Country In Collapse: 46,000 Israeli Businesses Have Shut Down Since October 7
Forty-six thousand Israeli businesses have been forced to close due to the ongoing war and its devastating impact on the economy, Hebrew-language newspaper Maariv reported on July 10, describing Israel as a “country in collapse.”
“This is a very high number that encompasses many sectors. About 77 percent of the businesses that have closed since the beginning of the war, roughly 35,000, are small businesses with up to five employees, and are the most vulnerable in the economy,” said Yoel Amir, CEO of CofaceBdi, an Israeli information services and credit risk management firm to Maariv.
(Related: Israel’s DEBT has doubled to nearly $43 billion since declaring war on Gaza.)
The report highlights the most affected industries, with the construction sector and its related ecosystem, including ceramics, air conditioning, aluminum and building materials, experiencing significant damage according to CofaceBdi’s risk ratings.
The trade sector, including services and industries such as fashion, furniture, housewares, entertainment, transport and tourism, has also been severely impacted. The report notes that “there is almost no foreign tourism,” with business damage prevalent across the country, affecting almost every sector.
The agriculture sector has also been hit hard, with the most affected being those that operate to Israel’s north and south, where active combat zones due to threats from Palestinian resistance and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have affected operations. These regions’ instability has further contributed to the economic downturn.
Amir estimates that by the end of 2024, 60,000 Israeli businesses could be shut down.
Hezbollah’s attacks have severely disrupted local business and education in the north, forcing tens of thousands of settlers to evacuate. “Our goal of draining the enemy’s economy has been achieved,” Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah stated on July 10.
Additionally, the Yemeni army’s maritime operations have contributed to the economic decline, significantly reducing revenues at key ports like Eilat in the south.
Israeli economy shrinking due to war
In the final months of 2023, Israel’s GDP plummeted by nearly 20 percent. The threat of escalation with Hezbollah raises concerns that any full-scale war with the Lebanese resistance could plunge the economy even deeper into crisis. Recent video warnings from Hezbollah demonstrate their capability to target critical energy infrastructure, including oil refineries and gas tanks.
Data released back in February showed that Israelis sharply curtailed spending, travel and investment at the end of 2023 as Israel’s all-out war on Hamas militants in Gaza took a heavy toll on the economy.
The war halted economic growth, particularly with a massive call-up of reserves and tens of thousands displaced from border towns near Gaza and Lebanon due to constant rocket attacks from Hamas and Hezbollah.
According to an initial estimate of gross domestic product from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, the $500 billion economy contracted by an annualized rate of 19.4 percent in the fourth quarter from the prior three months. This contraction was double the rate expected in a Reutersconsensus.
Despite the severe impact in the fourth quarter, 2023 as a whole ended with positive growth.
“The contraction of the economy in the fourth quarter of 2023 was directly affected by the outbreak of the Iron Swords War on Oct. 7,” the statistics bureau noted, using the Israeli government’s name for the current Israel-Hamas conflict.
For all of 2023, the economy grew by two percent, compared to 6.5 percent in 2022 but above the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) average of 1.7 percent. However, per capita GDP slipped by 0.1 percent last year, compared to an OECD average of 1.2 percent growth.
Until Hamas’ Oct. 7 cross-border attack on southern Israel, the economy was on track for growth of about 3.5 percent in 2023. However, October was particularly tough, with the conflict dampening Israeli moods and their desire to participate in the economy. Movie theaters and other entertainment venues were largely closed, though they have since reopened.
Depending on the length of the conflict and whether it expands to other fronts, the economy is expected to grow by as much as two percent in 2024. The central bank and other experts expect a sharp economic rebound in 2025, based on the view that Israel’s economy is fundamentally sound, led by the high-tech sector, and has shown resilience after prior conflicts.
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Tributes Paid to Loving Father and Husband Who Died Protecting His Family at Trump Rally
The family of Corey Comperatore, the man who was killed during the attempted assassination of Donald Trump on Saturday, have paid tribute to him on social media.
