Hardline Israelis on Gaza’s border slammed a shaky ceasefire with Palestinian militants – fearing Hamas rocket teams could open fire within days.
In frontier town Sderot, less than two miles from the missile-battered Palestinian enclave, one firebrand Rabbi called for a continuation of Israeli air-strikes.
Sderot teacher David Fender, 59, told the Mirror: “We absolutely protest that there are two sides to the fighting and we feel we are victimised.
“At the very minimum it would be good to continue to get rid of the rocket teams for the welfare of the Palestinians as well as us.
“We need the eradication of the leaders of Hamas, who should all be killed as they are threatening our children.
“Hamas is to blame for this and there should be no let-up until they are destroyed.”
More than 70 per cent of polled Israelis have dismissed the ceasefire, many saying Hamas needed to be further pulverised to stop future attacks.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
Claims of being “victimised” seem strange when the awful toll figures for both sides are compared- even though Israel accuses Hamas of starting every war.
Even though the militants rocket Israeli civilians in a bid to draw as much blood as possible, Gaza’s civilians always suffer a vastly disproportionate price for the tit-for-tat-strikes.
The horror of what the people of Gaza have suffered for the past 11 days is impossible to imagine if you haven’t lived through it.
Amid fears of a ceasefire end on both sides Gaza is counting the bloody cost of 11 days of cross-border strikes -with 243 Palestinians killed, including 66 children and 1,900 injured.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
In Israel 12 people have been killed, including two children and hundreds injured by rocket salvos from Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters.
And yet, despite the difference in levels of suffering, horror and loss Palestinian supporters in Sheikh Jarrah, East Jerusalem yesterday honked horns in celebration.
In Jerusalem Saleh Diab, a Palestinian threatened with eviction to make way for Jewish settlers, said:”This is a morning of freedom, a morning of victory.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
“It’s good that the conflict will end but unfortunately I don’t feel like we have much time before the next escalation.”
The scenes of jubilation were echoing similar celebrations in Gaza’s devastated streets, which have suffered their worst blitz in years.
But the tension in Jerusalem that started the latest conflict between Gaza and Israel exploded in the capital’s Temple Mount area again yesterday.
The ceasefire did little to stop post- Friday prayers riots breaking out again with hundreds of people throwing rocks and petrol bombs at police.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
Ominously, within hours of the ceasefire Hamas was celebrating the deal as a victory, with Ezzat El-Rechiq, a senior Hamas political bureau man saying:
“It is true the battle ends today but Netanyahu and the whole world should know that our hands are on the trigger and we will continue to grow the capabilities of this resistance.”
Gaza’s civilians have paid a massive price in blood and livelihoods for the Hamas beligerence which has seen an overwhelming Israeli military blitz.
As many as 16,800 homes have been damaged by Israeli warplanes and artillery, Gaza’s infrastructure smashed at a cost of tens of millions of dollars.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
Israel’s post-Covid economic recovery has also been battered by the immensely costly war, which has seen both sides accused of war-crimes against civilians.
In Sderot, Israel’s most rocketed town, 75 per cent of the local children have been evacuated from homes, throughout the latest onslaught.
Racheli Abigail, grandmother of five year-old Ido Abigail,the first Israeli child killed in the missile exchanges told the Mirror: “We have lost the most precious thing in the world.
“I am feeling a very strong pain. A child should be allowed to grow up and live a normal life like most other children have done.
“He was a lovely child and I would hate anything like to happen to other children.
“I want all the children in Israel to live quietly.”
Ido died last Wednesday when a Hamas rocket smashed into an apartment block next to his and a tiny piece of shrapnel flew through a narrow gap in a protective window he was sheltering behind.
In the same block Tamara Lerner, 75, told the Mirror: ”I do not believe the ceasefire will hold for long at all.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
“We were seeing rockets fired at Israel until the ceasefire at 2am and I see it regularly.
“Children are so used to sheltering from rockets here that they even play a game of “code red” in which they run for shelter and see how fast they can do so.”
The least time it takes for a child to dash for cover in a shelter room- or bomb shelter- here is eight seconds.
Geffen Benyair, six, is a little girl so shy she can barely speak and holds her brother Yehuda’s hand tightly as she says: “I don’t know what the rockets are. I think they are metal things. And they come from a place called Gaza.”
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
She sparks into life as she demonstrates how she runs as fast as she can for exactly eight seconds, knowing it could once again save her live, from warning to shelter.
It’s the most important lesson a schoolgirl might learn when Israel and Hamas are battering each other with missiles.
Sderot was virtually a ghost town still as locals refused for now to believe the vicious missile exchanges are over.
We found Andy Evraham, 40, walking his nine year-old daughter Agam, whose run to safety is around 15 seconds as her room is further from the house shelter.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
It is the firtst time father and daughter have left their home together in 11 days.
Andy too felt a ceasefire may be putting off the inevitable next attack.
He said: “I am not sure the ceasefire is a good thing because it may mean Israel will need to do the whole thing again when the rockets start all over again.
“If that is going to be the case then of course the ceasefire is not a good thing.
“We don’t want to end the attacks now and then have to start all over again soon in the future.”
On a local kibbutz we found a more moderate view.
(Image: Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)
Adele Raemer, 66, a teacher from Kibbutz Nirim says: “Kids have gone back to wetting their beds.
“I am pretty sure it’s the same on the other side.
“The war is over and the therapists are goingt o be working this through with kids for a long time.
“I am pleased to have a ceasefire.
“I am just an English teacher and if the Army says it’s enough strikes against Hamas then it’s enough.
“But on the other hand it’s a ceasefire not a peace agreement.
“And the fighting could well start again.”
