#RefugeeProblems

Okay, so I'm not really a refugee but hey, we need some way to lighten the mood right? When I last left you it was about 3AM on Wednesday night/Thursday morning and we had just heard our 6th or 7th siren go off and I was really needing some sleep. In the span of 13 hours from 8:30 PM Wednesday to 9:30 AM Thursday the sirens went off 15 times. If that's not psychological warfare, I don't know what is. The whole of Beer Sheva and the areas surrounding Gaza must have been sleep deprived like no other and ready to cry/scream/lash out every time we heard that siren go off again. Sometimes, I just didn't have the energy or capacity to go down to the bomb shelter so I waited it out in my bathroom. Some friends of mine even brought mattresses and sleeping bags to the shelter so they weren't awoken by the siren and had to run somewhere. By the time the 5th or 6th siren went off, our program directors had decided that we needed to get out of Beer Sheva. Since we already had a trip planned for Thursday night through Friday morning to Masada, they decided to just change our plans a little, leave Beer Sheva Thursday morning instead, hike and then camp near Masada, climb Masada Friday morning like planned, and then head back to Sde Boker instead of Beer Sheva. Sde Boker is an are south of Beer Sheva that, while still officially in rocket range, is so small and insignificant that here is no way Hamas would attempt to launch their not super accurate rockets at it. Our counselors keep telling us we're probably in the safest place in Israel. As of right now, we're staying in Sde Boker for another night and deciding tonight whether we will stay here, or perhaps go to Jerusalem until it's finally safe enough to return to Beer Sheva.

If you though Wednesday night was bad, things have only gotten worse. On Thursday, sirens were heard in Tel Aviv for the first time in over a decade, since the first Gulf War when Iraqi scuds were fired towards Tel Aviv. Even more rockets were fired into Beer Sheva and the Eshkol Region, and the IDF began calling up the reserve units. On Friday the unthinkable happened, sirens were heard in Jerusalem and rockets landed somewhere on the outskirts of the city. Even more rockets were fired into Beer Sheva and the Eshkol region. In the last 3 days, since Operation Pillar of Defense started, 640 rockets were fired into Israel, 410 of which hit the ground, the remaining 230 were intercepted by the Iron Dome. For those who don't know, the Iron Dome is essentially a system that detects when rockets are fired towards Israel and then sends up it's own rocket to explode the one coming into Israel. Pretty cool, eh? And so far, pretty effective seeing as it was only put in place March 2011.

So now that I've talked about all the factual stuff, let's talk about me. I mean it is my blog after all, I'm allowed to talk about me. Honestly, I'm not scared. I'm more scared for my Israeli friends who may be called up to serve in the reserves than I am of being in danger myself. I know that my program will take care of me and make sure I'm in a safe area and even get me out of Israel if necessary. I've talked to my uncle and my terrorism professor who believe that this won't last very long and soon life will return to normal in the south of Israel. According to my terrorism professor, after a few days the IDF will go into Gaza, "Hamas will get the shit beaten out of them" (yes, that is a direct quote), and this will all be over. Pretty reassuring given that he predicted when rockets were going to be launched, and where they were headed to. Other than not really having the right clothes for hiking (when I packed for the weekend, I didn't know what we'd be doing), not having great internet connection most places, and you know, not being "home" (AKA Beer Sheva), I haven't been too inconvenienced by this whole conflict. While yes, I would prefer to be going about life as usual in Beer Sheva, not worrying about my awesome Israeli friends, and not having to update my friends/family as often as I can that I'm safe and ok, this hasn't changed my life all that much. And honestly, I think that says loads about the Israeli mentality. My program could be saying that we need to leave Israel until this is over or insisted that we leave the south of Israel before all the rockets started or change all of our plans because this is happening. But that is not the case. People could be freaking out and going crazy and unable to function but that's not the case either. Life goes on. Of course we wish this wasn't happening and that innocent civilians didn't have to be a part of this violence but even though it's happening life goes on.

Some of my friends here and I have been planning what we would do if this were to continue and school was cancelled indefinitely and it seemed like our semester was over (mostly because university students would be called up to the reserves, not necessarily for safety issues). Even though we know and hope that this won't happen, it's been fun to plan. For me, I might visit my sister in Austria, or friends who are studying abroad in London. I might go back to California for a few weeks, then go back to Denver, finally move in with Erin and start looking for a job. I don't know exactly what I'd do, and I know that it won't actually happen, but it's been fun speculating. But for now, we're just taking it day by day, enjoying our little break from school and in a way reality, and just living. Who knows what will actually happen in the next few days/weeks, all I know is that things are okay right now and life goes on.