The IDF Homefront Command has released a new smartphone app that will warn Gaza border community residents of an attack from Gaza, adding the app will also work on kosher certified smartphones, explains Lt.-Colonel Shlomi Mamon.

He explains “We have completed the work in five six yishuvim and we are continuing. We are working as fast as we can to continue adding communities to the system” state Mamon in an interview with Southern Radio 101.5FM.

Mamon explained the app is operational in some community while others are in the final stages of completion. He hopes they will all be up-and-running in two-to-three months and not later than four months. He explains the new app system is tied in to the central notification system and it will alert relevant communities when necessary and this alert will be quicker that the system operating today.

Mamon also spoke of the kosher smartphones. He explained “We turned to the vaad rabbonim that certifies kosher phones to approve kosher smartphones to permit downloading the app. There is no reason for them not to permit it and then everyone may benefit from this technology”.

Mamon added the kosher phones that are blocked to SMS text messaging too cannot accommodate this app, adding they are searching for a solution for those phones too but do not have anything to offer at present.

Mamon was referring to the kosher phones used by some chareidim and the chardal (chareidi dati leumi) community, smartphones that accept SMS messages and email but are blocked partially.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)