Proposed reforms to herald new dawn for TV broadcasts
The Communications Ministry published a draft bill on Tuesday that would revolutionize broadcast regulations in Israel, including requiring Netflix and Disney+ to invest in Israeli content.
The bill would amend broadcast legislation issues while updating the regulations that apply to broadcasters (read: cable, satellite and Internet content providers) operating in the market.
The main recommendations highlighted in the bill:
Making the big timers pay for it
The bill proposes an obligation for broadcasters to invest in original Israeli content production. This means that both local sources as well as international sources (such as streaming platforms Netflix and Disney+) would be required to reinsert some of their revenues from broadcasting in Israel back into the local production industry.
The reform would take a relative percentage of their income from subscription fees and advertisements, which would be used to fund “a large and diverse supply of quality content that expresses the Israeli language and culture in all its shades,” as the ministry puts it.
This differs from the current situation in which Israeli content providers such as Partner-TV and Cellcom-TV, which broadcast over-the-Internet content, are not required to invest in original Israeli productions.
To further diversify the range of content in Israel, the bill also proposes that a certain percentage of the investment in local productions will be invested in external producers – organizations that aren’t already funded by the investor.
This could significantly impact the range and quality of original Israeli productions, which would join the ranks alongside prior international Israeli successes like Fauda and Tehran.
Broadcasting the news? Anyone could do it!
The bill proposes as a general rule that any broadcaster can broadcast news if it meets certain minimum conditions, as long as the creation of the news is done by a separate corporation from the broadcasting body (to minimize news bias and promote independence).
Furthermore, news sources selling their content to broadcasters must offer their product to all broadcasters at a fair and nondiscriminatory price, to prevent exclusivity.
Sports fans rejoice! More competition in how you watch your favorite events
To ensure the accessibility of high-demand or nationally relevant sports content, a list of major sports events will be established that broadcasters will be obliged to offer to their
to the area, according to the officials.
The IDF clarified on Tuesday that shortly after the arrest of Islamic Jihad leader Bassam al-Saadi in Jenin last week, threats were made by the group to carry out sniper and anti-tank attacks against Israelis; this led to OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen. Eliezer Toledano raising the level of alert in the region and refreshed an operative plan known as “Black Sash,” which was formulated to target Islamic Jihad.
Early Wednesday, the defense establishment received an alert that the group planned to launch an anti-tank missile at a civilian Israeli bus, leading to the decision to impose strict restrictions on movement to residents of the western Negev.
IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi demanded from the beginning that a strong defensive line be created along the border to prevent an attack and ordered the Southern Command to begin preparations for a strike that would include targeted assassinations against senior members of Islamic Jihad.
The IDF originally planned to begin the strike on Saturday morning, but in the end decided to launch the strike on Friday
at 4:15 p.m., with the airstrike against Jabari alongside a separate drone strike against Abdallah Kadum, a senior commander of the group’s anti-tank missile units. IDF drones and tanks carried out strikes against the movement’s positions and observation points at the same time.
Air force commander Maj.Gen. Tomer Bar chose an innovative way to strike Jabari, as he was in a 14-story building with 28 apartments and Israel wanted to minimize harm to innocent civilians in nearby apartments. The result was a decision to use a Spice250 bomb developed by Rafael, which penetrated an empty room in the apartment on the seventh floor. The bomb exploded, destroying just the floor, and brought the ceiling down on Jabari, who was in the apartment below, killing him.
Seconds later, IAF jets fired seven more missiles at the rooms of the apartment from different angles to kill any other terrorists inside.
The IDF also assassinated Khaled Mansour, the commander of Islamic Jihad in southern Gaza, during the operation. Mansour had overseen terrorist attacks against Israel for years, including an attack in 2010, in which IDF soldiers Eliraz Peretz and Ilan Sviatkovsky were killed. Mansour also served as the head of Islamic Jihad’s rocket unit and led hundreds of rocket launches against Israel.
Mansour was responsible for Islamic Jihad’s efforts to build terrorist tunnels into Israel. One of the tunnels built under his command, which was meant to be used to infiltrate into Israel, was destroyed during Operation Breaking Dawn.
The IDF originally planned to strike Mansour in an apartment he was hiding in, but called off the bombing after the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) discovered that it was right on top of a kindergarten. He later moved to another apartment and the attack was approved.
The targets hit during the operation were 17 observation points – including six that were manned at the time – 45 long-range missile targets, eight posts, eight weapon storehouses, six weapon manufacturing sites and three targets related to the movement’s naval efforts.
During the operation, 1,175 rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip toward Israel, although about 200 fell short and fell within the coastal enclave; some of the failed launches caused civilian casualties.
It was also revealed on Tuesday that during the operation, Islamic Jihad had intended to launch a drone toward the Tamar gas rig off the coast of Ashdod, but the attempt failed and the drone was not launched, according to Army Radio.
During the operation, the air force had a large number of drones and fighter jets in the air above the Gaza Strip for both attack and intelligence-gathering purposes.
Footage and information collected by the aircraft were transmitted to a single operations room, where the commander of the air force was able to see all the footage of the various Islamic Jihad sites, as well as activity in Syria, Lebanon, Israel’s natural gas rigs in the Mediterranean and