Israeli spacecraft Beresheet made its final maneuver ahead of a planned descent to the moon on Thursday, which, if successful, will propel Israel into an elite group of countries that have mastered the lunar landing.
The unmanned robotic lander dubbed Beresheet – Hebrew for the biblical phrase “in the beginning” – has traveled through space for seven weeks in a series of expanding orbits around Earth before crossing into the moon’s gravity last week.
The final maneuver brought the spacecraft into a tight elliptical orbit around the moon, just 15-17 kilometeres from the surface at its closest. The landing is set to begin late on Thursday, with touchdown expected around 3:30 pm ET, the Israeli space team said.

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The Ministry of Health has ordered the vaccination of all the aircrews of El Al Airlines in a process that began this Thursday.
This was the result of a measles case discovered last week at the company that led to the hospitalization of a 43-year-old flight attendant in a serious condition.
Read more at Arutz Sheva.
{Matzav.com}

Kim Jong Un said North Korea should prove its self-reliance and deliver a “telling blow” to the hostile foreign forces who mistakenly believe sanctions will bring his country to its knees.
The comments, reported by state media Thursday, represent Kim’s first official, defiant response to the breakdown of the second U.S.-North Korea summit in February, and were delivered to a plenary session of officials from the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea.
They also come as South Korean President Moon Jae-in is due to meet President Donald Trump in Washington on Thursday, as he tries to find a way to mediate between the United States and North Korea and restart a stalled dialogue.

Amazon.com Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos is daring rival retailers to raise their minimum wage to $16 an hour.
Bezos laid down the challenge in his annual shareholder letter, published Thursday. Bezos routinely uses the letter to outline his long-term strategy, which made him the world’s wealthiest man and Amazon one of the most valuable companies.
“Today I challenge our top retail competitors (you know who you are!) to match our employee benefits and our $15 minimum wage,” Bezos said. “Do it! Better yet, go to $16 and throw the gauntlet back at us. It’s a kind of competition that will benefit everyone.”

Attorneys for former White House counsel Gregory Craig said Wednesday that he expects to face federal charges in the coming days in regard to legal work he did for the Ukrainian government in 2012.
The expected indictment – which his attorneys called “a misguided abuse of prosecutorial discretion” – stems from work Craig did with GOP lobbyist Paul Manafort on behalf of the Ukrainian Ministry of Justice in 2012.
At the time, Craig was a partner at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, the law firm he joined after ending his tenure as counsel to President Barack Obama. Manafort, the former campaign chairman to President Donald Trump, pleaded guilty last year to charges related to his Ukraine lobbying.

The Likud is projected to gain one mandate over the initial post-election vote count, pushing it from 35 to 36 seats, one more than Gantz’s 35, after the counting of special ballots was completed Thursday.
Special ballots, which make up some five percent of the nearly 4.3 million votes cast in Tuesday’s election, include the votes of Israeli soldiers stationed at bases across the country, prisoners in jails and detention facilities, voters in Israeli hospitals, and members of the Foreign Ministry overseas service.

A lawyer is poised to sue New York City for ordering mandatory measles vaccinations in the toughest action against the virus in US history, with refusals to vaccinate facing fines of up to $1,000 or six months in jail, according to New York Senate emergency laws.
Mayor Bill de Blasio declared a state of emergency on Tuesday, which, he said, gave him the power to require vaccinations in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg neighborhood, where more than 250 measles cases have been reported since September, particularly in the Orthodox Jewish community.
Michael Sussman, a civil rights lawyer, says there are not enough cases to warrant a state of emergency, he believes the move unlawfully targets religious groups, and he plans to have a case filed against the city by Friday.

The Yemin Hachadash, headed by Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked, fell just short of the 3.25% electoral threshold, despite an influx from the votes of the soldiers.
Earlier Wednesday, Bennett said, “We need about 5 percent of the soldiers’ votes, compared to the 3 percent we had nationally. It is possible but borderline. It can succeed or fail on the basis of [only] dozens of votes one way or the other,” Bennett said.
However a full count of the special ballots showed the faction falling just short of the minimum threshold, with some 138,000 votes, or slightly over 1,000 votes below the bare minimum required to enter the Knesset.
The party has called for a recount of special ballots, citing irregularities in the counting process.