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rorists end.

While the PA policy shift made headlines, some experts remain unconvinced. Pointing to former President Yasser Arafat’s habit of ostensibly fighting terrorism for an international audience while secretly directing murderous attacks, they say that the PA has no intention of changing its ways.

An effort to amend the practice would be “a step forward…if it means that the welfare allocations will be similar to those of needy families, which are less than a tenth of what the terrorists earn,” said Brig. General. Yossi Kupferwasser, a former IDF Intelligence chief. “If not, this is a trick.”

Stone Throwers Nabbed

IDF troops arrested several Palestinian rock-throwers on Sunday who were suspected of seriously injuring an Israeli motorist hours earlier.

The suspects were detained in the Palestinian village of Deir Nidam north of Ramallah. They were transferred to the Shin Bet internal security service for interrogation.

“IDF troops will continue operations in the area of Deir Nidham until the completion of the search and investigation, and checkpoints have been set up in the area,” the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said in a statement.

Security officials say that the suspects are responsible for the Sunday afternoon rock attack that left 40-year-old Rivka Teitel in serious condition. Teitel had been driving her two children home from school when she was hit in the head by the volley of stones, causing her to black out and lose control of the vehicle.

Her two children guided the car to safety. Police called it “a miracle” that there were no fatalities. Rivka was evacuated by helicopter to Ramat Gan’s Tel Hashomer hospital, where she underwent emergency surgery on her skull.

Speaking with reporters on Sunday afternoon, Tel Hashomer trauma unit head Dr. Yoram Klein said that Teitel’s condition remains serious. He added that doctors were working feverishly to prevent Teitel from sustaining permanent brain damage.

Palestinian stone-throwing has remained a constant problem in Judea and Samaria, with the winding

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and narrow roads alongside spotty cell phone reception making Jewish motorists tempting targets for terrorists. The IDF invests considerable resources to combat the phenomenon, including installing advanced cameras and deploying troops at major junctions.

A Milwaukee pharmacist was arrested last week for intentionally destroying hundreds of COVID-19 vaccines at a local hospital.

Police say that the man purposely removed 500 doses of the Moderna vaccine from the freezer at the Advocate Aurora Health hospital and left them out for two days, causing them to spoil and be thrown out. He faces charges of first-degree recklessly endangering safety, adulterating a prescription drug, and criminal damage to property.

A hospital technician had notified police after finding hundreds of vaccine doses lying outside the pharmacy freezer. The subsequent investigation found that the pharmacist removed the vials from the freezer on December 24 before returning them the next morning and repeated his actions a day later.

The pharmacist remains behind bars. His identity has not been released to the public. Authorities are still searching for a motive but said in a statement that the pharmacist admitted “to intentionally removing the vaccine knowing that if not properly stored the vaccine would be ineffective.”

The FBI, the Food and Drug Administration, and local police have since opened a joint probe into the case. “We continue to believe that vaccination is our way out of the pandemic,” Advocate Aurora Health said in a statement. “We are more than disappointed that this individual’s actions will result in a delay of more than 500

Vaccine Sabotage

people receiving their vaccine. This was a violation of our core values, and the individual is no longer employed by us.”

The Moderna vaccine must be kept at a temperature of between 2° and 8°C (36° to 46°F) for 30 days prior to inoculation. Hospital personnel were able to salvage 57 of the vaccines before they expired. The discarded doses were worth between $8,000 and $11,000.

“We continued vaccinating until the remainder of the vaccine was discarded due to being rendered ineffective,” confirmed Aurora Health Care President Dr. Jeff Bahr. “This was a situation involving a bad actor as op-

posed to a bad process.”

We’re on the Move

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to one of the largest migrations in the United States in recent memory.

As working from home became widespread amid the COVID-19 pandemic, millions have chosen to move from pricey cities to cheaper locales across the United States. The rise in telecommuting has enabled many Americans to leave urban hubs in favor of suburbs and rural areas.

Adding to the phenomenon were the race riots last summer that left some of the country’s biggest population centers in flames. With crime rising and the need for personal space becoming more valued amid seemingly endless lockdowns, Americans are choosing to spread out.

According to data provided by UPS, upwards of 15.9 million people moved across the continental United States during 2020, a rise of more than 2 million from years prior.

“About a quarter (28%) told us [they chose to move] because they feared getting COVID-19 if they stayed where they were living,” said D’Vera Cohn from the Pew Research Center. “About a fifth (20%) said they wanted to be with their family, or their college campus closed (23%). A total of 18% gave financial reasons, in-

cluding job loss.”

The most population relocation destinations are Orlando, Atlanta, Las Vegas, and Phoenix, with Austin doubling the amount of new residents from 2019. Adding to the popularity of the aforementioned locales is the more relaxed approach elected officials have taken to combat the coronavirus.

While “blue” states order mass lockdowns that hamper the ability for small businesses to survive, Republican governors in Georgia, Nevada, and Texas have refrained from shuttering commerce. Texas, for example, does not mandate mask wearing, while Governor Greg Abbott pledged “never to implement another lockdown” in late November.

Stock Market Ends on Record High

Despite the coronavirus pandemic that resulted in soaring unemployment rates and widespread economic devastation around the world, the stock market closed 2020 at a record high.

If early 2020 saw the stock market crash amid a mass sell-off, the country’s most important indexes finished the year riding high on a roaring bull market. The S&P 500, a stock index viewed as an important gauge of overall economic performance, closed out 2020 up 16% with a total return of 18.4%.

With tech stocks booming due to the extended lockdowns, the Nasdaq composite skyrocketed 43.6%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average went up 7.2% due to strong gains by Microsoft and Apple.

The strong showing of the aforementioned indexes caps off a record comeback from a financial shock caused by the worldwide coronavirus outbreak. The virus pandemic shocked markets early in the year, causing the S&P 500 to plummet by 8.4% in February followed by a further 12.5% decrease in March.

As governors across the United States issued stay-at-home orders, the stock market was buffeted by rampant volatility. By April, the Dow Jones had several straight days where it lost, and then regained, 2,000 points while the S&P 500 rose or fell by at least 1% more than any other period in its history.

But record government stimulus spending along with investor optimism from the COVID-19 vaccines led stocks to rebound, sending the S&P 500 rising 68% from its lowest point in March. Market analysts predict that the record highs will only increase, with Goldman Sachs predicting 5.9% growth for 2021, the biggest jump since 1984.

The bull market is confounding experts, who point to the disparity between the soaring stock market and the widespread unemployment and poverty caused by a pandemic that has already killed 340,000 Americans.

“That a pandemic-induced economic shutdown of epic proportion has been digested with stocks ending the year 15 percent higher is mind-blowing,” said Michael Farr, who heads a Washington-based hedge fund. “2020 has been stunning.”

Targeting Chinese Cellular Firms

The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) reversed its plans to delist three Chinese cellular firms from its index.

The NYSE said in a statement on Monday that it had scrapped the decision after “further consultation with relevant regulatory authorities.” It said, however, that the companies may be kicked off in the future.

Citing President Donald Trump’s executive order forbidding Americans from investing in companies connected to Beijing’s military, the NYSE had announced last week that it would ban China Telecom, China Mobile, and China Unicom Hong Kong. The decision would have gone into effect as early as January 7.

The China’s Ministry of Commerce

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