A meeting was held at the Western Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City Sunday evening to pray for the people around the world who have been infected by the coronavirus outbreak. “Millions and millions of people are going through tremendous suffering in China and outside China,” Rabbi Avi Berman, executive director of the Israeli branch of the Orthodox Union, told The Jerusalem Post ahead of the ceremony. “As Jews, we believe that God has the power to send healing. We are not doctors, but we can pray.”

With just a little over two weeks until Israel’s third Knesset elections in a single calendar year, the leaders of the Shas, United Torah Judaism and Yamina factions posted a statement over the weekend pledging their support for incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and declaring that they would not enter negotiations to join a governing coalition led by anyone else. Also on Sunday, the Tzomet Party dropped out of the race with a statement urging its supporters to vote for Likud. Voting by diplomats at overseas embassies and consulates is scheduled to begin on Tuesday.

Israelis were delighted over the weekend at the news that Gilad Schalit, an IDF soldier who was held hostage by the Islamist terror militia Hamas in the Gaza Strip for 5 years between June 2006 and October 2011, had proposed to his girlfriend Nitzan Shabbat. The couple had been together for a year and a half prior to Shalit posting the picture of her wearing the wring he’d offered her on Friday afternoon.

In a dramatic development, senior United Torah Judaism MK Moshe Gafni announced over the weekend that the senior rabbinic leadership of the Ultra-Orthodox (haredi) community has approved the study of “secular” subjects, such as Math, English and others, in elementary boys’ schools. He said the move came in response to complaints from the parents of haredi children at the lack of preparation for gainful employment offered by these schools.

Iranian President Hassan Rohani made a fiery campaign speech over the weekend ahead of parliamentary elections scheduled for later this week, declaring that “America’s ‘maximum pressure’ toward Iran is doomed to failure…we will never yield to America’s pressure and we will not negotiate from a position of weakness.” He then added, without any apparent intent to project irony, that “Securing peace and stability in the sensitive region of the Middle East and in the Persian Gulf is impossible without Iran’s help.”

Hezbollah’s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah gave a thunderous speech from the safety of an undisclosed bunker somewhere deep underneath the city of Beirut on Sunday, declaring among other things that the assassination of IRGC Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani and the release of US President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace plan has “ushered in direct confrontation with the axis of resistance in Lebanon.” He added that “All the people of the region will carry a rifle, because this American tyrant has left no room for anyone.”

The UN Human Rights Council’s “database” of companies conducting business in the West Bank infringes on the human rights of tens of thousands of Israelis and Palestinians who work together daily. This is the true incubator of peace and coexistence. It is the most successful instrument for defeating terrorism, violence, prejudice, and hatred. Does the UNHRC really have nothing better to do than target the myriad of businesses that serve both the Jewish and Palestinian communities?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations on Sunday, speaking to them about a variety of topics related to Israel and the wider Jewish community worldwide.

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