A day after a spike in cross-border violence over the weekend, which sent residents of Israel's western Negev running to bomb shelters as dozens of projectiles were fired from Gaza, the locals are steadfast. They have faith in the IDF's deterrent capabilities and welcome the cease-fire agreement struck Saturday evening, but they are skeptical that the current calm will last.
Over the last three months, Palestinian demonstrators have launched hundreds of kites and balloons carrying firebombs across the border into Israel, sparking more than 1,000 fires in border-adjacent Israeli communities. The residents feel helpless to fight this new type of terrorism, and accuse the government of doing too little to stop it.
Kinneret Rosenfeld of Sderot, a neighbor of the Buchris family, whose home was hit by a Qassam rocket over the weekend, said Sunday that "we must demonstrate strength because our strength gives strength to everyone in the country. It's unpleasant and scary to raise children in an atmosphere like this, but they won't break us."
Dana Treibel-Nissanov of Moshav Ein Habasor said, "We get up several times in the middle of the night to make sure our houses and the neighbors' houses aren't on fire. That's our routine – every day, a few times a day, fires eat up thousands of dunams, and every week or two there's a volley of rockets and mortars in every direction."
"We're here to stay," she added nonetheless. "No balloon or kite, no missile or tunnel, and certainly not a damned terrorist, will scare us and force us out of our homes. The opposite – they only strengthen our roots in this wonderful soil."
Sderot resident Avichai Azulay said "We live in a reality that doesn't exist anywhere else in the world. The Color Red [early warning alert siren] is scary and keeps us awake, and a lot of people feel insecure. It can't go on."
Maya Rahamim, a resident of a community in the Eshkol Regional Council, added, "It's unbelievable that kites, a children's toy, underwent such a radical transformation in the hands of bloodthirsty terrorists. Kids used to see kites in the air and shout with joy. Now they run for cover."
The members of the Buchris family, who sustained shrapnel injuries when a Qassam rocket hit their home in Sderot, are still hospitalized at Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon. Aharon Buchris, 45, broke a number of bones in his face and sustained lacerations to his extremities. One of his daughters, 15, has been hospitalized to have shrapnel removed from her face, and a second daughter, 14, is under observation in stable condition.
The girls' mother has been treated and released and is now at her daughters' bedsides in the pediatric ward. On Sunday, property tax officials arrived at the family's home to assess the damage.
Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein visited the family's damaged home.
"We need to change the equation once and for all," Edelstein said. "I trust the IDF to restore calm to the Gaza periphery and Sderot."
At the end of his visit to Sderot, Edelstein and Deputy Knesset Speaker MK Meir Cohen drove to Sde Nitzan in the Eshkol Regional Council to watch the final game of the World Cup soccer tournament with a local family.
