There is one thing that Israelis and Hamas Officials have in common--they are both hiding in bomb shelters.
Since the Israeli Operation "Cast Lead" started last Monday, Hamas officials have been in hiding. And everyday in southern Israel, between three and four times a day, a "Red Color" alarm alert sounds (listen to it here) giving 900,000 Israeli citizens fifteen seconds to run for cover before a missile strikes.
Tonight, as the death toll reaches over 400 in Gaza (10 - 20 % civilian casualties), I'm wondering how many seconds do Gazans have before the Israelis strike? The New York Times reported that, "hundreds of thousands of Gazans have received warnings in the form of telephone messages or fliers that their buildings are Israeli targets."
Even with this warning, I find myself asking, why do "the latest casualties in Gaza include three children who had been playing outside"? Someone has to ask, what are your children doing playing outside? Why aren't they in a bomb shelter?
But it turns out, as Amnesty International reported "that there are no ‘safe’ places in Gaza for civilians to seek shelter."
As one Gazan said on the BBC, "we get together on the ground floor - we don't have basements or centres where we can all shelter together. So we can never be prepared for massive operations."
Maybe Hamas should have built bomb shelters instead of bombs, but I'm waiting for the day where Israelis and Gazans don't have to build either.
