A public bomb shelter in Sderot
Just less than two months ago I spent a day in the Israeli city of Sderot near the Gaza border. Sderot, with a population of about 24,000 residents, is a largely bedroom community that is fairly densely populated. Those characteristics are what have made this formerly quiet, peaceful town the biggest target for the thousands of rockets being fired by terrorists in the nearby Gaza Strip.
Sderot lies one kilometer from the Gaza Strip. Being a runner myself, when I first saw the minuscule distance between Sderot and Gaza I immediately thought about how I can run that distance in probably five minutes or less without even breaking a sweat. Qassam rockets however travel much faster than I can run.
The truth is that the area all around the Gaza Strip is surrounded by rural and suburban communities, but Sderot has taken the brunt of the rocket fire. Why? What I learned while in Sderot was that despite the fact that the terrorists rockets are often described in the media as “crude,” “homemade” or “inaccurate” they are still deadly. Although they are not as accurate as the laser and GPS guided weapons used by more developed armies, the rockets can be aimed at a target. So to insure the rocket causes damage, injuries or death terrorists aim them at densely populated areas like Sderot. That’s right, the rockets are specifically designed to land randomly in a densely populated civilian area.
Once the rockets are fired Israeli detection systems might succeed in sounding sirens that warn residents that they have no more than 15 seconds to find shelter. Luckily in Sderot there are shelters and reinforced structures everywhere. Private homes and apartments have “safe rooms,” bus stops are built of reinforced concrete, playgrounds and schools have shelters and there are many more public shelters all about the city.
So I decided to test myself and see if I could run to a shelter in just fifteen seconds. As I mentioned before I am a runner, I am also 29 years old and a fairly healthy and physically capable individual; so I might be more able than most to make it to a shelter quickly. Standing in the middle of a playground I gave myself fifteen seconds to run to the nearest shelter. I made it, barely.
Had I been a little slower I would not have. If I were a little older, or even a little younger I may not have. If I were wearing flip flops I may not have made it. If I were in the middle of eating a meal, tying my shoes or even sneezing I would not have made it. If I were pushing a stroller or carrying a baby I definitely would not have made it.
Now the terrorist rockets are reaching farther away than Sderot. They’ve hit the densely populated city of Be’er Sheva with a population of about 200,000 and the even larger city of Ashdod. It is no accident that these falsely labeled “homemade” rockets are striking these large and densely populated cities. In order to hit a city like Be’er Sheva that is surrounded by desert or Ashdod that lies next to the vast Mediterranean Sea the rockets must be precisely aimed. These cities do not have as many shelters as Sderot.
So Hamas and its spin-off terrorist organization the PRC are now targeting more civilians and more vulnerable civilians than every before. Aiming and firing thousands of rockets at civilians is a war crime and amounts to crimes against humanity. This is the tactic of the rulers of the Gaza Strip.
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