In our August issue Israel Today covered the 20th anniversary of Makor HaTikvah, the only Messianic day school in Jerusalem.

That the school has lasted so long after starting with so little is miraculous. Makor HaTikvah's sudden and tremendous growth over the past few years has been a testament to the importance of its mission - to provide a strong, faith-based education for the children of local believers in Yeshua (Jesus).

And that growth has continued through the summer. Makor HaTikvah has added more than a dozen new students to its already over-crowded facility for the coming school year. School principal Cookie Schwaeber-Issan told Israel Today that she had to turn away a number of potential students because there was physically no space for them in the classes.

Fortunately, donations have allowed the school to do a bit of renovating and purchase new books and computers (pictured below) so as to provide those students who could be taken in an enhanced learning experience.

For more information about Makor HaTikvah, visit the school's website at: www.makorhatikvah.org

Pictures of the summer renovations and additions:

New books make a fully-stocked library


The board reads: "Shalom First Grade!"


A new large-screen TV for presentations


6th grade classroom fixed, painted and ready to go


A donation of computers has given Makor HaTikvah its first computer lab


Makor HaTikvah's facilities on the Anglican School compound. The school desperately needs larger facilities to continue growing

Palestinian Arab gunmen attacked a Jewish vehicle near the Hebron suburb of Kiryat Arba on Tuesday night, killing a husband and wife and two additional people who were hitching a ride with them.

Yitzhak and Talia Ames, both age 40, leave behind six children. The other woman, Kochava Even-Chaim, leaves behind a daughter and was also pregnant with her second child at the time of the attack. Avishai Schindler was the fourth victim.

Rescue crews and security officials who responded to the scene said the terrorists managed to hit at least two of the car's occupants in their initial burst of fire, and then moved in closer to execute their victims at close range. The bodies of all four victims were found strewn across the road with numerous bullet wounds inflicted from point-blank range.

In a horribly tragic scene, one of the responding rescue crew volunteers realized that his wife, Kochava Even-Chaim, was among the victims.

"We saw him crying at the scene and didn't understand what was hapenning at first. It wasn't the first disaster he saw," ZAKA rescue service official Isaac Berenstein told The Jerusalem Post. "Then he shouted, 'That's my wife! That's my wife!'"

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attack is further evidence of why Israel must stick firmly to its security demands. Many other Israelis said it is further evidence that Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas either has no control over his people or doesn't care to stop them from killing Jews, and that in either case, he is not a viable peace partner.

"Even when Israel reaches out to them, the Palestinians make every effort to cut its hand off brutally," Likud lawmaker Ofir Akunis told Yediot Ahronot. "The whole world can see tonight that Israel desires peace while the Palestinians want violence and terror."

Settler officials urged Netanyahu to immediately return home, noting that previous concessions in the form of removing checkpoints had enabled Tuesday's attack, and that the Washington talks would inevitably result in more concessions that put Israeli lives in danger.

"This is a massacre that is not meant to foil talks, but is a direct result of negotiations and talks of concessions," Yesha Council Director-General Naftali Bennett told Yediot.

Right-wing lawmaker Uri Ariel (National Union) added in remarks to Israel National News, "It is clear by now – the most violent period is when there is a diplomatic process. Netanyahu must freeze the talks immediately and concentrate on safeguarding the security of the citizens of Israel."

Abbas' office issued a condemnation of the attack, but attempted to draw moral equivalence between it and Israeli actions by referring to the massacre as an "operation" and saying that Abbas objects to "any acts targeting civilians, Palestinians or Israelis."

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, whom the international community sees as even more moderate than Abbas, failed to go even that far, and instead condemned the attack only because it "is contrary to Palestinians interests."

Diplomatic sources revealed to Israel's Yediot Ahronot that when direct Israeli-Palestinians peace talks resume in Washington on Thursday, US President Barack Obama intends to strongly press both sides to sign a peace deal, even if it can't be fully implemented.

According to the leaked transcript of a conference call between Obama Administration officials and US Jewish leaders, Obama will pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to sign a framework deal now that will lead to the signing of a final status peace deal within one year. However, the implementation of that final status deal is expected to take at least 10 years.

