The police have blocked off streets adjacent to the prime minister's residence in Jerusalem ahead of a demonstration by leftists that will take place this evening.

China"s ambassador to London, Liu Xiaoming, said the United States had started a trade war with China and that there would be no winner from such an approach, Reuters reports."It is not China that has become assertive. It"s the other side of the Pacific Ocean who want to start new Cold War In China, so we have to make response to that," Liu told reporters. "We have no interest in any Cold War, we have no interest in any war."We have all seen what is happening in the United States, they tried to scapegoat China, they want to blame China for their problems," he said. "We all know this is an election year.""They want to do anything including treating China as an enemy," Liu said. "Probably they think they need an enemy, they think they want a Cold War but we have no interest, we keep telling America, China is not your enemy, China is your friend, your partner."Earlier this month, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the United States wants to build a global coalition to counter China, saying that the communist state could no longer be treated as a "normal country."All the same, when he was asked if relations with the United States had deteriorated beyond repair, Liu said: "I don"t think we have passed the point of no return."

Jewish Agency chairman Yitzchak Herzog reacted today to the defacing of gravestones in a Jewish cemetery in St. Petersburg in Russia. "I am relying In the authorities to find those responsible for this anti-Semitic act," Herzog said.

Some leading rabbis including Rav Haim Druckman and Rav Shmuel Eliyahu have ruled against staying in the hotel Migdala which is located In the banks of the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) and is owned by a Catholic priest. The hotel keeps kosher but the rabbis claim that it is run by missionaries.The organizer of tours that include a stay at the hotel has sited a halachic (Jewish law) ruling that permits staying in such a hotel.

The claim that Prime Minister Netanyahu and his team are behind creation of a Facebook profile of someone who has threatened to murder him is "a stupid idea" according to Netanyahu family spokesman Ofer Golan.

Jerusalem: 8:05Tel Aviv: 8:08Haifa: 8:09Beersheba: 8:06Eilat: 8:02

The US State Department has accused Eastern European nations of not fairly compensating Jews for property stolen from them during World War II.Secretary of State Mike Pompeo articulated the injustice of the situation following release of a State Department report criticizing the lack of reparations paid In the part of Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Boznia-Herzegovina, Croatia, and Latvia."Much time has passed, and the need for action is urgent. As we mark 75 years since the end of the Holocaust, the legacy of massive Nazi looting remains with lack of concern for the victims," Pompeo stated with the report's publication.

Today marks 23 years since a double explosion set off by terrorists in Mahane Yehuda, Jerusalem's open outdoor market, resulted in the murder of 16 people. 178 were wounded.