As of today, a cease-fire is in place. More accurately, it's a break between one round of fighting and the next. Each round, more rockets are fired at the Israeli homefront. The last escalation broke records: no fewer than 700 rockets were launched in the space of 45 hours. To compare, during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, a total of 4,594 rockets and missiles were fired at Israel over the course of 50 days, an average of 91 per day.
Along with the immense pain over the deaths of the four casualties in the most recent spate of violence and the regretful injuries and property damage, we must praise the developers of the Iron Dome defense system and thank the soldiers who operate it, who managed to intercept most of the rockets fired and thus prevent more killing and destruction. On the other hand, we cannot ignore the fact that this is not a complete solution. More civilians will be harmed, more rockets will land and it is more important than ever to finish fortifying the homefront.
It's no secret that in most of Israel's southern communities, the homes are generally not equipped with safe rooms. Public shelters are not accessible everywhere and most of the ones that exist are very old, don't comply with current safety standards and cannot be refurbished. As head of a local authority in the western Negev, I can testify with sadness and frustration that renovations to existing shelters have not been effective.
In the Merhavim Regional Council, for example, the time between a Color Red siren and a rocket strike is only 30 seconds. Allow me to inform you that it is impossible to reach a public shelter in that amount of time. Since most of the homes do not feature safe rooms, small children, the elderly and the disabled are insufficiently protected because running to a public shelter at the end of their street is not an option.
It's no wonder that most of the people reaching out for psychological treatment live in homes that lack basic defenses. Most of them say there's no point in trying to run to the nearest shelter because it's too far away.
We, the heads of the local authorities, are aware of the distress and are asking the government to provide subsidized loans to build safe rooms in homes that currently lack any fortifications. In the past, we have organized group purchases of home defenses to lower the cost. Apart from subsidized loans and group acquisition, we can come up with other solutions. Safe rooms could be constructed as part of city revitalization programs, with the cost subsidized through various means. There is no doubt about the urgent need for home fortifications and practical options exist. What we need now are initiative and willingness.
At a time like this, when the country's leaders are busy putting together coalition agreements, those deals need to include, among other things, uncompromising demand for an immediate solution for home defenses not only in communities in southern Israel but nationwide. If someone was waiting for proof of how urgent the matter is, the last escalation with Gaza provided it and showed that the entire country is a front line.
