Dharma in a bomb shelter

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The pre-kindergarten where my granddaughter was, when she was here.
To the left of it is a public bomb shelter.

Now that the shelter is unlocked this month, I stuck my head in to see what it's like inside. 

An ad from 2012 was still stapled to the wall.
I had to smile.  A Zen moment.
I could use such a retreat about now . . . .
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Better than nothing

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When people realized that our local supermarket had no protected space inside, the authorities trucked in a portable shelter.

It is a sad commentary on the situation in my town and in the south that we need such a migunit that can withstand enemy rocket fire. 

There is a ring of small shops  in our town's little commercial center 
Next time the Red Alert siren blares I reckon a lot of people will be running (we have 90 seconds here) to take shelter in the small concrete box.
It is going to be really crowded standing in there for the mandatory ten minutes after the explosion.

I think I'll just continue staying home,  with the luxury of a real bomb shelter right in my apartment.
Didn't want to buy food anyway . . . .
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UPDATE July 27: This just published:

 Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund announced on Sunday that it will provide 160 portable bomb shelters to communities adjacent to the Gaza Strip. The KKLJNF raised $4 million from Diaspora Jews for the project, which will place concrete structures in Ofakim, Bnei Shimon, Gan Yavne, Sderot, Naveh, Bnei Netzarim, Sdot Negev, Eshkol, Hof Ashkelon, Merhavim, Sha’ar Hanegev and Netivot as well as in the Beduin communities of Lakiya, Sha’ar Shalom, Rahat and Hura.

The article continues at the Jerusalem Post.
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Synagogue in a bomb shelter

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When our counteroffensive, Operation Protective Edge, began on July 8,  I remember the Home Front Command instructed people not to gather for public prayer in synagogues that lacked a missile-proof room.

The Conservative congregation of Meitar is lucky then.
Even in normal times they meet in this purpose-built bomb shelter.
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Here are some interesting guidelines from various rabbis on how to observe the Sabbath while under fire:
1. from Chief Rabbi Lau 
2. from Tzohar
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(Linking to OurWorld Tuesday.)

Israeli Bedouin girls hurt by Gaza rocket (& update)

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The siren sounded for my town yesterday evening and we went to sit out the mandatory ten minutes in my bomb shelter.
A dull boom was heard, not so far away.

It turned out to be sad news.
The rocket exploded in one of the many Bedouin encampments somewhere between Jewish Omer and  Bedouin Lakiya; maybe even the one in my photo.

Two sisters of the al-Atrash tribe were wounded by shrapnel.
Atir Alwaliki, age 13, got it in the knees and is a lot better today.
But Mar'am, 10, was injured in the stomach and is fighting for her life at Soroka Hospital.

The tin-roofed huts (enlarge the picture to see)  are no protection against the rockets fired by Gaza, and Hamas doesn't seem concerned that they injure their fellow Arabs here in the Negev.

Some 80,000 "dispersed Bedouins" have set up camp, sometimes  a separate encampment for each extended family, all over the Negev, refusing to move to the towns that have orderly infrastructure and services which the government built for them.
Officially, these are treated as unrecognized or illegal villages. 

Like so many problems in the Middle East, this is a complicated one that no one knows how to solve.
The "Lands of the Negev" video, although old (2010) and one-sided (made by the Israel Land Administration authority), can give you some background.

Let us hope the missiles stop soon (eight straight days of conflict already).
Let us pray for healing for Maram and Atir.
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UPDATE!  Haaretz has this welcome update today, Wednesday:

10:25 A.M. Education Minister Shai Piron visited Maram Alwakili, 11, the Bedouin girl who was wounded Monday when a rocket hit her home in the area south of Lakiya. He met with her family and offered words of support.
Dr. Tzachi Lazar of the pediatric emergency ward described an improvement in the girl's condition. "She has woken up, and is communicating with her surroundings, and breathing on her own. Keep in mind the severity of her wound, a shard of shrapnel had entered interior abdominal organs."

UPDATE #2
The rockets on Bedouins happened in spite of the Gaza Hamas spokesman's ridiculous promise on this video.
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(A is for Alwaliki sisters for ABC Wednesday.  Linking also to Our World Tuesday.)
Some papers spell the names Atil Alwakili and some write Atir Alwaliki.  ??
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UPDATE #3:
This just published in the Jerusalem Post:

 Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund announced on Sunday that it will provide 160 portable bomb shelters to communities adjacent to the Gaza Strip. The KKLJNF raised $4 million from Diaspora Jews for the project, which will place concrete structures in Ofakim, Bnei Shimon, Gan Yavne, Sderot, Naveh, Bnei Netzarim, Sdot Negev, Eshkol, Hof Ashkelon, Merhavim, Sha’ar Hanegev and Netivot as well as in the Beduin communities of Lakiya, Sha’ar Shalom, Rahat and Hura.