Mr Comperatore, aged 50, was at the Trump rally and died protecting his wife and daughter when Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire at the former president from a nearby roof.
“He was the best dad a girl could ever ask for,” his daughter, Allyson, wrote on Facebook.
“My sister and I never needed for anything. You call, he would answer, and he would do whatever it is you needed, and if he didn’t know how he would figure out how. He could talk and make friends with anyone, which he was doing all day yesterday and loved every minute of it. He was a man of God, loved Jesus fiercely, and also looked after our church and our members as family.
“The media will not tell you that he died a real-life super hero. They are not going to tell you how quickly he threw my mom and I to the ground. They are not going to tell you that he shielded my body from the bullet that came at us.
“He loved his family. He truly loved us enough to take a real bullet for us. And I want nothing more than to cry on him and tell him thank you. I want nothing more than to wake up and for this to not be reality for me and my family.
“We lost a selfless, loving, husband, father, brother, uncle, son, and friend. And I will never stop thinking about him and mourning over him until the day that I die too. July 13th will forever be a day the changed my life. I will never be the same person I was less than 24 hours ago.
“There are a lot of children out there that say their dad is their hero, but my dad really is mine. I don’t think I would be here today without him.”
Mr Comperatore’s brother also paid tribute to him, saying that died “a hero.”
“My baby brother just turned 50 and had so much life left to experience. Hatred has no limits and love has no bounds. Pray for my sister-in-law, nieces, my mother, sister, me and his nieces and nephews as this feels like a terrible nightmare but we know it is our painful reality.”
A GoFundMe page has now been set up for his family.
BREAKING: Biden And Obama Locked In Blackmail War, Says Trump Insider
7 States Sue Biden Admin for Forcing Health Providers to Perform, Pay for Gender Transitions
(LifeSiteNews) – Seven states along with a group of doctors are filing a lawsuit against the Biden administration’s threats to withhold federal funding from healthcare providers that refuse to perform or cover “transgender” procedures.
In May, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) finalized a rule announced the previous month defining “sex” in federal health law as encompassing “gender identity,” making it discriminatory not to provide so-called “gender-affirming care” to those who identify as other than their actual sex.
Several lawsuits have since arisen between the Biden administration and health workers unwilling to take part in practices they see as wrong and harmful, and Catholic News Agency reported that this week the attorneys general of Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Utah along with the American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) are suing as well.
The plaintiffs contend that the rule is illegal on multiple grounds, including violating physicians’ rights, overriding state authority, and rulemaking without statutory authority.
“Joe Biden is once again exceeding his legal authority in order to force his radical transgender ideology onto the American people,” said Missouri Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey, who is leading the charge. “I am filing suit because I will not allow out-of-touch federal bureaucrats to force Missouri health care providers into performing experimental and dangerous gender-transition procedures on the taxpayer dime.”
“(D)octors should never be forced to violate their sound medical judgment and perform life-altering and sterilizing interventions on their patients,” ACPeds executive director Dr. Jill Simons added. “Our doctors take an oath to do no harm, but the Biden administration’s rule forces them to violate this oath and perform procedures that are harmful and dangerous to our patients — vulnerable children. What the Biden administration is calling for is wrong and unlawful.”
A significant body of evidence shows that “affirming” gender confusion carries serious harms, especially when done with impressionable children who lack the mental development, emotional maturity, and life experience to consider the long-term ramifications of the decisions being pushed on them, or full knowledge about the long-term effects of life-altering, physically transformative, and often-irreversible surgical and chemical procedures.
Studies find that more than 80% of children experiencing gender dysphoria outgrow it on their own by late adolescence, and that even full “reassignment” surgery often fails to resolve gender-confused individuals’ heightened tendency to engage in self-harm and suicide — and may even exacerbate it, including by reinforcing their confusion and neglecting the actual root causes of their mental strife.
“Gender-affirming” physicians have also been caught on video admitting to more old-fashioned motives for such procedures, as with an 2022 exposé about Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Clinic for Transgender Health, where Dr. Shayne Sebold Taylor said outright that “these surgeries make a lot of money.”
