Yon Reports from Sderot

Michael Yon brings a report from Israel:

The playgrounds in Sderot come equipped with bomb shelters, decorated with kid-friendly art. When the alarms sound, the youngsters have 15 seconds to dash, tumble or waddle into a shelter before impact, or risk being torn asunder.

Earsplitting detonations, spewing searing hot steel, must be terrifying for the kids. It is truly sad to imagine that a ten year-old can have more experience diving for cover than many combat experienced soldiers.

In Sderot, I met up with the American-Israeli writer and Pajamas Media editor Allison Kaplan Sommer, who has lived in Israel for some 15 years, has three children and lives with her husband outside Tel Aviv. Together we went into the police station where the Israeli officers have saved hundreds of the rockets that have been fired from Gaza. Every journalist in Israel should see those rockets. The officer explained that the peak times for launch are when the kids are going or coming from school, and shoppers are in the open, for the greatest odds of casualties.

I really don’t understand why the Israelis didn’t just suck it up and deal with the rockets fired from Gaza. I mean, don’t they understand that they could make things worse by retaliating? Surely having death rain down on your children is better than antagonizing a group of thugs…who knows what the thugs might do?