control of access to this gateway by an Iranian client would represent an enormous strategic gain by Tehran. It would give the Iranians the ability to disrupt or shut down a significant volume of oil traffic to the West at a stroke. The Saudi- and Emirates-supported intervention succeeded in preventing the Houthis from capturing the southern tip of Yemen, and thus acquiring control of the strait. They proved unable, however, to defeat Ansar Allah in its entirety.
In a pattern that has become wearingly familiar in the Middle East over the last decade, the country then became divided into de facto areas of control, and subject to a massive humanitarian crisis. The current offensive on Marib is the most intense episode of fighting since 2018, and is an attempt by the Houthis and their backers to break the long stalemate and regain momentum toward their objective of conquering the entire country.
Pro-government defenses at Sirwah, to the west of Marib City, have collapsed in recent days. As a result, the frontline is now located roughly 20 km. (12 miles) from Marib City, according to Reuters. Hundreds of fighters on both sides have been killed. At present, however, the lines are holding, and the government maintains air superiority, which may prove crucial in preventing the taking of the city by the Houthis in the period ahead.
Marib is home to between one million and 1.5 million refugees. More than 1,500 families have been displaced since the current round of fighting began on February 6. Around 116,000 people left their homes in Yemen in the course of the last year, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration.
THE HOUTHI offensive commenced on February 6. The timing is crucial to understanding the dynamic. On February 4, US President Joe Biden announced the withdrawal of US support for the Saudi war effort.
“This war has to end,” the president said. “To underscore our commitment, we are ending all American support for offensive operations in the war on Yemen, including relevant arms sales.”
Two days later, the US administration unconditionally revoked the designation of the Houthis as a foreign terrorist designation. The Houthi offensive toward Marib began on the same day. The Houthis also commenced a series of drone attacks on Saudi Arabia.
The desire for an end to war in Yemen is understandable. The humanitarian crisis is acute and urgently in need of attention. Some 250,000 people have lost their lives in a half decade of war.
Unfortunately, however, the US has leverage over only one of the sides. The net result of the removal of support for the Saudi-led side has thus predictably not led to a move toward ending hostilities. Rather, it has resulted in increased aggression by the pro-Iranian side, which now perceives itself as facing an isolated and crumbling opponent rather than an adversary enjoying the backing of a major power.
The sequence of events leading to the Houthi push toward Marib is indicative of a sharp change of perception in Washington, DC, which is producing rapid results in the Middle East.
The element of the previous administration that dealt with the Middle East shared the core perception of the region held by key US allies, including Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. According to this conception, a contest for power in the Middle East is under way between rival camps.
This contest is fought partly through proxies. It is a battle for strategic space, and the control of resources and key geo-strategic locations. The camp of which Saudi Arabia and Israel are members is one committed to alliance with the West, and to preserving the strategic architecture in place in the region since the end of the Cold War. It is opposed principally by Iran and its allies and proxies. Arguably, Turkey and its allies constitute an additional anti-status quo power axis.
Reading from this map, support for the Saudi cause in Yemen was obvious and axiomatic. The country is of strategic importance. A pro-Western alliance is fighting a pro-Iranian one. Iran must be prevented from reaching Bab el-Mandeb. No further discussion required.
The Biden administration’s reversal of this straightforward stance with regard to Yemen is the latest evidence that it is reading from a very different map. Together with the administration’s attempt to sideline Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, it suggests that an earlier dynamic has been reestablished. This dynamic, familiar from the Obama period, is one in which allies are reined in and unilateral concessions are made to Tehran, in the hope that this will produce a change in behavior further downstream.
Seen from this perspective, local allies who wish to take a firm stance against Iranian aggression rapidly start to look like a nuisance, a greater impediment to progress than the supposed adversary.
