Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is working on an agreement to have Jonathan Pollard brought to Israel a week before the March 2 elections, a Times of Israel (TOI) report said, quoting a Likud source who spoke to Zman Yisrael, TOI’s Hebrew sister site. Former Israeli spy Pollard told Channel 12 News in an interview in August that he asked Netanyahu to use his influence to convince US President Donald Trump to allow him more freedom in order to care for his ailing wife Esther. Esther Pollard is seriously ill with aggressive breast cancer and Pollard explained that he doesn’t have the freedom to properly take care of her since all his restrictions are like a “virtual prison.” “I can’t take care of my wife properly now because I have no freedom of movement,” Pollard said in August.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told senators privately Tuesday he does not yet have the votes to block new witnesses in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial. McConnell convened a closed-door meeting of GOP senators shortly after Trump’s legal team made its closing arguments in the trial, the third and final day of defense proceedings punctuated by revelations from John Bolton, the former national security adviser. A Republican familiar with the meeting was not authorized to describe it by name and requested anonymity. The GOP leader faced a handful of potential defections, but several days remained before any potential witness vote would be taken. A decision to call more witnesses would need 51 votes to pass.

In a moving scene by Auschwitz, an English-speaking Holocaust survivor told his story, surrounded by a group of American yeshiva boys. Rabbi Shmuel Beller, 92, grew up in the Polish town of Oświęcim which later became the most notorious concentration camp associated with the Holocaust – Auschwitz. Emotional, with his voice choked as tears streamed down his face, R’ Biller screamed “Unbelievable what the murderers, these Germans Yemach Shemam did! Where was Roosevelt, President Roosevelt Yemach Sememo?! He could of saved alot of Jews! “He didn’t!” “The Rasha (Roosevelt) Yemach Shemo!” R’ Biller was 12 when World War II began and spent five years being transported to ghettos and labor camps until he was sent to a concentration camp at the end of the war.

U.S. officials say President Donald Trump’s long-awaited Middle East peace plan calls for the creation of a State of Palestine with its capital in portions of east Jerusalem, ending speculation as to whether his administration, in preparing a proposal without input from Palestinian leaders, would abandon a “two-state resolution” to the conflict. The officials say the plan to be unveiled on Tuesday more than doubles the territory currently under Palestinian control, although it also recognizes Israeli sovereignty over major settlement blocs in the West Bank, something to which the Palestinians will almost certainly object.

United States Attorney General William Barr visited Boro Park on Tuesday, as he met with Jewish leaders following the recent rise in anti-semitic attacks targeting Jews in Brooklyn. Barr said he is “extremely distressed” about recent acts of intimidation and violence against Jewish communities, and said federal authorities will be lowering their levels of tolerance for acts of anti-Semitism moving forward in order to more aggressively prosecute hate crimes cases. Among items discussed in the meeting, the AG said he is issuing a directive to U.S. Attorney’s Officers around the United States to “reinvigorate their relationship and outreach to Jewish communities” in response to recent acts of anti-Semitic intimidation/violence against Jews.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit filed filed an indictment against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on three separate charges of corruption. The move came three hours after the prime minister withdrew his request for parliamentary immunity from prosecution for bribery, fraud and breach of trust. Netanyahu, who was visiting Washington ahead of the launch of President Donald Trump’s long-anticipated peace plan, said he “decided not to let this dirty game continue,” in a statement issued on his official Facebook page. The Knesset was widely expected to reject Netanyahu’s immunity request, which would have dealt a massive blow to the prime minister ahead of the March 2 parliamentary elections — the third in less than a year.

Two weeks after the arrest of Aharon Ramati, suspected of running a cult, the police investigation is not yet completed and the prosecution is requesting to carry out further investigations, B’Chadrei Chareidim reported. The court acceded to the request and extended his arrest by two days. “The defendant has already proven that if he is released he will obstruct [legal proceedings],” the police representative said at the hearing. The police suspect that Ramati received information on his impending arrest two weeks ago and hid some of the minors that were at the “seminary” complex. Since the investigation began, 103 testimonies have been recorded against Ramati.

Israel’s reception of world leaders last week for the World Holocaust Forum involved much more than meeting leaders at the airport with flower bouquets and laying out the red carpet. Israel’s cyber defense system was hard at work fighting hundreds of cyber-attacks on Ben-Gurion Airport and the planes of the world leaders, a Channel 12 News report said on Sunday as reported by Times of Israel. The report said that according to officials of Israel’s Airports Authority Cyber Division, over 800 separate cyber-attacks targeted Israeli airspace while the word leaders were landing in Israel on Thursday. Officials added that the attacks, stemming from Iran, China, North Korea, Russia and Poland were all successfully fended off.

The lawyer for the suspect in the stabbing during a Chanukah party in Monsey has requested a federal competency evaluation. Attorney Michael Sussman says a psychiatrist concluded that Grafton Thomas is not competent to stand trial. Now the U.S. Attorney’s office has two weeks to respond. Thomas has pleaded not guilty to attempted murder charges in the Dec. 28th stabbing that left five people injured at Rabbi Rottenberg’s home in Forshay. The 37-year-old also faces federal hate crime charges. Sussman issued a statement to reporters saying that he had asked the federal court, where Thomas faces hate-crime charges, to keep his motion, Levin’s report, and other documents under seal, to retain the privacy of personal health matters.

Attorney general Barr is scheduled to visit Boro Park on Tuesday, where he will meet to discuss the rise in anti-Semitism and recent string of hate crimes. According to a tweet by ABC reporter Alex Mallin, the “A.G. DOJ spox tells ABC that AG Barr will be traveling to NYC tomorrow to meet with Jewish leaders in Borough Park to discuss anti-Semitism and ways to combat it. The visit follows a series of attacks and acts of intimidation in several of NY’s Jewish neighborhoods back in December.” YWN has learned that the meeting will be held at the Boro Park Jewish Community Council. Interestingly, YWN has confirmed that not one of the four Orthodox Jewish elected officials representing the Brooklyn Jewish community was invited to the meeting.