The weather news are unrelenting,
snow and coldness have attacked the globe. A winter in Negev dessert
means, above all, hard rains which, going together with low degrees,
make perceived temperature significantly lower than thermomethers
show. Last days we've experienced almost extreme downpours.
Waterfalls of rain were streaming down the streets, what made it
difficult to go through, cause the level of water reached a height of
the ankles and this situation didn't change for few days. The hard
rain had also bad influence for all electric installations in local
buildings, cause many of them are not air-tight and many people in
this town has more important expenditures than preparation for this
kind of difficulties, which happen only few weeks during year. But
despite this invonvinience, a water is a blessing bringing life in
the most basic, agrocultural meaning. It allows plants to grow and
gives birth to fresh green in these spreads of stony and sandy land.
The word 'rain' can be doubly
understood, in its first, traditional aquatic meanings and more
metaphorically, as the rocket rain which fall down on this all over
the year and very often isn't noticed neither by Israeli and foreign
media. In December we've had three or four (nobody really counts)
rocket attacks, but only one has been mentioned on the internet
version of Yedioth Ahronoth. People somehow are accustomed to the
fact, that the southern district of Israel is a rocket-rainy area.
Frankly, the sound of rockets flying over Sderotians' heads is
hearable more often than Tzeva Adom informs. January and February
were more peaceful, althought sometimes the sounds of explosions wake
up citizens in the middle of night, but nobody knows what happened,
where and why.
Apart from the fact that the falling
water is a real blessing for this land in the environemntal meaning,
it brings also the second, maybe not so obvious advantage. The water
mixed with powdery sand and undersized stones, which are typical
ingredient of the soil here, makes viscous and heavy mud which helps
to overwhelm military tunnels from Gaza, which are supposed to be
alternative way of illegal transfer to Israel in order to attack
civilians. Together with the last series of stabbings in all country,
it's the source of the serious fear among citizens in this area,
mostly because of its unpredictability. When there is a rocket,
locals can be informed by the Tzeva Adom and generally feel protected
by IDF. The actions taken from the ground are unexpected and happen
without any warning, so people cannot be prepared to defence.
This matter became especially
intensive last time when the silence of night and the calm of a
bedtime has been started to be interrupted by talks and sounds of
digging and this problem appears not only in Sderot, but in many
towns and kibuttzes around. People, who don't want to unveil their
identity, say that they hears all these weird sounds in their
households. They can't sleep because of the noise of talks and the
Kongo machine (used for digging) coming from unidentified source.
Some of them thinks sometimes that they misheard something or maybe
even some psychiatrical problems have started, what is also not
unusual or surprising among the citizens of this area and in most of
cases is caused by the war stress and traumas. But the light of day
reveals the dangerous true that terrorists are trying to find another
way to attack the people, whose only fault is the fact that they are
Israeli Jews.
Citizens required a proper security
and naturally the Ministry of National Defense is doing their bests
to protect civilians, citizens of Gaza can see and hear digging wirk
on Israel's side as well. The issue is serious. IDF have been
checking every related report by residents in the Gaza periphery.
Actually, the special commission is working on the new system which
would help to find and destroy new tunnels quickly. US government set
120 millions $ for the 'Israeli invention' for detecting and
identying tunnels. Heedless of the fact that some jihad soldiers were
perished during their work on tunnels previous week, the Hamas calls
for continuation of building the tunnels and making them even more
advanced and better developed than during the last Gaza war in 2014.
Simultaneously, the collapsing of tunnels isn't a new phenomenon in
this area. Each time when there is at least between 100 and 130 mm of
rain, the tunnels cave in.
Israel and Hamas have exchanged
calming messages, assuring one another that they are not interested
in open conflict, but nobody knows how long this quasy-peaceful
period can last, especially in the light of these events.
(The post has been based on the information taken from the articles in the Jerusalem Post, Yedioth Ahronoth and Times of Israel)
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| Photo by The Times of Israel, overlooking the Gaza Strip |
