Michael Yon emailed yesterday, with some photos from Sderot, Israel and the following commentary:

Charles,

I shot these two photos in Sderot, Israel. The first photo shows a few of the hundreds of rockets that the Sderot police have collected, from the thousands that have been fired into cities. The police had stacks of these rockets. In the photo, the policeman was pointing to a factory-made rocket that he said was made in Iran. Most of the “Kassam” rockets are homemade, but they are deadly. About 7,000 have rained down on Israel since the 2005 “cease fire.” Hamas has a habit of firing the rockets when Israeli kids are going to or coming from school. The kids have bomb shelters on their playgrounds! Schools and kindergartens sometimes are hit. Up to a third of the kids in the target cities have PTSD! Little wonder why the Israelis finally reacted and went after Hamas. Meanwhile, some countries and organizations wish to charge the Israelis with war crimes, but nobody is charging Hamas with murder. Is it a crime to protect your kids?

I visited some homes that were hit. Two that I saw were destroyed. The second photo is from inside the home of a 70 year-old woman who, thankfully, was not at home when the rocket blew up her home. Imagine your grandmother coming home to find her home has been destroyed.

I had no idea just how powerful these rockets are, and so I did not bring a wide-angle lens that day. To truly capture what happens to the homes when they are hit, you need a wide-angle lens, but I had only a 50mm. Her home was simply devastated. Some European officials say these rockets are merely a nuisance and Israel overreacted when it attacked Hamas. Those officials are wrong. These rockets are increasingly powerful and thousands have rained down, and Hamas continues to fire at innocent civilians. Hamas needs to be destroyed. They deal in suicide bombers, random rockets, kidnapping and murder.

Last week the United Nations accused Hamas of stealing humanitarian food supplies from its own people. Hamas said it was a mistake! Hamas is like a terrorist version of the Mafia, and the United Nations doesn’t have the guts to stand up to them, so they point the finger at the victim who struck back: Israel.

This dispatch explains more.

Very Respectfully,
Michael Yon