Day 10: Beautiful Bomb Shelters

Most children get their exercise on the playground or at sports practices. I know I did. My childhood was full of adventures in the woods, on the farm, or in the mountains as well as peaceful days of soccer, basketball, and football practices. In America our specified times for running at sports practice is usually at the end of practice and consists of running up and down the field. In Sederot, Israel my contemporaries spent their childhood running from Hamas rockets. Can you imagine over 500 rockets being shot into your town and the surrounding area over the course of 2 years…in 2007 and 2008? Bomb shelters built every 300 yards along the streets, sirens going off at random while you’re eating breakfast, taking a spelling test, playing at recess, or taking a shower after a long day at school- this was life for the children of many towns in southern Israel.

Thursday morning we were greeted at our hotel by Bentzi Gruber, and IDF colonel who commanded 20,000 Israeli troops during the war in Gaza 2 years ago. He is still big-tymin in the IDF and is one of the heads of the army’s missions to conduct ethical and moral battle practices. If you’ve seen any of the videos in which Anti-Israeli activists absurdly interrupt Israeli speakers in the middle of talks and forums on University campuses in the US, Bentzi is most likely the one being interrupted. He gave a presentation on the ethical methods and dilemmas that the IDF deals with when fighting terrorists. Talk about hearing it from the horse’s mouth. This man ran the show. He showed us videos of Hamas soldiers firing rockets from Mosques, loading troops into the back of ambulances, and driving TNT infused vehicles across the boarder into IDF hummers.

So we saw some pretty crazy stuff on a slide show. In a hotel meeting room. Big deal, right? Well, imagine seeing that… and then loading on a bus to drive to where it all happened. Intense.
From our hotel in Tel Aviv (which, by the way, is now within missile range of Hamas’ rockets) we headed south. Driving parallel to the coast we passed the port cities of Ashdod and Ashqelon (which was hit by a rocket 13 days ago) and into the sleepy town of Sederot. The bus weaved through the homey neighborhoods up to a dead end under a dusty hill. Cresting the hill, we walked up to an expansive view of ‘it.’ There it was, Gaza. Literally highway, boarder fence, a bit of open pasture, and then less than 3 miles away, the city of Gaza. Bentzi pointed out multiple spots from which Hamas has often launched rockets into the down in which we were standing….Now I realized why they had explained the bomb siren procedure to us on the bus ride. Whew.

Israel Fact #23: Ill throw a few Gaza facts at you here- 11,000 Palestinians from Gaza were given medical care in Israel last year- that’s 98% of applicants who applied to cross the boarder and receive it. 35% of Gaza’s electricity comes from Israel- ironically from a power plant in Ashqelon that Hamas has targeted. Last year 16,000 truckloads of goods from the private sector and 3,000 truckloads of aid from NGO’s were delivered from Israel into Gaza. An estimated $ 1.1 billion, yes billion, of goods passed through the network of 600-800 tunnels from Egypt into the Gaza Strip. Humanitarian crisis inflicted by Israel? Ill let you use your brain to figure that one out. If you need some help figuring out whats going on, this might help
After the overlook we stopped by the Sederot police station which has stockpiled all of the rockets fired into their town over the past 10 years. My mind was boggled- how on earth did these people conduct normal lives like this? Rockets dropping into your streets at random without more than 15 second notice. Sirens blaring, men, women and children springing to the nearest shelter, cell phones jammed while everyone tries to call their loved ones at once- not knowing if they could have been killed. These thoughts rushed through my head, down into my chest, as my hand ran over the rough, rusty rocket casings.
To put a stamp on it all, we were taken to a local daycare that had been built by some loving American organizations. Ordinary daycare for the most part- basketball goals, climbing wall, concession stand, movie room, computer lab…all encased in a bomb shelter. And with counseling for the many children with post-traumatic stress. That’s when it hit me for good- of course these people want peace. They have to drop their children off at a concrete daycare instead of at the park. They have to sprint to shelters at all hours of the night. They have to send their children off to the army as soon as they graduate from high school. They all have a relative, high school classmate, or co-worker who has been killed in the never-ending war. If no less than that- I saw it in the eyes of Israeli after Israeli who spoke to us about their struggle and quest for peace. Psalm 122
To be continued…