Traveling the Red Zone, Part A (Nitzan)

On Assignment in Jerusalem By A. Ozious January 5, 2009 Traveling the Red Zone, Part A (Due to the amount of photographs, this article will be sent in several parts.) After a tough weekend of Kassam rockets, along with Grad missiles, falling into Israel from Hamas, followed by an IDF 'incursion' into Gaza , Nitzan residents apprehensively breathed a little apprehensive sigh of relief on Sunday. The previous week they endured nights of bombardment with the ground 'rockin' & a rollin' under their feet, while running in circles like a dog chasing its tail every time a 'tzomet adom' sounded, shouting: "What are we supposed to do? Where are we supposed to go?" (a tzomet adom is the alarm that announces an incoming missile or rocket) So, after starting a major war with the Israeli Air Force blasting the inner core of Hamas infrastructure, and Hamas returning hundreds of rocket fire into Southern Israel, and after our troops make their nightly trek deep into enemy territory to face a kingdom of darkness and evil, it suddenly dawned on our not-too-smart/ intelligent leadership that citizens in the 'Red Zone' of Southern Israel might need protection from the fallout. Facing the dilemma of security for ordinary citizens living in the Red Zone, they came up with the bright idea of distributing 'concrete sewage pipes' throughout the neighborhoods, not necessarily for the protection of the residents, but to ease their own conscience and ineptitude. Realizing that the round tanks sitting on top of the ground rolled when they were sat down, much less if a bomb went off near it, they later put wooden wedges or bricks along the sides to keep it from rolling or at least to give the appearance they gave their best shot to secure it under the circumstances. Yet, when I visited Nitzan the first of the week, residents were emerging from indoors with brave faces and wonderful smiles to get on with life in the Red Zone and create an 'optimistic' situation out of a bad deal. While youth put their creative skills to the test and decorated their "Home Sweet Homes" with paintings and graffiti, several anxious adults visited the location of their new homes, inspecting the erection of the long-awaited houses, finally being built for some of the Gush Katif refugees.