14-Mar-12: This is how it sounds and kind of how it feels to be where the rockets are coming at you

This video was shot in Ashdod, a pleasant coastal city with the misfortune of being within shooting range of the tens of thousands of terrorist rockets stored in houses, mosques and hospitals throughout Gaza.

You hear six explosions and an air-raid siren in this short video clip. We heard those sirens here in Jerusalem when Saddam Hussein's forces fired on us in January and February 1991, and it's something you not only don't forget; it actually makes us shiver to hear it now.

You can see that Ashdod, like Ashkelon and Gan Yavneh and Gadera and Beer Sheva and Netivot and Sderot and other communities with names that are unfamiliar to non-Israelis, looks not so different from cities in countries that are perhaps more familiar to you.

Now, glance over to the right of this page and the widget called Challah Hu Akbar's Counter. It counts rocket attacks on Israelis. Try to imagine how different life is in the places we just listed, and in fact throughout Israel, compared with where you live. What would you be asking your government to do if those rockets, mortars and missiles were being fired at your children and you?