The joint endeavor aims to become the first mission to space to perform a double landing on the moon.

By TPS, World Israel News Staff

Israel’s Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology Orit Farkash HaCohen and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Minister for Advanced Technology Sarah bint Yousef Al Amiri signed a historic agreement on Wednesday at the 2021 world Expo in Dubai for the cooperation in Space projects.

The UAE Space Agency has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Israel Space Agency to enhance cooperation in scientific research, space exploration, and knowledge transfer to “accelerate economic growth and human progress.”

The agreement lays the framework for a strategic partnership that will strengthen efforts to gather and analyze scientific space data. Both parties will enhance collaboration and cooperation in a wide range of strategic fields, including exploration, research, data analysis, education and more.

The UAE will exchange research and develop scientific instruments for Israel’s Beresheet-2 mission to land a spacecraft on the Moon by 2024 as part of the landmark agreement.

The joint endeavor aims to become the first mission to space to perform a double landing on the moon.

Morris Kahn, founder of SpaceIL, the Israeli company that developed the first version of the Beresheet spacecraft, said that the joint initiative with the UAE is based on a deep relationship and common values.

“Over the past few months, we have forged a strong relationship with senior UAE officials who seek to establish a deep relationship based on shared values ​​of education, technology and inspiration for the younger generations of the two peoples,” he said, cited by Israel Hayom.

Universities in Israel and the UAE will also launch collaborative research projects. They include exploring the red tide phenomenon, analyzing red palm weevil infestation which threatens date palm cultivation, and mapping aerosols – solid and liquid particles suspended in the atmosphere. Vegetation and environmental data gathered by the Venus microsatellite used by the Israel Space Agency and the French Space Agency will also be shared with the UAE.

Israel has witnessed near-unprecedented developments in space research, advanced technologies and the expansion of its private sector in recent decades, including becoming the eighth country in the world to successfully launch and position satellites in space.

The Emirates’ space program started in 2006 with a knowledge transfer program that saw Emirati engineers working with partners around the world to develop the UAE’s spacecraft design, engineering and manufacturing capabilities, launching a series of earth observation satellites designed and built by Emirati engineers.

Farkash-Hacohen stated that “governments sign agreements but people and collaborations are the ones that truly make peace.”

“Israel is an international leader in the worlds of research, space, science and hi-tech. I share Minister Al Amiri’s vision of harnessing science and space not only as an economic stimulus but also for bringing hearts together and educating our next generation.”

Al Amiri noted that “sharing knowledge and expertise is a key part of the UAE’s vision to create an attractive and competitive national space industry. If you look at the most successful global space programs in history, the common denominator is collaboration.”

“Israel has a globally recognized space industry and developing bilateral and multilateral partnerships has never been so important as we embrace a new era of space exploration,” she added.

This is the 15th agreement signed between Israel and the UAE in a bit more than a year’s time since the signing of the Abraham Accords.

Israel, the UAE, and Bahrain signed a historic peace agreement at the White House in September 2020, the first agreement to be signed between Israel and an Arab country in 25 years.

The UAE is the first major Arab state to recognize Israel since the Israel-Jordan Peace Treaty was signed in October 1994.

Announced on August 13, the Abraham Accords is the first between a Gulf state and Israel and is expected to lead to similar agreements with other Arab countries, possibly Oman or Saudi Arabia.

The post Israel, UAE partner on 2024 mission to moon appeared first on World Israel News.

Unprecedented: Israel’s ambitious 2024 moonshot includes two simultaneous landings.

By World Israel News Staff

Israeli efforts to return to outer space took a step forward as SpaceIL announced on Sunday it secured $70 million in funding for the Beresheet 2 moonshot. The first Beresheet lander crashed into the moon in 2019.

Landing Beresheet 2 by the target date of 2024 will cost an overall $100 million, according to SpaceIL.

Beresheet 2 will be made up of three craft: a mother craft remaining in orbit around the moon for five years, and a pair of landers with separate missions making simultaneous landings. No nation has ever attempted simultaneous landings.

One lander’s mission will be to explore the far side of the moon. Landing a craft on the moon’s far side is especially difficult because the moon blocks all radio contact with the Earth. In 2019, China became the first and only country to land a craft there by using a a satellite to relay transmissions between Earth and the craft.

