Sync SQLite database without causing multiple onChange

We store a copy of the server state of some items locally in our app. When we get new data from the server, items may have been changed, removed or inserted. When data is synced, all current data is fetched from the server.

Local list:
Item 1, progress 23
Item 2, progress 75
Item 3, progress 88

Remote list: (item 2 was removed)
Item 1, progress 55
Item 3, progress 88
Item 4, progress 1 (NEW)

The current solution clears the table and then bulk inserts all items like this:

  // Remove old content (this is to prevent dead items being left)
  mContentResolver.delete(URI_TO_TABLE, null, null);

  // Insert all new items
  // Most existing items are changed in a sync, hence we may just insert them again instead of updating
  final ContentValues[] inserts = new ContentValues[newItems.size()];
  for (int i = 0; i < newItems.size(); i++) {
      inserts[i] = getChallengeContentValues(newItems.get(i));
  }
  mContentResolver.bulkInsert(URI_TO_TABLE, inserts);

The problem here is that we also use a ContentObserver, which sends out two onChange() each time (one for delete and one for bulkInsert), causing our UI to first update when the table is cleared, emptying our list of items, and directly after update with the freshly synced list, populating the view again. This is causing a lot of ugly blinking.

Is there anyway to just get one onChange()? The applyBatch() seems to generate one onChange() per operation. Can you somehow tell ContentProvider to threat a bunch of updates as only one?

OR is there another way of basically taking the new list (remote) and store it in the database?