During the first year, Obama wants to see Netanyahu, Abbas and their respective teams holding meetings at a hectic pace in order to iron out differences in the run up to signing the peace deal. When the two sides hit roadblocks, US officials will intervene.

The signing of such an agreement will give Obama the diplomatic achievement he needs to bolster his increasingly unpopular presidency. But that will do little to change the situation on the ground in Israel, as evidenced by the fact that even Obama acknowledges it can't be implemented in the short term.

In fact, it is likely to exacerbate the conflict by further restraining the Israelis from combatting violence against their own, a development that has traditionally encouraged the Palestinians to escalate their campaign of terror.

In other words, as some observers put it, Israelis are likely to pay with their lives so that Obama and his party can remain in power.

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday upped his belligerent rhetoric against Israel and Jewish rights in the Holy Land on the eve of US-hosted peace talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Speaking to reporters accompanying him on the flight to Washington, Abbas told the Jews that Judea and Samaria (the so-called "West Bank") is not theirs, and suggested Jewish settlers living there would be wise to pack up and leave.

Asked by the editor of the Bethlehem-based Ma'an news agency what he wanted to tell Israelis living in the West Bank ahead of the peace talks, Abbas replied:

"The settlers are sitting on lands that are not theirs. I tell them that this is not your land and you know that. You can't impose facts on the ground, because the settlements are illegal and will be removed."

Israeli authorities on Tuesday lifted a gag order on last week's murder of an American Jewish man in downtown Jerusalem by a group of drunk Arab teenagers.

The teenagers had been attending a friend's birthday party in downtown Jerusalem, and then decided to hang out in "Cat Square" near the popular Ben Yehudah pedestrian mall.

While there, the youth convinced one passerby to buy them a bottle of vodka. After finishing their drinks, the teenagers approached 60-year-old Lance Wolf, an American Jew living in Jerusalem for the past two years, and demanded cigarettes. The teenagers later told police that Wolf refused them in a very rude manner, so they decided to get some revenge by beating him repeatedly over the head with wood planks they found at a nearby construction site.

The two boys who assaulted Wolf then fled the scene along with three other friends who watched the beating without interfering. Wolf then lay on the sidewalk bleeding for nearly an hour while several passersby did nothing to help. He died several days later at Jerusalem's Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital. Paramedics insist he would have lived had he received medical attention sooner.

The entire incident was caught on a security camera pointing at Cat Square. That footage helped police capture the two mains suspects, residents of a northern Jerusalem Arab neighborhood.

The suspected murderers are aged 13 and 15, a fact that will likely keep them out of jail.

Nor does their family believe they deserve such severe punishment.

The mother of the younger suspect told reporters: "They drank because it was a birthday. It wasn't on purpose. It happened because they were drinking. He is a good boy."

The brother of the suspect added: "The police have turned him into a murderer. But everyone at his age hangs out there (at Cat Square). It's summer break, and they mill around there until morning. There's nothing else to do."

Police officials responded that while the suspects do not seem like particularly troubled or troublesome teens, the parents nevertheless carry a huge responsibility to raise their children right and to know where they are and what they are doing.

Israel's left-leaning mainstream media did not reveal that the suspects are Arabs in its initial reports on the murder.

Israel's largest daily newspaper, Yediot Ahronot, on Tuesday cited experts who warned that Hamas now possesses missiles that can reach Tel Aviv from the terror group's base of operations in Gaza.

Hamas' Fajar-5 missile has a range of up to 50 miles. It is believed to have been developed outside Gaza. A shipment of the missiles reportedly entered Gaza recently via the Sinai Peninsula. In the coming months, the Israeli experts believe Hamas will be able to manufacture the missiles locally in Gaza, giving the group a huge arsenal of weapons that can threaten the bulk of Israel's population.

About one-third of Israel's entire population lives in the Greater Tel Aviv area.

With the recent missile acquisitions by Hizballah in southern Lebanon, nearly all of Israel, excluding the southern Negev region, is now in range of terrorist projectiles.