A 

new Israeli app that 
works on devices using 
the Android operat-
ing system allows the users of 
streaming services to receive 
on-screen alerts on their screen 
in real-time.
Nir Vaknin, a 15-year-old 
Sderot resident, is one of the 
two developers behind the app. 
He told Israeli news site Mako 
that when using streaming 
devices, he usually received 
rocket alarms 30 seconds too 
late. Israelis in Sderot only have 
an average of 15 seconds from 
the moment the alarm sounds 
until rockets can crash into their 
community. As a result, delays in 
rocket alerts make the difference 
between life and death.
Vaknin explained that the app 

is also crucial in situations in 
which people would not be able 
to hear the alarms from outside 
due to loud music or large gath-
erings.
Vaknin and his developer Itai 
Goli, a resident of Ness Ziona, 
spent several months developing 
the app, receiving assistance 
from the IDF’
s Home Front 
Command.
While Home Front 
Command urges Israelis to use 
its official app, it stated that 
new apps could serve as poten-
tial additions, helping keep 
Israelis safe.
Unlike the Home Front 
Command’
s TV alerts, the new 
app can be programmed to dis-
play alerts only for specific cities 
or regions.

The young tech pioneers 
are currently in talks with the 
Transportation Ministry and the 
National Road Safety Authority, 
hoping to have their app 
installed on buses to alert drivers 
should they enter an area under 
rocket fire, Vaknin told Mako.
He described living under 
the constant threat of rocket 
fire as an “unbearable reality,
” 

but added, “I am not a military 
man, nor the chief of staff and of 
course I am not the prime min-
ister. I cannot present a solution, 
so I made an app to better deal 
with the situation.
“Who wouldn’
t want to know 
that what they’
re doing helps 
save lives?” the 15-year-old 
concluded. 

Eretz

SIVEN BESA, IDF

Israeli Teen Creates 
Cutting-Edge Rocket 
Alert App

A kindergarten in central Israel during a rocket alarm in 2014 

BENJAMIN BROWN, TPS UNITEDWITHISRAEL.ORG

The Jerusalem City Council 
approved a plan “to construct 
an educational campus for 
Education Ministry schools 
near the city’
s Arab Shuafat and 
Anata neighborhoods … out-
side the pre-1967 borders but 
within Jerusalem’
s municipal 
borders,
” reports Arutz 7.
“These schools will be an 
alternative to the UNRWA 
(United Nations Relief and 
Works Agency) schools that 
currently dominate the area,
” 
says the news website, adding 
that the project will cost about 
$2 million.
“UNRWA in Jerusalem 

represents the only UNRWA 
entity under full Israeli control,
” 
says David Bedein, the Center 
for Near East Policy Research, 
author of Roadblock to Peace 
— How the UN Perpetuates the 
Arab-Israeli Conflict and an 
active voice in efforts to reform 
UNRWA.
“Given the fact that Israel 
can act to assert its control 
over UNRWA policies in 
Jerusalem, the previous Mayor 
of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat, in his 
final few months in office in 
2018, suggested that Israel ter-
minate UNRWA
’
s operations in 
Jerusalem,
” Bedein said.

“Picking up where Barkat left 
off,
” he added, “Jerusalem’
s new 
Deputy Mayor, Fleur Hassan-
Nahoum, now serving Arab 
communities in Jerusalem, has 
embarked on an ambitious pro-
gram to counter the influence 
of the Palestinian Authority 
and UNRWA in Jerusalem’
s 
schools.
”
Hassan-Nahoum wrote on 
Facebook last week, “
As the 
holder of the Foreign Relations 
Portfolio in the Jerusalem 
Municipality, it is my respon-
sibility to inform the donor 
countries about UNRWA [and] 
the lack of proper education in 
their schools.
” 
She says the main issue to 
be addressed must be “how we 
need to change the UNRWA 
curriculum for the sake of the 

children growing up in eastern 
Jerusalem. The curriculum does 
not have proper Hebrew or 
secular studies lessons and per-
petuates terrorism. The lessons 
in the UNRWA textbooks are 
about incitement against Israel 
and anti-Semitism. The chil-
dren graduate UNRWA schools 
not knowing Hebrew, English 
and math at the level that makes 
it possible for them to work in 
and integrate into the modern 
world.
”
The Jerusalem deputy mayor 
says that her “plan is to replace 
the UNRWA curriculum with 
a curriculum of opportunity in 
order to provide the necessary 
skills for children to become 
high-level workers and mem-
bers of society.
” 

Jerusalem Plans Alternative 
to UNRWA-Run Schools

UNITED WITH ISRAEL STAFF

 JANUARY 16 • 2020 | 31