Yet the Biden administration has given uncompromising support to all major aspects of the LGBT agenda, including reopening the military to recruits afflicted with gender dysphoria, promoting gender ideology within the military (including “diversity” and drag events on military bases), holding White House events to “affirm transgender kids,” condemning state laws against underage transitions as “close to sinful,” promoting underage transitions (potentially at taxpayer expense) as a “best practice,” and trying to force federally funded schools to let males into female athletic competitions and restrooms.
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Grid Down: California Utility Provider Cuts Power off to Thousands Amid Wildfire Threat
One of California’s biggest utilities made good on threats to cut off power in some parts of the state on Tuesday morning in an attempt to address wildfire risks.
After warning on Monday that there could be deliberate outages in parts of Northern California and the San Francisco Bay area, Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) cut power to roughly 2,000 customers across eight counties as well as one tribal community. The outages, which are known as Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS) started at around 12:30 AM on Tuesday.
Although the company originally believed that around 12,000 homes and businesses could be affected by deliberate outages, they ultimately only needed to shut off power to 2,000 customers. However, thousands of outages that were not related to the intentional shutoffs were reported on Tuesday morning in some parts of the state.
Much of California is experiencing high temperatures and dry, gusty conditions that are conducive to wildfires, with temperatures hitting the triple digits in some places. For example, wind gusts exceeded 63 miles per hour in Sonoma County and registered around 49 miles per hour in Butte County, while temperatures hit 109 degrees in Sacramento and 111 degrees in Redding.
PG&E was worried that the temperatures could overheat their power infrastructure at a time when it is already under significant strain thanks to a greater demand for air conditioning and other methods of staying cool that require energy. When combined with the windy and dry weather the state is experiencing, these conditions create a significant wildfire risk.
The company said that restoring power to all of the customers who are affected could take up to 12 daylight hours after weather conditions improve, leaving people without power and uncertain about when exactly it could return. They cautioned that power restoration could be delayed for customers in areas where individual power lines have sustained significant damage from wind-blown branches or debris that need to be repaired. They also reserved the right to implement additional power cuts for these and other customers depending on the weather conditions and wildfire threats.
“We continue to monitor the situation to determine if a shutoff is necessary for safety,” said PG&E spokesman Paul Moreno. “We are sending all of these customers regular updates so they can prepare accordingly.”
In the meantime, the utility has opened a few “community resource centers” in the blackout areas where people can go to cool off in air conditioning, use Wi-Fi, charge their phones and other devices, and obtain free bottled water. Ahead of the planned outages, they encouraged customers to charge their devices, freeze large containers of water, and check on loved ones to ensure their safety during the heat.
PG&E was responsible for dozens of damaging wildfires
There is already a major wildfire burning in Fresno in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and the company is taking the wildfire threat seriously after being held accountable for previous wildfires sparked by their equipment.
PG&E’s equipment has been blamed for starting some of the worst fires in the history of the state, including the 2018 Camp Fire. More than 30 wildfires have been attributed to the utility since 2017, and the blazes were connected to the destruction of more than 23,000 homes and businesses as well as the deaths of more than 100 individuals. In 2019, they ended up filing for bankruptcy after they were fined and sued for their role in starting wildfires. Weather conditions and downed utility lines were also behind the horrific Maui fires seen last August that killed more than 100 people.
Emergency Alert: Deep State Could Attack The RNC And Assassinate Trump By Any Means
France Begins Shutting Down TV Stations That Question WEF’s ‘Net Zero’ Agenda
French President Emmanuel Macron has authorized the Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication (Arcom) to begin shutting down TV networks in France that dare to question the WEF’s ‘Net Zero‘ agenda. This week, Arcom […]
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J6 Committee Leader Tried Stripping Trump of Secret Service Protection Before Assassination Attempt
Democrat Rep. Bennie Thompson, the leader of the January 6 Select Committee, attempted to strip Donald Trump of his Secret Service protection before the assassination attempt on Saturday. Trump was the victim of an assassination […]
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