Rockets for Rosh Hashana
It's true there were no physical casualties from last night's rocket fire - but that doesn't explain what happened here in Sderot last night. My family lives in Silver Spring, Maryland - thousands of miles away from where I live and work. I spent the family-oriented holiday Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, with amazing families in Sderot, Israel where I work and live. After a long day of eating, drinking, and celebrating I arrived home to take a relaxing shower and go to bed. As I got out of the shower the night silence was lit up, my heart began to race and my legs quivered. The echoing Tzeva Adom (Color Red) reverberated in my first-floor apartment in Sderot as I huddled in its most sheltered area - the corner of the kitchen next to the refrigerator. Then, suddenly, the deafening silence following the alarm was broken by a not-so-distant explosion. I work for the Sderot Media Center , and two Kassam rockets had just clocked me in at just before 1 a.m. - I was out the door, running down the street to get my camera. Why has the world bought into this misconception that the rockets have stopped as more than 250 have struck Israel in the past eight months? Humanizing Hamas: An NYTimes objective gone wrong
The New York Times recently published an interview with Hamas's political chief, Khaled Mashal, entitled Addressing US, Hamas Says It Grounded Rockets. In the interview, the Times takes a very sympathetic approach to Hamas leader, who was just elected to his fourth term as Hamas's political bureau chief, the post he has held since 2004. The Times attempts to portray a new more "moderate" Mashal, in the hopes that Hamas is actually turning a new leaf. In the article, The Times quotes Mashal as asking Americans to disregard the Hamas charter, (steeped in anti-Semitic declarations), while also stating that Iran does "not control or affect Hamas policies." The Times also quotes Mashal saying that Hamas has no interest in bringing strict Muslim law into Gaza. Holocaust Remembrance Day: The tragedy of silence
Yesterday, Israel marked Holocaust Remembrance Day. Standing on a street in Sderot, I listened quietly to the siren sound, remembering the tragedy of 6 million Jews killed in Nazi Europe, my great grandparents, uncles and aunts from Poland among them. I've become used to sirens sounding in Sderot during my past two years here-the click of the intercom, followed by a female voice that calmly repeats Tzeva Adom, Tzeva Adom, or Color Red. The scenes that unfold usually entail people dashing into shelters-racing for 15 seconds that may mean the difference between life and death. UNRWA, where is the money going?
In recent years, billions of dollars have poured into Gaza from hundreds of countries and international organizations. How much of that money has actually reached Palestinian civilians, effectively improving their quality of life and economy, has yet to be completely determined, thanks to vague audits and on-line information. Only recently, with a relatively silent international press, have there been questions from top political leaders, primarily from the US, about the way in which the donor money will be transferred into Gaza. At an Egyptian donors' conference organized by Norway and Egypt in early March, more than 75 international donors and organizations met to announce their financial support of the reconstruction in Gaza. Over $5.2 billion were pledged at the conference, surprising the Palestinian Authority, which had originally called for $2.8 billion. In light of the US pledge of $900 million, the second largest following Saudi Arabia's $1b. pledge at the conference, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated that no US funds earmarked for Gaza would end up in the "wrong hands." Waiting for Peace to Make an Appearance
As I travel down to Sderot to begin another week working at our Sderot Media Center office, I'm reminded of Shakespeare's famous line: "All the world's a stage." Sderot, a small Israeli city located less than a mile away from Gaza, is in its own right a stage for weekly rocket attacks, post trauma victims and visiting politicians. Iran, Hamas and Obama
As US President Barack Obama makes historic overtures in attempting to foster open dialogue with Iran, the rest of world watches in optimistic anticipation. The UK's Guardian recently reported that Obama's administration drafted a letter to Iran "aimed at unfreezing US-Iranian relations and opening the way for face-to-face talks." Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has welcomed US overtures saying that:
Change or no change, residents of southern and northern Israel have reason to be wary of Iran, a country that continues to fund Hamas and Hizbullah terrorism operations. Human Rights for Sderot residents
Liraz Madmony, 23 of Sderot, grew up under Palestinian rocket fire. Although a rocket has never directly hit her home, Liraz has experienced the terror of rocket explosions countless times over the past eight years. "We don't have a bomb shelter in our house," she says. "Every time, the Tzeva Adom is set off, our family races to the shower, the only room that is most 'secure' from a rocket attack." Liraz, a law student in a Ramat Gan college in central Israel, is heavily involved with student organizations such as WUJS (World Union of Jewish Students). "Many times I've missed my law classes and student activities because of the rocket attacks. It's almost impossible to lead a normal life when you are forced to live under with warning alerts and raining rockets." Defining war crimes
Type in 'war crimes' in Google and you get both the Wikpedia definition and examples of countries associated with the term including Japan, US, and...Israel. The coupling of 'war crime' and Israel is not new, and indeed much of the international media and foreign leadership favors using the term to describe Israel's current offensive operations in the Gaza Strip. The Wall Street Journal on January 10, published an article entitled "Israel is Committing War Crimes" by George Bisharat. Bisharat writes that "Israel's current assault on the Gaza Strip cannot be justified by self-defense. Rather, it involves serious violations of international law, including war crimes." The impact of Palestinian rocket terror on Israeli children
There have been many questions bouncing around in the media this week. Why is Israel at war? Why are there so many Hamas men dead? Why are Hamas firing rockets at Israel? A war of resistance, some say. Israel is holding a siege against Gaza. Palestinians are starving and suffering. And who is to blame? Israel of course. At least that is the conclusion that emerges within the headlines of AP and Reuters news reports, European news media, and countless Internet blogs on the current fighting. For those who seek objective answers to those questions, the unfolding tragedy of Sderot and the western Negev must be taken into account. Under missile fire in Ashkelon
The writer and her family are Anglos living in Ashkelon. This post was written on Monday as the first rockets hit in the morning hours. It's 12:25 in the afternoon and the city has been jumping, literally and figuratively. The morning started nice and quietly enough and since there were no alerts during the night, it lulled many of us into a false hope that the worst was behind us, that is until the first alarm of the day at about 9:15. As per drill, we (Rafi, Shani, me and the 3 dogs) all ran downstairs to my mother-in-law's hall where she was already waiting for us with her housecleaner who was muttering something in Russian, like "oy, oy, oy." Then, a massive "boom" shook the air. It was so loud that my mother-in-law (hereby referred to as "safta", Hebrew for grandma) heard it and without her 2 hearing aids, she doesn't hear a thing. We waited a few extra minutes and then the phone started ringing. |
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