Saudi Arabia appears already to have acquired this distinction with regard to the new administration. The desperate defense of Marib currently underway is the direct result. With regard to the broader administration intent that lies behind all this, the offensive in Yemen, combined with the flurry of rocket attacks against US targets in Iraq by Iran-linked militias, would suggest that as of now, it appears to be producing increased Iranian aggression rather than its intended opposite.
After nearly two months, Israeli data is beginning to confirm what Pfizer already knew: their coronavirus vaccine stops symptomatic and severe COVID-19.
So, why are Israelis still wearing masks for anything but Purim?
Health experts are still unsure whether the vaccines prevent asymptomatic cases – contracting the virus but having no symptoms. If those people who get vaccinated can still contract coronavirus and transmit it to others, then it will be difficult to stop the spread of COVID-19.
If people silently become infected with coronavirus, they could pass it on, potentially sickening people who are not immune.
A model developed by the researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in January showed that people with no symptoms transmit more than half of all cases of the novel coronavirus.
But there is growing evidence that people who get vaccinated do not spread the virus very much, if at all.
The ideal vaccine is one that produces what is known as sterilizing immunity, which means that your immune system is able to stop a pathogen, including viruses, from replicating within your body. Not all vaccines achieve this standard. For example, the measles and rubella vaccines provide it. The hepatitis B and C vaccines do not.
Although it is scientifically intuitive that a reduction in infection and transmission would come with vaccination, and preliminary signs suggest that the vaccine does do at least some of both, according to Cyrille Cohen, head of the immunotherapy laboratory at Bar-Ilan University, “we need proof” and that these are exceedingly difficult studies to do.
Having the answer would have “obvious” and “major implications” on people’s daily lives, said Eran Segal, a computational biologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science. That is because to achieve herd immunity, the vaccine would need to prevent transmission.
The more the virus circulates, he explained, the more opportunity it has to mutate in ways that enhance its ability to spread – like the British variant – to make people sick or become vaccine resistant.
“If you have people coming from abroad and you know there is a small chance they will pass on the virus, we can let them go and they do not have to quarantine,” Segal explained. “But if you know there is a non-negligible chance that they can still pass on the virus, then you have to pay attention, because of the variants.”
He said it also relates to the general opening up of society, such as the ability to hold large concerts without concern. Or, to hold those concerts without social distancing and masks.
“Everyone still needs to be cautious,” said Prof. Gili Regev-Yochay, director of the Infectious Disease Epidemiology Unit at Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer. “Things are more complicated now because people think they are vaccinated and everything is good, so it’s harder to get them to keep on their masks. But it is necessary because we do know that some people will get infected and be asymptomatic. And those people may be able to spread the disease.
“The problem is that if not everyone is vaccinated or there are people who are immunosuppressed, even if they are vaccinated the vaccine is less effective, they may get the disease,” she continued.
REGEV-YOCHAY said several Israeli research teams are now looking into the question of transmission after coronavirus vaccination and “the results are looking very promising.”
Moderna showed early positive results that people who get infected were less likely to transmit the disease in its original reporting, which was submitted to the US Food and Drug Administration in December when it achieved approval for emergency use.
During its Phase III clinical trial, Moderna researchers swabbed participants to see if they had the virus when they went for their second shot and then compared the results of those who received the vaccine versus the placebo.
They saw a two-thirds drop in the number of asymptomatic infections among people who received the first shot compared to those who received the placebo.
In a supplement provided to the FDA, it showed that 14 of the 14,134 vaccinated people had asymptomatic cases of coronavirus at the time, versus 38 of the 14,073 in the control group.
However, this was not the primary endpoint of the Moderna
research. They only tested people twice – at the beginning and before the second shot, making the screenings about a month apart – so they may have missed infection.
Oxford University in its clinical trial for AstraZeneca also screened participants for the virus. Different reports by the university showed between a 49% and a 67% reduction in positive tests among the vaccinated compared to the unvaccinated.
Earlier this week, a SIREN (SARS-COV2 immunity and reinfection evaluation) report by Public Health England was preprinted online by the peer-reviewed Lancet medical journal that evaluated staff working in publicly funded hospitals in the UK.
