Sderot residents in Eilat - One night without Quassams

[HadassahSukkot]

This one brings tears to my eyes. Especially since the "Disengagement" - - Sderot has been under CONSTANT fire..


http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3329361,00.html

Sharon and Shalom Asayag arrived in Eilat with their four-year-old daughter Hodaya.


“We had a quiet night and enjoyed ourselves, but we won’t be able to stay here for the entire week,” Sharon, a Wisconsin Plan employee, says.


“The Qassams do not interest my employers,” she says. “You have to get to work on time or lose your salary. Our neighbor, a 57-year-old woman, was killed (http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3328589,00.html) on her way to her job with the Wisconsin Plan.”


Shalom adds: “Last Thursday the municipality asked that residents remain indoors, but the Wisconsin Plan officials forced my wife to go to work.”


Shir, 15, also of Sderot, says as she was standing in line at the breakfast buffet, “Only one day has passed but it seems as though the Qassams are light years away.”




'This is not what we were promised'
Yaara Cohen, who fled to Eilat with her two-year-old daughter, says, “In Sderot we don’t do anything all day, so here we plan to go out and have some fun.” [more at link]

[HadassahSukkot]

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/article.php3?id=6702

Should Israel Reconquer Gaza?
by Ruth Matar

The most basic responsibility of a government is to protect its citizens. The Olmert government is not fulfilling this responsibility.

This week, a woman was killed and a man lost his legs when Kassam rockets landed in downtown Sderot. The Islamic Jihad and Iz A-Din El-Kassam terrorists proudly claimed credit.

Fatima Slutzker, a Muslim woman married to a Jew, was the seventh fatal victim of a Kassam rocket among the nearly 1,700 that have been fired since the withdrawal from Gaza. She was 57 years-old.

The rockets fell not far from the house of former Sderot Mayor Amir Peretz, now Israel's defense minister. Maor (ben Dorit) Peretz, the 24-year-old guard assigned to protect Peretz's house was also hit by the rocket's wildly-scattered deadly shrapnel.... [more at link]

[HadassahSukkot]

IDF taking limited action to Kassams

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=115723

The IDF destroyed four buildings overnight in anti-terror operations in Gaza. Defense Minister Amir Peretz has ordered the IDF to prepare plans to slow, but not eliminate Kassam rocket fire.

The air force struck buildings in Rafah, Beit Lahiya, Jabalya and Khan Yunis before Friday morning, in response to a recent onslaught of Kassam rocket attacks on the Israeli cities of Sderot and Ashkelon which left one dead, and two others in serious condition.

According to the IDF, three of the destroyed buildings were being used as Hamas weapons storage facilities, while the fourth was a weapons production facility belonging to Islamic Jihad. Warnings were given to the local populations prior to the aerial attacks.

Peretz has ordered the IDF to prepare plans to reduce the number of rockets being fired into Israeli towns, calling the current situation unacceptable. “We are continuing our policy of pressure on the South,” Peretz stated Thursday. The defense minister said, however, that he does not believe the IDF will successfully put an end to rocket attacks, adding that a limited number of attacks will be an acceptable reality... [more at link]

[HadassahSukkot]

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=115620

Outrage over rising Kassam attacks

A total of 12 rockets hit Sderot in four separate attacks on Wednesday, killing a woman and seriously injuring two others. Four rockets also hit Ashkelon. The IDF has vowed retaliation.

.... Mayor Ronny Mahatzri [of Ashkelon] said in an interview with the Ynet news service, “It is time for the State of Israel to wake up and act in a determined manner to stop these terror attacks from Gaza, with all the means it has at its disposal --- artillery attacks, aerial and land.”

[more at link]

[HadassahSukkot]

Defense Minister slams Business Tycoon for helping Sderot children

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=115717

Defense Minister Amir Peretz slammed business tycoon Arkadi Gaydamak Thursday night for accepting an appeal from parents to fund a brief vacation for families of children in rocket-battered Sderot.

Gaydamak was one of a number of business leaders approached by Batia Katar, head of the local parents’ committee in Sderot for funds to send their traumatized children for a short break away from the sounds of Kassam rockets exploding around them.

The billionaire agreed to pay a week-long vacation at five hotels in Eilat. Families with babies and smaller children were taken to the hotels in the Red Sea resort town on Thursday afternoon. Those with older children and teens were set to follow them on Friday, reaching a total of some 1,000 residents who were leaving the city for a week.

“The tension is very high and is affecting the children,” said Katar. “We therefore asked [Gaydamak] to take the children out now for a break from studies, for a holiday, and so on,” she said Thursday.


[more at link...]