I assume the retrograde orbit ($\theta_{inc}=142°$) is a side-effect of geography - ocean overfly access only lies West of the secured launch site - this article in Spaceflight 101 makes several points that I don't quite understand. I think if one can actually understand this particular orbit, all of these questions can be answered at the same time, so I'm grouping them together here as a 'what the heck is going on here' type question.
The Ofeq satellites are operated by the Israeli Ministry of Defence and built by Israel Aerospace Industries and Elbit Systems. Their primary purpose is to collect data from territories relevant to Israel.
Therefore, the satellites typically operate from equatorial orbits inclined 142 degrees covering Israel and surrounding territories.
While that orbit prevents the satellites from collecting intelligence on a global scale, it does provide six daylight passes over the Middle East for the first one-and-a-half years of their missions, delivering rapid response imagery of targets of interest to the Israeli intelligence community.
The number of favorable passes per day decreases with mission duration due to orbital mechanics, but the Ofeq satellites can still achieve more relevant passes over the area of interest than a polar orbiting spacecraft that would only have one or two daily passes with favorable look angles.
1) "While that orbit prevents the satellites from collecting intelligence on a global scale..." Is it the inclination, or the sun-synchrony, or both? Is this a repeat ground track orbit?
2) "...six daylight passes over the Middle East..." per day?? How does that work??
3) "...Ofeq satellites can still achieve more relevant passes over the area of interest than a polar orbiting spacecraft that would only have one or two daily passes with favorable look angles." I think I understand the part about polar orbit, the earth's surface at 32N latitude moves about 2100 km in 90 minutes, so at say 700 km altitude you could possibly make two passes looking at $+/- 56°$ degrees, or one pass more vertical and one more oblique?
4) "The number of favorable passes per day decreases with mission duration due to orbital mechanics..." some kind of precession?
1 41759U 16056A 16262.10113449 0.00138035 00000-0 24500-2 0 00 2 41759 142.5282 325.3519 0184795 50.1757 311.5128 15.32477128 00
" (screen shot: i.stack.imgur.com/DJfY9.png) which is the morning of Sept. 18th. But when I try space-track or nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/masterCatalog.do?sc=2016-056A (n2yo's supposed source) there's nothing! So from what data source are these sat maps calculating? $\endgroup$