The study measured the impact of a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine over an eightweek period and found “strong evidence that vaccinating working-age adults will substantially reduce asymptomatic and symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and therefore reduce transmission of infection in the population.”
Specifically, the report showed that there were 977 new infections during 710,587 person-days of follow-up in the unvaccinated group, an incidence density of 14 infections per 10,000 person-days. In the vaccinated group, 21 days after the first dose, there were 71 new infections, an incident rate of eight per 10,000 person-days of follow up, and nine new
infections seven days after the second dose, an incident rate of four per 10,000 person-days of follow up. Person-time, as described by the North Carolina Institute for Public Health, is an estimate of the actual timeat-risk that all participants contributed to a study.
“After controlling for other risk factors... vaccine effectiveness against infection 21 days after the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in the overall study population was 70% and increased to 85% seven days after the second dose.”
Staff was PCR tested regardless of symptoms in order to detect asymptomatic infection.
In Israel, where nearly 4.6 million people have received at least one jab, data is starting to emerge, as well.
A prepublished study by the Health Ministry and Pfizer that was released through the media showed the vaccine reduces infection, including asymptomatic infection, by 89.4% in people who got two doses of the vaccine compared to unvaccinated people.
However, as noted, the full report has not yet been released and some scientists have said that the report’s methodology may have led to an overestimation of the vaccine’s effect.
Separately, a report by Sheba that was released in the Lancet earlier this month found that among more than 7,000 healthcare workers who received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in January, there was a 75% reduction in coronavirus cases within
15 to 28 days.
The hospital’s Regev-Yochay said only 170 people became infected during the two-week period. Of those who contracted the virus, 99 showed symptoms. Eighty-nine of the sick were unvaccinated.
THERE IS also another consideration when it comes to virus transmission, and that is viral load: How much virus can be measured in a patient, which will determine how much virus you are spreading into the air when you breathe or cough. The less virus you spread, the fewer people who are likely to contract the virus from you.
The effect of vaccination on viral loads in coronavirus post-vaccination infections is still unknown, but some studies are starting to surface on that subject too.
A paper published earlier this month on Medrxiv, a nonpeer-reviewed health sciences website, by researchers from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and Maccabi Health Services, reported that mean viral load substantially decreased 12 days post-vaccination.
“Analyzing positive SARSCoV-2 test results following inoculation with the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine [the Pfizer vaccine], we find that the viral load is reduced four-fold for infections occurring 12-28 days after the first dose of vaccine,” the report said. “These reduced viral loads hint to lower infectiousness, further contributing
to vaccine impact on virus spread.”
The report was based on an observational study, not a randomized, clinical trial. As such, it had several limitations.
Also, this month, one of the country’s largest testing labs, MyHeritage, published a study comparing the viral load of some 16,000 positive test results between December 1 and January 30. The study was hoping to evaluate if there were any differences between the amount of virus present in people over the age of 60 – the first people in the country to be vaccinated – and those between the ages of 40 and 59, who started vaccinating later.
The lab, together with researchers from some of Israel’s top universities, considered four two-week-long windows, the first three before most of the older population had been vaccinated.
Israel kicked off its vaccination campaign on December 23 with medical workers and the elderly, so by the end of the testing period, around 80% of people over 60 in Israel had received at least one vaccine compared to around 30% or 40% of those ages 40 to 59.
According to the study, in the last two weeks, those over 60 presented a viral load lower by 50% to 95%.
However, here too, there were limitations, such as that the researchers did not know if the people being tested for coronavirus were vaccinated at all, let alone with one or two shots.
Bar-Ilan’s Cohen said there has also been anecdotal evidence surfacing in the country as more people get inoculated.
“We know, for example, that there was an anecdote that two healthcare people who were vaccinated became infected by the virus but no one in their immediate surroundings at home or work got the virus from these people,” Cohen said.