In 2019, Israel launched the Beresheet moon lander, which would have been the first privately funded and smallest craft to land on the lunar surface. In another first, the Beresheet was the first lunar craft launched from a rocket as a secondary payload. Beresheet was a “hitchhiker” or secondary payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket whose primary payload was an Indonesian telecommunications satellite.

In initial findings, SpaceIL said Beresheet’s crash was due to a series of technical glitches causing an engine to shut down during its descent. The craft hit the lunar surface at a speed of more than 1,800 mph. SpaceIL never released the findings of its full investigation into the failure.

The primary benefactors for Beresheet 2 are billionaires Morris Kahn, Patrick Drahi and Martin Moshal. Kahn, an entrepreneur, also serves as chairman of SpaceIL. Drahi is French businessman and Israeli national currently living in Switzerland. Moshal is a South African tech entrepreneur.

“I am grateful to our dear donors, who believe in the power of the “Beresheet 2” extraordinary mission to inspire a whole generation of students and dreamers, for their confidence in the ability of SpaceIL to realize this challenging mission, which will place Israel at the front row of global deep-space technology,” SpaceIL CEO Shimon Sarid said in a statement.

The post Aiming for the moon: Israeli spacecraft secures $70 million for lunar landing appeared first on World Israel News.

Billionaire Len Blavatnik recently announced a $1 million grant for SpaceIL, the entity behind Israel’s next moon mission.

The post WATCH: Israeli moon mission receives $1 million boost appeared first on World Israel News.

SpaceIL is working on ideas to get to Mars as well, says co-founder Kfir Damari.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The NGO that sent the world’s first private spacecraft to the moon in April, only to see it crash at the last moment, is going to send another one by 2022, Sputnik News reported Sunday.

SpaceIL cofounder Kfir Damari told the Russian site that the second attempt would cost even less than the $100 million shoe-string budget for developing its original Beresheet, or Genesis, lander.

“The second attempt will take us about three years and will be significantly cheaper than the first project – costing roughly $80 million,” said Damari. “Firstly, because we already have the experience, the know-how and the design, and secondly because we learned from past mistakes.”

The technical failures that led to the crash were already identified and investigated in the weeks that followed the crash landing on the lunar surface.

Damari’s announcement is perhaps surprising because SpaceIL said in June that it would “search for another significant challenge” rather than simply repeat a similar journey, which “does not set the bar required of groundbreaking missions.” However, the successful entrepreneur revealed that the startup has not broken its word, saying that no less than a Mars exploration mission was in the early planning stages.

Such a target would put the tiny Israeli NGO in the rarified company of the world’s superpowers – the United States, Russia and China. But SpaceIL’s founders and financial backers wanted to do more than reach outer space. Its stated goals include inspiring children all over the world to love science and reach for the stars, figuratively if not literally.

Damari therefore never considered the lunar mission a failure.

“Despite the fact that Beresheet crashed, hundreds of kids wrote to us saying we inspired them to become engineers and scientists. So all I want to do is to fulfill the potential of these kids and show them that if they can dream it, they can do it,” he said in the report.

The three-year window is less than half the eight years it took the first time, which was prompted by a $20 million competition for a non-governmental group to reach the moon, called the Google Lunar XPRIZE.

Although the competition was halted as none of the finalists, including SpaceIL, could meet its requirements, the Israeli organization went on with the help of wealthy donors.

The prize committee did give the organization $1 million in recognition of their “successful failure,” in that it joined the ranks of seven countries to orbit the moon and was one of only four to attempt a soft landing.

The Beresheet 2 project will also get more help from the government this time around. After the little lander almost made it, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Space pledged $5.5 million for a second attempt, more than doubling its contribution for the first, historic try.

The post SpaceIL reveals new moon mission set for 2022, with Mars attempt in works appeared first on World Israel News.

Here is a recap of the top Israel news stories on August 6, 2019.

And in case you missed our last recap…

The post WATCH: Daily Israel News Recap – August 6, 2019 appeared first on World Israel News.

The tiny creatures might have survived the crash landing.

By World Israel News Staff

When Israel’s Genesis lander crashed into the moon on April 11, few knew that it had carried samples of a tiny life form with extraordinary powers of regeneration. So much so, that it may have survived the space craft’s disintegration on the lunar surface.

