American Paramedics Joining Magen David Adom : Service of Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                     

American Paramedics Joining Magen David Adom : Service of Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon   

After being struck by rockets in such continuous volume since Wednesday, the whole southern part of Israel has been abused, needing more medical resources than on hand.  I'm happy to read that 14 Jewish paramedics have already arrived in Israel to work as volunteers with Magen David Adom.  They are but the first of dozens who are scheduled to arrive to join the others and assist people in the south.

Since 2001 at least 4,800 rockets have fallen into Israel   There were 28 deaths and hundreds injured.  15,000 people from Sderot alone suffer from PtSD with 1,000 in ongoing treatment from all the bombing.

Usually it is up to the Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon to deal with everyone's medical problems.  For instance, 1600 KASSAM missiles attacked the south in 2006.  They worked with 1400 patients with acute and post traumatic stress disorders and diseases then.  Each year they face 100,000 emergency admissions. They are a center with 500 beds which means 1 hospital bed per 1000 residents which is the lowest in the country in 2006.  Yet they are serving over 500,000 residents in the immediate area.  I wonder how many hospitals in the USA have had to convert their cafeteria regularly into hospital bed space.  They have, and also have had to go underground for some of their work due to shelling near the hospital so often.

By 2008 Israel was forced to do something to stop the shelling and went into Operation Cast Lead.
By 2009 the terrorists of Gaza were still terrorizing 1 million civilians of southern Israel and already 10 deaths came from this.

Just looking at what was going on from October 24 to 30, 2012, 105 rockets and 12 mortars were shot into Israel from Gaza.
October 31 to November 6th  -2 rockets landed
November 10 to November 16--340 rockets rained down on southern Israel   An IDF vehicle was hit, killing one soldier and injuring the others.  The vehicle was on fire from the hit.  They were on their usual patrol outside the fence separating Gaza from Israel looking for breaks in the fence.

From January 2012 to October there have been 800 rockets shot into Israel. Add 342 plus more to that sum as the shelling has continued, hitting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem with farther ranging rockets from Iran.   These have been answered by  sending complaints to the UN and air flights to hit wherever rockets are coming from.  However, Iran is sending arms through Sudan and up into Egypt where they get to the terrorists through tunnels and trucks.

At the moment, officials are waiting to see if Egypt can reach a  peace agreement.  If not, Israel is ready for a ground incursion to put an end to this shelling.

Resource:  http://www.jpost.com/Headlines/Article.aspx?id=292175
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palestinian_rocket_attacks_on_Israel,_2012
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_rocket_attacks_on_Israel
Oregonian newspaper, 11/18/12  Front page: Israel escalates assault on Hamas, Gaza Strip, page A12 whole page-Opposing narratives bound for collision by AP Dan Perry and Josef Federman, Hamas rockets are new element in fight by NY Times News service-Ethan Bronner,  Israel's Iron Dome missile defense by AP, picture by Hatem Moussa/AP and another picture by McClatchy-Tribune.  They made a few errors here and there, but not bad.  My problem with these reporters is that they jump into the news without an opening sentence to explain, such as headline Israel escalates assault.....It sounds like Israel is the aggressor from that which is not true.  Israel is defending its people.  How about-Israel Defends by hitting back strongly or something like that.  It's like what happened with the report Susan Rice read which had eliminated the word terrorists and replaced it with some other milk toast word.