“Somehow the vaccine was protective,” he continued. “But this is only an anecdote. In science, we need real proof, and it is very difficult to do such studies.”
As noted, the original Pfizer, Moderna or AstraZeneca trials were not set up to answer this question. Rather, they were meant to determine the safety and efficacy of their vaccine candidates.
Normally, in these types of clinical trials, volunteers are divided into two groups – one that receives the vaccine candidate and the other a placebo. Once the number reaches a critical, preset trial mass, the researchers compare the two groups to see if the ones who got the authentic jab fared better.
Pfizer and Moderna reported more than 90% efficacy, and the side-effects were considered mild and minor.
THE REASON that transmission studies are not done in the first stage is that they take a long time and are difficult to properly conduct. Experts estimate that proof of reduced transmission is at least several weeks if not years off.
“It is not by chance that Moderna and Pfizer did not set prevention of transmission as one of their primary or secondary objectives in clinical studies of the vaccine, because they really take time,” Cohen said. “You have to follow people who were vaccinated for a long period of time and determine if they infected other people.”
For example, he said you may take a family where one person is vaccinated and then test that person and his family members regularly to decide if any person was contaminated by the vaccinee. But Cohen said this is not foolproof either, as family members could also be contaminated by an external source.
Segal said another way of doing it is to track a large cohort of tens of thousands of people from the point at which they get vaccinated, testing them every week to see if they actually got infected.
“This is not going to be over until it is over,” Regev-Yochay said of the pandemic. “We are still not there.”
The scene at Hof Hasharon beach on Tuesday was nothing short of heartbreaking. A beautiful landscape tarnished with countless dark bits of tar scattered across the sand and rocky shore.
“I’m really trying to get my head around it because it’s really difficult to gather all the tar, so I’ve just been taking it by hand and making these huge balls, and when they get too heavy, I put them in the bag and do it all again,” said Yonatan Bari, one of the hundreds of volunteers on the beach collecting tar off the rocky shore.
“But for all the tar on the rocks, there’s really no way all this stuff will be collected. It feels impossible,” he added.
That was the result this week after the country has found itself in the middle of an almost unprecedented ecological disaster. On February 17, hundreds of tons of tar were pushed ashore due to inclement weather, coating approximately 160 km. out of the 190 km. of Israel’s Mediterranean coast. Sea turtles, marine birds and endangered marine mammals were some of the wildlife that have perished or have been affected by the spill.
The Environmental Protection Ministry estimates the oil spill occurred more than 50 km. off the coast of Israel, outside its territorial waters. Not only will the waters and rocky shores be arduously difficult to clean, but the oil spill event will also continue to corrupt the Mediterranean’s natural marine ecosystem for many years to come due to the widespread nature of the incident.
After lighter, volatile components of crude oil evaporate, part of the remainder of it is left to mix with the water, forming an emulsion that is thicker and stickier than its original form. The recent stormy weather generated wind and waves that stretched and tore the patches of oil into smaller pieces, or tar balls, which were carried to the shoreline. Because tar is unstable when heated, it becomes a viscous consistency when it is exposed to the sun, thus lengthening its pollutive effect on the environment.
“Tar is a dangerous substance. The event will not end in the next few days, so we are preparing for long and hard work. Engineering tools will not be useful, so tar will have to be removed by hand,” said Environmental Protection Minister Gila Gamliel.
On Tuesday, the government approved a proposal and has since allocated NIS 45 million for the treatment of the coastal pollution brought on by the recent oil spill (up to NIS 250,000 per kilometer). An additional NIS 25m. fund is under consideration between the Environmental Protection Finance ministries in the effort to respond to similar events in the future.
In a statement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged the gravity of the situation. “We must act quickly before it seeps in the ground, especially in the rocky areas. Otherwise, this damage will stay with us for many years. This budget assistance will help save and protect our beaches. We will protect our environment.”
