|
 Shops were open to all. But access to gyms, hotels and theatres was
limited to people with a "Green Pass": those who have had both doses
of the vaccine more than a week prior, or recovered from the disease
with presumed immunity.
Pass-holders could prove their status by presenting a vaccination
certificate or downloading a Health Ministry app linked to their
medical files.
Coming exactly a year after Israel's first documented coronavirus
case, Sunday's easing of curbs was part of a government plan to open
the economy more widely next month, when Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu is up for reelection.
"We are the first country in the world that is reviving itself
thanks to the millions of vaccines we brought in," he tweeted.
"Vaccinated? Get the Green Pass and get back to life."
Mask-wearing and social-distancing were still in force. Dancing was
barred at banquet halls. Synagogues, mosques or churches were
required to halve their normal congregation sizes.
Elementary schoolchildren and pupils in the last two years of high
school resumed classes in towns with contagion rates under control.
Middle-school pupils were still home-learning, however, prompting
some to stage a sit-down protest in a mall.
[to top of second column] |
 "I haven't been in school in a
year," said 14-year-old demonstrator Rotem
Bachar. "How does it make sense to open malls up
to crowds, while we can't attend class if even
they are capped at 15 to 20 pupils and have
other precautions?" Israel has
administered at least one dose of the Pfizer Inc vaccine to more
than 46% of its 9 million population, the Health Ministry says. The
ministry said on Saturday that the risk of illness from COVID-19
dropped 95.8% among people who received both shots.
Israel has logged more than 740,000 cases and 5,500 deaths from
COVID-19, drawing criticism of Netanyahu's sometimes patchy
enforcement of three national lockdowns. The government has pledged
that there will not be a fourth.
But Nachman Ash, a physician in charge of the country's pandemic
response, told Army Radio that another lockdown "is still possible
... Half of the population is still not immune."
(Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Jan Harvey and Frances Kerry)
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