. . . The article continues here.
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Welcome to my MAMAD bomb shelter

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Come on in!
My  bomb shelter is ready for whatever may come.

In answer to hundreds of rockets, the army began its major counteroffensive on the launchers in  Gaza early this morning. 

At least this time around we don't have to worry a threat of poison gas, so the sealed carton with my gas mask will stay sealed.   -- Always look on the bright side of life,  ta dum ta dum.
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(Linking to Our World Tuesday.)
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Today's drill

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Here's one of the shelters in one of the schools in town (Meitar).

It is adjoining the classrooms, as you can see.
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 The Education Ministry, in cooperation with the army's  Home Front Command, rescue services, and local councils, held a drill in Israel’s schools and kindergartens this morning. 

Here is my video of the air raid siren.
You see a big public bomb shelter next to the municipal pre-kindergarten in my neighborhood, but the kids have there own fortified room inside their own building.  Which is a good thing since here we have only one minute to take cover from any in-coming rockets from Gaza.
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Small protection

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This is the makeshift bomb shelter in the small Negev Zoo on the outskirts of Beer Sheva. 

Painted in Hebrew is "merchav mugan," meaning protected space.

If you hear the Code Red  siren go off, make a run for it, fast. 

Several rockets have been fired into southern Israel from Gaza in the last two days. 

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Time factor and Turning Point Three targil

Today ABC Wednesday's T is for Turning Point Three.
This is the code name for the week-long nation-wide preparedness targil (Hebrew for drill/exercise) being run by Israel's Home Front Command.

At 11:00 this morning the country's 2,300 air raid sirens sounded.
 I made it a point to be at a public place just then, namely, my Kupat Cholim medical clinic in Jerusalem.
Sure enough, we the public and the staff were instructed to go down the stairs to the basement. I never knew there was a bomb shelter there.
Here is the metal, air-tight door in the picture.
As you can see, the staff had turned the protected space into a kitchen and break room.

T is for time factor!

Israeli households (well, mine NOT included) recently received this handy and reassuring (LOL) refrigerator magnet.
Click to enlarge and you will see that we in and around Jerusalem are in the best location if the missiles begin in-coming from Gaza and/or Syria and Lebanon and/or Iran.
 We supposedly will have three whole minutes of warning. Yay!
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To see more about the Turning Point drill and other Facts of [Israeli] Life, please see my previous post. Toda (= thanks)!
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Facts of (Israeli) life

The bloggers of That's My World Tuesday invite you to their local world.
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All this week Israel is even stranger than it is normally.
We are having a preparedness drill named "Turning Point 3."
It is to practice what would (or should) be done by the authorities and the people in the worst-case scenario--simultaneous incoming missiles from Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, and even Iran, accompanied by terror attacks from the West Bank.

Every air raid siren in the country will go off at 11:00 a.m. Tuesday.
For the first time ever, the Home Front Command wants all citizens to practice taking cover inside the nearest shelter or protected space.

The black things you see above are built into all the new apartment buildings (since 1992).

The secure space's walls are made of steel reinforced concrete and the door has an air-tight seal.

There can be one inside the residence and also one on every floor of the building.

The old underground bomb shelters in the middle of my village. I think these public shelters are no longer in use.

The shelter next to our kindergarten does, however, look well maintained, even painted sky blue with clouds.

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I think the newest and most interesting innovation is this (in today's Jerusalem Post):

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"For the first time in such an exercise, the IDF Home Front Command will also test a new system that issues warning of incoming missile attacks to private cell phones. The IDF is also reviewing technology that would enable it to send little 'pop-up' screens to computers that are connected to the Internet.
Developed by Israeli hi-tech company eVigilo, the system connects to existing cellular antennas and is able to send messages to all phones that are being supported by the antenna. This enables the system to send warnings from areas as large as the entire country to just several city blocks, where the missile is predicted to land.
'Israelis have around 10 million cell phones and we plan to take advantage of them during an emergency,' explained OC Home Front Command Maj.-Gen. Yair Golan."

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Can you imagine, you are sitting and blogging when suddenly a box pops up on your computer screen saying "A missile is on its way to your neighborhood and will strike in X seconds (or X minutes)" !

Well friends, that's my world. Oi, such a world!

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Be prepared

The air raid siren wailed today for a very long minute and a half. Bloodcurdling. I hate it.
It stirs up the worst memories.
We are in day three of a five-day national exercise to practice responding to emergency scenarios. During the Second Lebanon War in 2006 we suddenly learned that the civilian population in what used to be the hinterland had become the frontline. So now we have a newly formed Home Front Command.
When the alarm sounded this morning school kids had to go quickly to their shelters or get under their desks.
The picture shows the old bomb shelter dug into the hill across the street from my house.