Specifically, the budget will be used to assist the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and local authorities to remove the tar pollution from the beaches and treat the afflicted animals. It will also be used to fund environmental surveys to determine the extent of the damage more accurately as well as facilitate coastal rehabilitation to restore the environment and its biodiversity. The funds will also be used to facilitate the transport of the hazardous substances to off-site destinations. But to where?
“The Environmental Protection Ministry is now taking into account what to do with all this tar because, right now, they don’t have an answer for what to do with all the tar that’s being collected. It should not be dumped in a dumping site,” said Youval Arbel, sea campaigns manager at Zalul, a leading environmental NGO. “You might be able to recycle the tar into asphalt for roads,” he suggested.
By Wednesday, however, the Environmental Protection Ministry issued an official statement outlining their plan. About 1,200 tons of tar-contaminated materials (sand, rocks, plastic, wood, algae and shells) will be evacuated from the beach and transported to appropriate biological and thermal treatment facilities or landfill sites, if necessary.
WHERE DID THIS COME FROM?
Although the exact source of the pollution is still unclear, government authorities have narrowed their search down to a small handful of oil-carrying vessels that passed through the country’s economic waters about a week before the tar became visible on the coastline. Whether the leak was accidental or intentional remains to be seen, and the quantity of oil spilled has yet to be determined, as well.
However, Israel’s investigation of the oil spill was initially placed under a gag order on Monday by the Haifa Magistrate’s Court at the request of the Environmental Protection Ministry. Any details that could shed light on suspected people, vessels, ports of interest, navigation routes or cargo were prohibited from being published.
The ministry told Maariv, The Jerusalem Post’s sister publication, that the censorship
order was made because “the investigation conducted by the National Marine Environment Protection Division and the Green Police has complex international aspects.”
However, after widespread protests and numerous requests by several news outlets and the country’s journalism association, the court partially reversed the decision.
Indeed, the decision to place investigation details under censorship prompted reports that the Environmental Protection Ministry knew about the spill before the tar reached Israel’s shores, although, the ministry has stressed it did not have any prior warning of the incident before the tar reached the coastline.
“I think the announcement of censoring the event was wrong. It created a lot of rumors with people asking themselves ‘what are they trying to hide,’” Arbel said.
Regardless of who knew what when, Arbel said that the authorities must be much more prepared for such unwanted surprises.
“We have aerial monitoring, satellite imagery and other remote sensing devices, but not enough action was done,” he said. “If the image of the oil spill was in the hands of the agencies by February 11 and no alarm was rung, then it’s our failure that we didn’t have the services needed to combat it early on.”
Gamliel said that she is determined to find the source of the oil disaster. “Everything is being done to find those responsible for the destruction of the beaches and the human harm to animals,” she said.
Reports targeted a Greekowned oil tanker, the Minerva Helen, as the source behind
the oil spill, as the vessel was reported to have left Port Said, Egypt, on February 11 en route to Israel before allegedly experiencing a significant leak in international waters more than 50 km. off the coast. Further investigation is underway.
However the vessel’s management issued a statement denying any involvement in the leak, saying “during the period that the vessel was drifting offshore Port Said awaiting her next employment, the vessel was not involved in any operation nor in any other activity that could be connected to an oil discharge at sea.”
THE PRICE OF PAST MISTAKES
This kind of incident is nothing new. In fact, crude oil spills have become something of a routine occurrence. Although very large events are usually the ones widely reported – such as the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska (260,000 barrels spilled), the 1991 Gulf War oil disaster (roughly three million barrels spilled) and the notorious 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico (four million barrels spilled) – smaller oil spill disasters around the world damage marine and coastal environments in the same way.
And the cost of cleanup often ranges anywhere from millions to billions of dollars depending on certain factors, such as location of the spill, the type of oil, the kinds of cleanup strategies implemented and the amount spilled.
