Many Israeli tourists visit Cyprus these days, and that is apparently the reason that a “would-be” terrorist was plotting a series of bomb attacks on Israeli planes and/or tourist buses. Luckily his plans were foiled and he was arrested by the police in Cyprus who had been warned about him, evidently by our Mosad. He is a 24 year old Lebanese born man, strangely enough holding a Swedish passport. He was found carrying notes with details about Israeli airplanes and such. Hopefully others like him won’t try blowing up Israelis anywhere else in the world.
Israel is going through a great heat wave, much hotter than the usual summer climate, but this year it makes a greater problem, because there are electricity problems, not only lack of enough gas for production since the Egyptians stopped supplying it, but evidently there are also not enough power stations.The Electric Company has been trying to build new power stations, but needed more money and also the places they had planned for this were not approved for different reasons (ecology, too near civillian centers etc. ). People have been warned there might be power cuts which may last an hour or two, each time in a different place, and have been asked not to use electric instruments or machines during special hours, and to use air conditioners at a higher warmth. So far these instructions have held and hopefully this will continue, and power stations will be built and enough gas supplied.
The question of the ultra-religious young men to serve in the army has not yet been solved, and a solution still seems far away. It may even cause a break-up of the coelition government. Yesterday those religious groups made a most unusual demonstration, in my opinion a very uneducational one. They took large groups of their young boys, handcuffed them together , and gave them signs against compulsory military service, saying that only studying Torah (religious studies) were defending the country. These people don’t even work, and live on payments from the government. How long can this be continued?
Enough for today. Shalom from Irene
Posted in Observations