Genesis carried a payload belonging to the Arch Mission Foundation, whose goal is to create “a backup of planet Earth.” The foundation’s project was a “DVD-sized archive,” a lunar library packed with “30 million pages of information, human DNA samples, and thousands of tardigrades,” Wired magazine reported on Monday.

Tardigrades, or “little water bears,” are tiny eight-legged, segmented creatures measuring about 1.5 millimeters long. They are considered among the most resilient creatures ever discovered and can survive extreme conditions, including radiation, dehydration and starvation. They can even survive space.

The founder of the Arch Mission Foundation, Noah Spivack, told Wired that Tardigrades can enter dormant states  “in which all metabolic processes stop and the water in their cells is replaced by a protein that effectively turns the cells into glass.” Tardigrades have been revived after 10 years in dormancy.

The little creatures are a favorite of space buffs. The most recent incarnation of the Star Trek series, Star Trek: Discovery, played off the idea of tardigrades by introducing a highly advanced creature of the same name which looked virtually identical to the real tardigrades and which could navigate the universe.

Spivack said that based on analysis of the crash and the location of the disc-sized library on the lander, he’s confident that the payload survived.

The post Israeli spacecraft left tiny creatures on the moon, may still be alive appeared first on World Israel News.

The organization announces that it will pick a mission that is more groundbreaking than landing safely on the moon.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

SpaceIL, the organization that almost completed its mission to land a spacecraft on the moon in April, has decided not to try again, it announced Tuesday.

Even though the Beresheet (Genesis) lander crashed only a few kilometers from the moon’s surface, its journey “was seared into Israel and the world’s consciousness as a successful one, a breakthrough,” SpaceIL’s statement said.

The mission also broke many records, it said, such as being the smallest spacecraft (2m. x 1.5m.), built with the lowest budget ($100 million), that traveled the greatest distance to get to the moon (6.5 million kilometers).

The nonprofit organization, which sees exciting the younger generation about science in general and space in particular as a major part of its mission, will therefore move forward rather than repeating the journey, despite its previous intention to launch Beresheet 2.

“The repetition of a similar journey does not set the bar required of groundbreaking missions, so it was decided to search for another significant challenge,” SpaceIL said in a statement.

When the Beresheet lunar lander’s engine failed at the last moment, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was watching from the control room, told the press, “Write this down, in three years we will get another spacecraft on the moon, and this one will land in one piece.”

The Ministry of Science’s Israel Space Agency announced in early May that it would contribute NIS 20 million towards the next attempt.

On May 15, a NASA spacecraft found Beresheet’s probable remains. Cameras on its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) “captured a dark smudge, about 10 meters [32 feet] wide, that indicates the point of impact,” NASA officials said. There was “a light halo around the smudge,” they said, which “could have formed from gas associated with the impact or from fine soil particles blown outward during Beresheet’s descent, which smoothed out the soil around the landing site, making it highly reflective.”

The LRO has been going around the moon since 2009, looking particularly for water or ice, and has found the remains of other probes that hit the moon in the 1960s and 1970s.

The post SpaceIL will pick new mission, going to moon ‘not challenging enough’ appeared first on World Israel News.

While Israeli spacecraft Beresheet’s didn’t manage to land intact on the moon’s surface, SpaceIL president Morris Khan, struck an optimistic tone focusing on the mission’s accomplishments.

The post WATCH: ‘Israeli flag is on the moon, Beresheet was a success,’ says SpaceIL president appeared first on World Israel News.

While the Israeli craft did not successfully land on the moon on Thursday evening, both the prime minister and president expressed hope for the future of Israeli space exploration.

By World Israel News and AP

An Israeli spacecraft has failed in its attempt to make history as the first privately funded lunar mission.

The SpaceIL spacecraft lost contact with Earth late Thursday, crashing just moments before it was to land on the moon. Scientists declared the mission a failure.

The small robotic spacecraft, built by the non-profit SpaceIL and state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries, had hoped to match a feat that has only been achieved by the national space agencies of three countries: U.S., Russia and China.

“If at first you don’t succeed, try try again,” said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was on hand for what organizers had hoped to be a celebration.

Meanwhile, President Reuven Rivlin soothed the children who were invited to his residence to hopefully watch a successful landing.

