U.S. national security adviser Michael Flynn told journalists in Washington on Wednesday that the Trump Administration is “officially putting Iran on notice” that it’s “destabilizing behavior” would no longer be tolerated. The statement came during a week when Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) tested a nuclear-capable ballistic missile, Iranian-back Houthi rebels attacked a Saudi Arabian warship off the coast of Yemen, killing two sailors.

Israeli security forces carried away the last of the activists who had come to the Amona outpost in the West Bank to try and prevent its evacuation on Thursday morning, ending an episode which saw dozens of activists and police officers injured and several activists arrested. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Wednesday evening that a committee is being set up to work towards the construction of a new, government authorized settlement in the West Bank, which will be the first since the launching of Revava near Ariel in 1991.

The Western Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya issued a statement on Wednesday appealing to the Defense Ministry to follow through on a commitment to pay for the treatment of hundreds of wounded Syrian refugees who have been cared for by the hospital. The Health Ministry, which manages the hospital, said that the expenses have run into tens of millions of shekels and the cumulative effect on the hospitals operating budget are beginning to make it difficult for it to continue day to day operations.

Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center’s Dana-Dwek Children’s Hospital made history this week by becoming the first hospital in Israel to offer Sprinraza, a new treatment for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a severe genetic disease affecting millions of children around the world which has long been thought incurable. “This is a breakthrough in all the treatments of genetic diseases of this kind that in the past could be regarded as science fiction,” said Prof. Aviva Fattal-Valvsky, head of the hospital’s pediatric neurology unit.

The NGO Freedom House issued its annual report Wednesday which included, among other things, a statement that Israel is the only “free” country in the Middle East, with an aggregate score of 80 out of 100 on a range of issues including electoral process, political pluralism and participation and functioning of government, freedom of belief, rule of law, etc. The report added gloomy predictions about the decline of political freedoms in a number of countries around the world.

Canada’s current position on Israeli settlements is that they are illegal because they violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention regarding the transfer of population. Yet Canada must apply Article 49 equally to all states.