As the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage in Israel, Israel’s Defense Ministry and the IDF are busy evacuating Chareidi coronavirus patients, who often lack the proper quarantine conditions at home, to coronavirus hotels. However, with an average of over 1,500 new coronavirus patients being diagnosed every day in Israel, the hotels are filling up so quickly that a creative solution is being discussed, renting “coronavirus cruise ships” to house the many patients who still want to go to hotels, Kikar H’Shabbos reported.

Another explosion occurred in Iran on Saturday at a power plant in the country’s central Isfahan province, according to a Reuters report based on Iranian media outlets. Initial reports say no one was injured in the explosion but local power supply was cut off. Earlier on Saturday, an explosion at an oil pipeline in the southwest oil-rich region of Khuzestan resulted in a huge fire at the site. No injuries were reported and no official governmental explanations were provided. Some blamed the explosion on an Iranian dissident group, the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz, which has been declared a terrorist entity by the Iranian government. The incidents on Saturday are the latest in a series of mysterious explosions and accidents in Iran beginning on June 30.

YWN regrets to inform you of the Petira of Rebbitzen Reichel Berenbaum A”H, the wife of Hagaon HaRav Shmuel Berenbaum ZATZAL, the late Mirrer Rosh Yeshiva. Rebbitzen Berenbaum was sick for the past 2 months, and was Niftar while being treated in Lakewood. The Rebbitzen was an incredible woman, who devoted her entire life to the Mirrer Yeshiva, standing by her husband, as he was Marbitz Torah to thousands of his Talmidim over the decades. She spent her years working in the Yeshiva office, making sure the Yeshiva functioned in all aspects.

The mayor of Portland demanded Friday that President Donald Trump remove militarized federal agents he deployed to the city after some detained people on streets far from federal property they were sent to protect. “Keep your troops in your own buildings, or have them leave our city,” Mayor Ted Wheeler said at a news conference. Democratic Gov. Kate Brown said Trump is looking for a confrontation in the hopes of winning political points elsewhere. It also serves as a distraction from the coronavirus pandemic, which is causing spiking numbers of infections in Oregon and the nation.

A “Black Lives Matter” mural painted on the street in front of President Donald Trump’s namesake New York City tower has quickly become a target for vandalism, defaced with bucketfuls of paint three times in less than a week. In the latest incident, two women were arrested around 3 p.m. Saturday after police said they poured black paint on the block-long mural outside Trump Tower on Manhattan’s chic Fifth Avenue. Bystander video showed police officers surrounding one of the women as she rubbed the paint on the mural’s bright yellow letters and screamed: “they don’t care about Black lives” and “refund the police.” One of the officers slipped on the paint and tumbled to the ground, sustaining injuries to his head and arm, police said.

One of the two men arrested for attacking an NYPD lieutenant and NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan was released without bail Thursday night, with the judge granting him supervised release. Police identified him as 25-year-old Quran Campbell. The second suspect, Banks Shaborn, also 25, was being held on $10,000 bail. A senior police official called these developments “stunning.” “Quran Campbell is captured on video for the nation to witness him viciously assault 3 cops in uniform – 1 who lost consciousness. Judge Robert Rosenthal’s reckless decision to release Mr. Campbell WITHOUT BAIL endangers every NYer and the officers who risk it all to protect them,” Monahan posted Friday morning on Twitter.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Friday she is receiving chemotherapy for a recurrence of cancer, but has no plans to retire from the Supreme Court. The 87-year-old Ginsburg, who spent time in the hospital this week for a possible infection, said her treatment so far has succeeded in reducing lesions on her liver and that she will continue chemotherapy sessions every two weeks. “I have often said I would remain a member of the Court as long as I can do the job full steam. I remain fully able to do that,” Ginsburg said in a statement issued by the court. She said her recent hospitalizations, including one in May, were unrelated to the cancer. A medical scan in February revealed growths on her liver, she said, and she began chemotherapy in May.

Israel’s ministers met on Thursday night to make a decision on further restrictions to stem the spread of the coronavirus in a meeting that stretched out to the wee hours of Friday morning. A decision was made to ban gatherings of over 10 people indoors and 20 people outdoors, to close gyms, pools, and dance studios and allow restaurants to open for delivery services only. These restrictions go into effect on Friday at 5 p.m. All non-essential businesses and recreational sites will be closed on weekends, from Friday at 5 p.m. until Sunday at 5 a.m., including retail stores, outdoor markets, malls, barbers and hair salons, libraries, zoos, museums, pools and tourist attractions. Beaches will also be closed on weekends beginning next week on Friday, July 24.

A senior Brazilian doctor was suspended by the leading Jewish hospital in Latin America for comparing the public’s fear of the coronavirus to the fear that Nazis instilled in Jews during the Holocaust, JTA reported. Nise Yamaguchi, an oncologist and immunologist at São Paulo’s Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital, said on television on July 5: “Fear is harmful to everything. First, it paralyzes you. It makes you easy to manipulate. Anyone. Do you think that a few Nazi soldiers would be able to control the hungry Jewish herd if they didn’t subject them to that daily humiliation?” A week and a half later, Yamaguchi was suspended by the hospital where she worked for 35 years, a step that drew considerable media interest in Brazil.

In response to New York City’s Black Lives Matter murals – done as nods to the growing nationwide anti-racism movement – two police advocacy groups are asking Mayor Bill de Blasio for their chance to make a statement of their own. The groups want to paint the words “Blue Lives Matter” on the street next to 1 Police Plaza in Lower Manhattan, a refrain used by those in the law enforcement community calling attention to the dangers police officers face each day on the job. They also suggested using the area at Broadway and West 45th Street in midtown as an alternative location.