Rivlin told the assembled youth, the moon mission was “an excellent achievement,” calling the evening an important night for the State of Israel,” reported Times of Israel

“There is no need to be disappointed. We need to praise what we accomplished.”

Netanyahu for his part predicted an moon landing within three years.

The post Israeli spacecraft crashes in attempt to land on moon appeared first on World Israel News.

Watch live footage of Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft land on the moon!

The post WATCH LIVE: Israeli spacecraft moon landing appeared first on World Israel News.

Israel’s space journey started with small communications satellites and on Thursday is set to culminate in a moon landing. 

By Abigail Klein Leichman, Israel21c

1960 – Charting Israel’s path to outer space

Early Hebrew science fiction books (Courtesy)

The National Committee for Space Research (NCSR) is established by the Israeli government and the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities to explore the feasibility of space launches and satellite development.

1983 – Israel Space Agency founded

The Israel Space Agency is founded under the auspices of the Ministry of Science and Technology, responsible for initiating, leading and coordinating all activities of the civilian space program.

1996 – First civilian communications satellite goes into space

(Courtesy Spacecom)

AMOS-1, Israel’s first civilian communications satellite, is launched from the European Space Centre in French Guiana on May 16. Its purpose was to enable home TV services provided by YES in Israel and by HBO and other networks in Europe.

Today, Spacecom’s AMOS satellite fleet provides broadcast and broadband satellite services with Pan-European, Pan-African, Middle Eastern, Russian and Asian coverage and cross-region connectivity.

2003 – First Israeli astronaut

The first Israeli astronaut, former fighter pilot Ilan Ramon, goes into outer space aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia on January 16.

Tragically, he and his six crewmates perished on February 1, 2003, when Columbia broke apart during reentry into the atmosphere over Texas. However, Ramon’s achievement inspired people in Israel and beyond, sparking heightened interest in Israel’s potential role in space exploration.

2005 – Israeli Nanosatellite Association founded

(Shutterstock)

Raz Itzhaki (currently cofounder and CEO of nanosatellite startup NSLComm and former manager of Israel Aerospace Industries’ nanosatellite department) founds the Israeli Nanosatellite Association with a group of young space engineers and scientists — including Yonatan Winetraub — to promote the development of nanosatellites for academic, educational and commercial purposes.

2007 – Google Lunar X Prize program announced

The Google Lunar X Prize is announced on September 13, with the stated aim of encouraging commercial spaceflight and exploration. The contest challenges privately funded teams to put a robotic spacecraft on the moon, move the craft 1,640 feet (500 meters), and have it beam high-definition photos and video back to Earth.

2018 – Israeli voters choose name of SpaceIL craft

2018 – Time capsule prepared for Beresheet

(Flash90)

On December 17, SpaceIL and IAI present a time capsule that will be packed aboard Beresheet. It contains three disks with hundreds of digital files of documents including Israel’s Declaration of Independence, flag and national anthem, a nano-Bible, dictionaries, encyclopedias, Israeli songs, information about Israeli scientific and technological discoveries and developments, children’s drawings, and photos of Israeli landscapes and cultural icons.

2019 – Beresheet has liftoff!

(Courtesy SpaceIL)

In an emotional and historic moment for Israel, the Beresheet unmanned spacecraft launches flawlessly in a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida at 8:45pm February 21 (3:45am February 22 Israel time).

The countdown was recited in English in Florida, and in Hebrew at Israel Aerospace Industries’ control center in Yehud. The liftoff was watched live by tens of thousands of people on social media.

SpaceIL has six ground stations set up around the world to enable communication with Beresheet on its way to the moon and after landing.

2019 – Israel’s spacecraft takes a selfie

On March 6, Beresheet takes its first selfie photo with an on-board camera, and sends it back to Earth.

2019 – Amazing images and videos from Beresheet

On March 25, SpaceIL and IAI share images and videos transmitted from Beresheet, taken at different heights and times along its journey toward the moon.

2019 – Final orbit around Earth

On March 31, Beresheet completes its final orbit around Earth, passing only 1,700 kilometers from its home planet in a 72-second maneuver intended to achieve synchronization with the lunar orbit on April 4.

2019 – Beresheet achieves lunar capture

(Flash90)

At 5:17pm (Israel Daylight Time) on April 4, SpaceIL’s engineering team and IAI successfully complete the critical lunar capture maneuver. This enables the spacecraft to be captured by the moon’s gravity and begin an elliptical orbit around the moon.

