CPTnet
31 August 2007
SDEROT REFLECTION: Where rockets still fall
By John Lynes
Sderot is a pleasant Israeli town close to the Gaza Strip. It seems almost
deserted during the day, but comes to life in the evening. Few outside of
Palestine and Israel had heard of Sderot until a couple of years ago.
Nowadays it is front-page news, under frequent bombardment by homemade
Palestinian Qassam rockets fired from the nearby Gaza Strip.
Some months ago, several CPTers independently wondered about the possibility
of a permanent CPT presence in Sderot, were we to be invited. We discussed
the question in Hebron and by email. Personally, I was strongly in favour,
not least because I had been in London, England, in the 1940s while German
rockets were falling, and I know how it feels. Several teammates were less
certain. So I was happy when Sean (a doubter) and I paid a quiet visit to
Sderot last week.
We met several victims, notably a fifty-year-old Israeli who spent two
months in a coma after shrapnel penetrated his stomach. We also met one of
his neighbours, a ninety-three-year old woman from England who showed us
where a Qassam rocket had damaged her home. She had survived the London
Blitz and was undeterred by Palestinian rockets, but anxious for the future
of her children and grandchildren.
A first-aid worker told us to expect a wave of rockets in retaliation for an
Israeli attack on Gaza the previous day. While we were wandering, a Qassam
rocket hit an empty kindergarten building close by. I'm ashamed to confess
we were so inured to casual gunfire in Hebron that the thump barely
registered, but we hastened to photograph the damage. In the police station,
we were shown the carcasses of hundreds of Qassams that had hit Sderot.
On the day after we left, seven more Qassam rockets struck Sderot, including
four by the kibbutz where we had stayed the night before.
Our conclusion? The Israelis we spoke to were all welcoming and glad to
share their anxieties and their longing for peace. We were both glad to
have made the journey, but the violence-reduction techniques we use in
Hebron would not apply to Sderot. All we could do is to show solidarity
with Israeli victims of violence, and this would not justify a continued
presence.
Please remember the children growing up in Sderot. And their anxious
parents and grandparents. And of course their neighbours on the other side
of the Gaza border, whose despair and powerlessness directs those rockets.
They all cry out for our prayerful understanding.
For pictures of our visit to Sderot, please see
http://www.cpt.org/gallery/album220
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Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) seeks to enlist the whole church in
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