Israel goes back to Standard time, known as “winter” time, at 2 a.m. Sunday morning, leaving only a six-hour and nine-hour difference from the East and West coasts of the United States respectively.

The usual seven and 10-hour gap will return the following weekend, when the United States also turns back its clocks.

This is the first year that Israel in ending Daylight time, known as Summer time, in tandem with European countries, after a tradition of making the fall switch the Thursday night before Yom Kippur.

Many rabbis claimed that if the fast day were to extend into the early evening hours when there is daylight, less people would fast. Somehow, Israelis this past Yom Kippur managed to start and end the fast an hour later than usual, just like almost everyone else in Europe and the United States.

The more significant impact in extending summer time for the religious community has been on the start of morning prayers, when the relatively late daybreak has forced many synagogues to postpone the start of prayers because the earliest time permitted for putting on tefillin is later than it was at the same time of year during “winter” time.

Israelis will fast on Yom Kippur this year just like Americans, starting and finishing the fast one hour later due to Daylight Savings Time, known in Israel as summer time, remaining in effect until the end of October.

The Knesset Monday night overwhelmingly voted for the change, ending years of arguments between secular Jews, who want a longer period of an extra hour of daylight just like most of the world, and religious leaders who have argued that continuing the fast later in the evening will cause many people to break the prohibition against eating or drinking on the holy day.

In the past, Daylight Time ended the week before Yom Kippur, and the fast would began around 5 p.m. and end around 6 p.m.

Similarly, Daylight Time used to be postponed until after the Passover holiday so that families would not have to extend the traditional family Seder meal until the later hours, when children were more likely to have fallen asleep instead of participating in the observance. The clocks now move forward at the end of March, regardless of when Passover begins.

“If people can’t pray because of the [new] law, we’ll discuss it again,” commented  Likud Knesset Member Miri Regev in the Knesset.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said at last week’s Cabinet meeting, where the measure was approved along with the proposal for exporting natural gas, “We now have a land flowing with milk, gas and sunshine.”