The difficult maneuver involved reducing the spacecraft’s speed from 8,500 km/hour to 7,500 km/hour, relative to the moon’s velocity. In the coming week, with expected intense engineering activities, many more maneuvers will take Beresheet from an elliptical to a round orbit, at a height of 200km from the moon.

The maneuvers will aim to reduce the spacecraft’s distance from the moon and reach the optimal point to conduct an autonomic landing in the Sea of Serenity in the evening Israel time, April 11.

The post A timeline of milestones on Israel’s amazing journey to the moon appeared first on World Israel News.

Beresheet, (or “Genesis”) is scheduled to land on the moon on April 11.

By World Israel News Staff 

Genesis, Israel’s historic spacecraft, which entered lunar orbit on Thursday on its journey to the moon is on an “excellent” track, according to data from the SpaceIL and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).

During its lunar orbit, Genesis will be at its nearest point to the moon (perilune) at 470 kilometers (292 miles) from the lunar surface, and the farthest from the moon (apolune) at 10,400 km (6,462 miles).

Genesis is scheduled to land on the moon at about 11 p.m. Israel time on April 11 (4 p.m, EDT). During the coming week, SpaceIL and IAI are to conduct a series of intense maneuvers with the spacecraft in preparation for the landing.

This past Thursday, during the critical Lunar Capture maneuver, when the spacecraft entered the moon’s orbit from the Earth’s orbit, Genesis provided dramatic pictures of the moon while activating its engines.

The spacecraft was launched to the moon on February 22. A couple of days later, the lunar spacecraft successfully completed its first maneuver towards the moon. On March 20, it performed a special maneuver to align itself on the right track to the moon.

The post Israeli spacecraft Genesis sends remarkable photos of far side of the moon appeared first on World Israel News.

SpaceIL, the nonprofit group behind the Genesis spacecraft headed to the moon, released a new video meant to inspire Israeli children to dream.

Genesis is scheduled to land on the moon on Thursday.

The post WATCH: Israel’s SpaceIL video inspires children to reach for the stars appeared first on World Israel News.

Here is a recap of the top Israel news stories on April 4, 2019.

And in case you missed yesterday’s recap…

The post WATCH: Daily Israel News Recap – April 4, 2019 appeared first on World Israel News.

SpaceIL’s Genesis will perform a critical slowing maneuver to bring it into the moon’s orbit. 

By David Isaac, World Israel News

Israel’s first ever spacecraft, Beresheet (or, “Genesis”) will perform a decisive maneuver today at 5:15 p.m. Israel time as it makes its way toward the lunar surface.

The spacecraft’s motors will be operated for a lengthy six minutes in order to slow its speed to enable it to be captured by the moon. This will be its most decisive maneuver since it launched into space aboard a Falcom SpaceX rocket on Feb. 22.

If Genesis flies by too fast, the spacecraft may jump out of both the earth’s and the moon’s orbit and head into the sun’s orbit. That would mean the end of the mission.

During the maneuver, Genesis’s speed will be slowed from about 8,500 kilometers per hour (5,200 mph) to 7,500 kilometers per hour (4,600 mph).

Genesis has made a number of maneuvers since entering space, beginning on Feb. 24 when it was 64,000 kilometers from earth and conducted a 30-second burn of its engine.

The mission has not been without its hiccups. On Feb 25., SpaceIL reported technical difficulties and a planned maneuver was automatically cancelled. But the mission returned to schedule after the problem was sorted out.

Once Genesis completes today’s maneuver, it will enter an elliptical orbit with the moon. A week before its scheduled landing date on April 11, it will conduct a series of maneuvers to bring it from an elliptical orbit around the moon to a circular one, which will gradually reduce in time to one orbit every two hours.

Its final maneuver will be landing in the Sea of Tranquility, which was also the landing site for America’s first manned moon landing on July 20, 1969.

The post Genesis spacecraft performs decisive maneuver for lunar capture appeared first on World Israel News.

Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft, headed for the moon, has sent a new video and images from orbit, with one showing a stunning sunrise from roughly 130,000 kilometers away from Earth’s surface.

The post WATCH: Israel’s Beresheet captures sunrise from space appeared first on World Israel News.