According to the International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation, the number of small (seven-700 metric
tons) and large (greater than 700 metric tons) oil spills from tanker vessels have substantially decreased since 1970. But is this a sound justification for the continuation of oil transportation across valuable marine environments when the consequences of an spill can take multiple years or, in many cases, decades to clean?
Despite clear evidence that the climate crisis is driven by our overwhelming dependence on fossil fuels, it still makes up the majority of Israel’s energy profile, which further enables the continuation of risky oil transportation over environmentally crucial waters.
In fact, new oil pipeline developments are already in the works following an agreement between Israeli firm Europe-Asia Pipeline Co. and United Arab Emirates-based MED-RED Land Bridge, making Gulf oil more accessible to Europe. Although the deal is estimated to be worth between $700m. and $800m. over the course of several years, its merits are controversial as the continued use of oil pipelines and oil tankers will further threaten coral reef ecosystems in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba as well as associated maritime economies.
But, in light of the recent oil spill, it may only be a matter of time until something goes wrong again. Signing the Save Med Red petition is one attempt to prevent this from happening.
IT IS TIME TO ACT
According to Dr. Adi Levi, scientific director of the Israel Association of Ecology and Environmental Sciences and head of the Division of Environmental and Sustainability
at Achva Academic College, there is simply no more time to cast doubt or remain indecisive on the progressive move away from our dependence on fossil fuels. Now is the time to act and change our environmental conduct.
Levi outlines a plan to prevent future disasters from occurring. Beyond efforts to increase supervision and strengthen safety regulations, there are two parallel courses of action that are already available to address the root of the problem: transitioning to renewable energies and significantly streamlining energy production.
“We must dramatically reduce the relative share of fossil fuels in Israel’s energy profile and set ambitious targets that will lead us to closer to 100% renewable energy by 2050 (with priority given to solar energy production on roofs and buildings). Israel’s Start-Up Nation must also lead the transition towards electrifying public transportation and converting diesel trucks as well as millions of private vehicles to use electricity instead of gasoline,” said Levi.
These measures alone can dramatically reduce our dependence on polluting oil
and our high rate of greenhouse gas emissions. Additionally, integrating environmentally synergistic measures such as these will also cut intense levels of urban air pollution, which is responsible for the deaths of more than 2,000 Israelis each year.
Despite the strong-willed attitude among the volunteers, the unfortunate gravity of the situation still weighed on them, including Bari. “I feel like crying, really. It’s probably one of the worst disasters in Israel’s history for sure. I keep thinking about how we as a society are addicted to oil and that we cannot live without it. We need it for electricity, for cars, for energy, for everything. We need to go in another direction – ways that have already been found,” Bari said, referring to renewable energies. “This should be the last straw.”
As another volunteer on the beach with Bari said: “We need to draw a line in the sand for the good of the environment and for the sake of our own health and well-being before tar-filled beaches and polluted landscapes become a cultural norm.”
It is no secret that most of you, the people reading this, probably have a supercomputer in your pocket otherwise known as a smartphone. It is also no secret that the automotive industry is going through a fundamental transformation from fuel automobiles to electric.
The best news of the month here in Israel is that Tesla, the king of electric cars, made its debut in the holy land. It was sold out in about 30 seconds.
When it comes to technology, we’ve made tremendous advances over the past decade, but I think we can all agree that battery technology has not advanced alongside the rest of the tech we use daily.
Battery anxiety when your phone is about to run out has become a thing. Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.
Well, when it comes to battery technology, there is an Israeli company leading the way. Of course there is.
The company is called StoreDot and they have raised significant capital from some of the biggest names in the business.
StoreDot was founded in 2012 by industry veterans, Dr. Doron Myersdorf, Prof. Simon Litsyn, and materials expert Prof. Gil Rosenman. The founders were material researchers in Tel Aviv University, and they wanted to examine the use of nano-materials in applications such as display screens, lasers, flash memory, batteries and more. They worked closely with Samsung to identify major markets and unmet needs, where synthetic treatment of small molecule organic compounds could be leveraged.
