Targeting Civilians

Gaza continues to send rocket after rocket to Israel. Yesterday they counted 50 rockets in one day.

Does anyone care?

My friend in Ashkelon, worked late last night for the city, convincing people that they are ready to protect their citizens with an early warning system and shelters.

Ashkelon is the oldest and largest Mediterranean seaport in Israel, 8 miles north of the Gaza Strip (about the same distance from Ramallah to Jerusalem).
It was first mentioned in Egyptian writings from the 19th century. One of the 5 cities conquered by the Philistines, along with Gath, Gaza, Ekron und Ashdod. (Josh.13:3,1 Sam.6:17) Samson went down from Timnah to Ashkelon (Judges 14:19) The population in 2005 was 117,000, making it today the 8th largest city in Israel. In 2005 the world's largest water desalination plant opened at Ashkelon.

It is not the first time that Ashkelon has been under rocket attack.
Hamas has rockets with a range of 22 kilometers. These rockets are able to hit Ashkelon from the heart of Gaza. - The Qassam rocket (also Kassam) is a simple steel rocket filled with explosives, produced by Hamas. Although they are sometimes erroneously referred to as missiles, they are free-flight artillery rockets lacking any guidance system. Qassams are sometimes referred to as "homemade" or "primitive", but critics dispute this, maintaining that they require "both expertise and dedicated locations to manufacture," and that "these rockets are manufactured in industrial areas by the Palestinians themselves".

The Katyusha was originally a World War II-era Soviet rocket. A rocket is a missile on a smaller scale and with a smaller quantity of explosive material. Like the missile, a rocket consists of a warhead containing the explosive material, a body containing the fuel powering the rocket's flight, and a tail in which the engine is located, which also stabilizes the rocket during its flight. Rockets can be launched by operators who are near the rocket launcher when it is fired, or by means of a delayed timer (which doesn't require an operator being near the position when it is fired). The devices are easy to move and to conceal, and can be assembled on the back of a vehicle in order to make it quicker to move them to the launch site and take them away after firing.

Yesterday a total of 24 people are hospitalized, mostly for shock, after eight long-range Grad rockets hit the coastal city of Ashkelon. According to Arutz Sheva, the Katyusha-like rockets were fired in several waves in the mid-afternoon hours. Two rockets slammed directly into residential homes, and shock victims were treated at the sites. One rocket landed at the northern entrance to town, and marks the longest-range hit to date. Later in the day, eight more Kassam rockets were fired into Israel; four of them landed north and east of Gaza, and four landed in Ashkelon.- On Wednesday, Roni Yihye, 47, a father of four, was killed by a Kassam rocket in Sapir College Wednesday. He was from Moshav Bitcha, a moshav (agricultural community) located near Ofakim.

I hear Palestinians complain about Israelis targeting their civilians. But when we read the news, we find out that they removed specific terrorists in surgical operations. They have it backwards because the Palestinian rockets are the ones that are purposely fired at civilian populations and therefore always targeting civilians.

Shalom - Lilo