Homefront Command officials conducted air raid siren testing in the north beginning at 11:00am on Thursday.

**Speaking at a dinner sponsored by an American fundraising organization for the IDF, IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-General Gabi Ashkenazi raised $20 million for the IDF.

**A Shloshim event will be held in Rishon L’Tzion for the city’s late chief rabbi, Yosef Azran z”l.

**Due to progress in negotiations, Discount Bank employees have agreed to call off sanctions until after Pesach to permit negotiations.

**A sharav heat-wave is expected around the country on Thursday, with temperatures in Yerushalayim expected to reach 32C (90F).

**Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital emergency room closed to all non life-threatening cases on Thursday morning between 9:00am-1:30pm to accommodate a training exercise.

**Six people died as a result of traffic accidents in Israel on Wednesday.

**IDF St.-Sergeant Barak Yifrach z”l, from Maalot, was killed in the vehicular accident near Mishur Adumim on Wednesday morning involving a bus and a van. As of Thursday morning at 7:00am, 89 people were killed on Israel’s roadways since January 1, 2010.

**Wednesday night firebomb attack against a bus on the Gush Etzion-Chevron Road near al-Aroub.

**A border policeman sustained light facial injuries after being hit with a rock on Wednesday evening in the Silwan area of the capital.

**Arabs on Wednesday evening threw a firebomb at an IDF post near Beit Omer.

**An Arab concealing a large knife was taken into custody at the Beit Merkachat Ckpt in the Chevron district on Wednesday afternoon.

(Yechiel Spira – YWN Israel)