Since then, the team has evolved and identified an opportunity to facilitate extreme fast charging and thus to eliminate the major obstacles to mass adoption of electric vehicles. I mean, it’s one thing when you’re nervous that your phone battery is low. It’s another thing altogether when your car battery is about to die.
It’s not just the speed of charging that creates a barrier and inconvenience, it’s also the availability of and people’s proximity to fast chargers, and mostly the psychology around it – this is where “range anxiety” enters the equation. The notion that you can get stuck on the highway with no power is naturally scary to people. There is also maybe a new phenomenon that we’re calling “charging anxiety”, where drivers can actually reach a charging station without issue, but then face a long wait to be able to charge because there aren’t enough charging stations or there aren’t enough fast chargers.
Prior to founding StoreDot, Doron served as a senior director of SanDisk. He holds a PhD in R&D Management (1994), a master’s degree in information systems (cum laude, 1991) and a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering Management (cum laude, 1989) – all from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology.
StoreDot has 110 employees, including 35 PhDs working from their Herzliya headquarters to build and optimize their solution.
While StoreDot’s battery technology can be applied
in many industries, the company has chosen the electric vehicle market to focus on.
As far as StoreDot’s secret sauce, traditional Li-ion batteries anodes are based on graphite. The StoreDot battery replaces graphite with metalloids – transition metals (including silicon) – that allow improved energy density and leveraged capability of ion diffusion to improve charging time.
StoreDot’s next generation developments involve post-lithium solutions.
StoreDot has raised $130m in three rounds of financing from four strategic investors including Samsung, Daimler, BP, and TDK.
StoreDot also has a strategic manufacturing partner in China – EVE energy, who also has a partnership with BMW.
One of the most interesting and unique aspects of StoreDot is the team. This is not your typical start-up team. As mentioned, the team consists of 35 PhDs (research capacity of 2 research faculties!), specializing in a broad spectrum of disciplines, including chemistry, organic chemistry, nano-particles, molecule design, quantum physics, materials, electro-chemistry.
This holistic approach to the battery system, the integration of these multiple domains, is unique to StoreDot. Additionally, they have a complete rapid development cycle capability under one roof.
As far as the company’s success, in January 2021 StoreDot released, for the first time, engineering samples of Li-ion batteries that can be charged in five minutes, which was previously considered impossible. The samples were produced on standard Li-ion production. The significance is that it doesn’t force any major adaptation on the industry.
StoreDot is collaborating with its strategic partners across the entire ecosystem, to resolve the challenges that impede mass adoption of EVs. The company’s target audience are the world’s largest car manufacturers.
StoreDot was named a Bloomberg New Energy Finance Pioneer in 2020.
The company’s goal is that five minutes of charging will yield a driving range of 160 km. (100 miles).
According to a recent interview with the CEO, Dr. Doron Myersdorf, the company is aiming to mass produce its technology by 2025, so we are not quite there yet.
The company was valued at a half a billion dollars when it raised its last round of financing in 2017. Since then, the electric vehicle market has expanded significantly, which might value StoreDot at a few billion dollars.
Just to illustrate how exciting and promising the electric vehicle market is, one doesn’t have to look beyond Tesla, that’s valued at around $800 billion, which is approximately four times the value of companies like Toyota and eight times Volkswagen.
I’ve had the opportunity to spend some time with Dr. Myersdorf over the years and as far as CEOs go, you don’t get much more brilliant than Doron. He’s also laser-focused on the mission and is quite the visionary, which is a rare and unique combination.
As I’ve said many times before, the most exciting companies in tech are the ones that take an old industry like transportation, hospitality, communication, healthcare, or battery technology and totally revolutionize them using cutting edge innovations. StoreDot definitely fits that description. It’s no wonder the smartest people in the industry are paying close attention to this company!