Color Red: The Real Stories

By: Prof. Shlomo Maital

A visitor to the Saad Intersection near Kibbutz Saad, and on the road to the Gaza border, would have seen a strange sight during the 22 days of Operation Cast Lead - an army of communication vans, with satellite dishes on their roofs, parked on a hilltop, cameras pointed toward Gaza. Israel did not allow foreign journalists into Gaza, and only a handful of Israeli ones, so the TV crews used telescopic lenses to show viewers what they could of Gaza from afar.

I believe my frustrated colleagues at Saad pointed their cameras in the wrong direction. Point them east as well, my friends, not just west! The underplayed story is that of the enormous resilience and hardiness of the people of Southern Israel and the Western Negev, Sderot and later Netivot, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Beersheva, Kibbutzim Nir Oz, Nahal Oz, Saad, and others, under rocket assault for eight years, with minimal attention or sympathy from the world. 

The real story of Operation Cast Lead is not the war front, but the home front. The reason is abundantly clear. As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman notes, in Lebanon War II Hezbollah "focused on demoralizing Israeli civilians with rockets on their homes." The same applies to Hamas. In fact, to all terrorist acts.   

When they strike in Manhattan, London, Madrid, Mumbai or Sderot, the goal is to disrupt normal life by killing and terrorizing civilians. The battle, then, is in the hearts and minds of civilians. Whether the jihadists win or lose depends on whether they succeed in sowing fear. In Israel, at least, I believe they have not. This is the real victory Israel has won. And it was won by the people, not just by the army. 

Here are a few of what I believe are the real stories of Color Red.

Color Red: The Background

"Color Red" is the code name for the warning some 800,000 Israelis received when Hamas launched Qasam or Katyusha (Grad) rockets. During the 22 days of Operation Cast Lead, the warning was broadcast on Israeli radio each time a launch at a major center was detected by radar, and was accompanied by sirens in large cities (Ashdod, Ashkelon, Beersheva) and by internal speakers in smaller communities like Yivul, where our daughter, son-in-law and six grandchildren live, 7 kms. (4.2 mi.) from Gaza. From the time they hear "Color Red!," Israelis under fire have between 15 seconds (border communities) 30 seconds (surrounding region) and a minute (e.g. Beersheva) to take cover.  

During the past eight years, 4,500 rockets were fired by Gaza terror organizations. Qassam rockets were first fired in October 2001 at Israeli settlers in Gaza. The first Qassam to land on Israeli territory was fired on February 10, 2002. Some 223 rockets were fired last year during the "tadiya" (so-called cease fire), between June 19, when it began, and December 19, when Hamas ended it unilaterally. 

Operation Cast Lead began on December 28 and ended January 18. During it over 500 rockets were fired on southern Israel, threatening Israelis in an area of some 1,000 square miles. 

Some 23 Israelis were killed during the eight years of rocket attacks, and during Operation Cast Lead, 10 soldiers died and three civilians. (All the data above is from Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs).  

Qassam rockets are home-made, produced in Gaza. Katyusha (Grad) rockets are imported, smuggled in through tunnels and by sea. Neither have a guidance system. Mark Garlasco, an analyst for Human Rights Watch, which has blasted Israel for 'war crimes', told the daily Haaretz that "we believe that the Grad and Qassam are illegal weapons because they are not accurate enough to be used in this situation." 

America's Defense Department has expressed interest in purchasing the Color Red warning system, for possible use in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was developed by Rafael, Israel's Weapons Development Authority.
       

Color Red: The Song

      Color Red! Color Red!
      Hurry hurry hurry to a safe place.
      Hurry hurry hurry, 'cause it's a little dangerous now.

Art therapist Shahar Bar works with children in communities bordering on Gaza, such as Kibbutz Nir Oz and Kibbutz Saad. She reports that young kindergarten children with whom she worked were suffering from bedwetting, crying, anxiety and at times were 'frozen' when the Color Red alarm sounded. She felt she had to do something.

So she wrote a song.

     My heart is beating, Boom! Boom! Boom! 
     My body is shaking -- Doom! Doom! Doom!

We touch the threat from a safe place, she explains. And we give validity to our fears and our body reactions.

     Falling down [rocket]…. Ka Boom!

      Our bodies we shake shake shake,
      Our legs we loosen loosen loosen!

Shahar even works in a little yoga…

    Breathe in deep, breath out far,
    Breathe in deep, we can now laugh [laughter]…

    It's all over! And I feel good, it's over. 
    Yes-s-s-s-s-s-s-s-s! (shouted)

Her four-year-olds love the song. They ask to sing it again and again. It has helped them overcome their fears. A ten-minute videotape of the children singing it is available in a video made by Yuval Shoam. 

Can Hamas "militants" be defeated by four-year-olds? The song Color Red! says they can.

Color Red: "Statistical" Weapon

Unguided rockets are a so-called 'statistical' weapon. They are aimed in the broad direction of cities and communities, with the hope they will hit houses and kill civilians. When Color Red is fired at the 19,700 people who live in Sderot, the odds it will hit a given individual or home are very small. But that does not diminish the fear. Why? 

A study by Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman and his late colleague Amos Tversky, both Israelis, shows that people "overweight" low odds - we act as if very small probabilities are in reality much bigger, as if one chance in a million is in fact one in a hundred. That is why we buy lottery tickets. And it is why Qasam rockets can terrify, even if statistically the odds are small. 

What one in a million really means to ordinary people is that it could possibly kill me and my family, not that the odds are small that it will. And when rockets fall repeatedly, it means that the chances I'll be hit grow rapidly. One day, one of them will have my name on it.  

It is all about sowing fear.   

Color Red: Cobwebs and Social Capital

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah made a famous speech, a year before Lebanon War II, in Bint Jebeil, a South Lebanon village and the scene of bitter fighting in 2006.  

"It has been proved once again," he said, "that Israel is weaker than cobwebs.  [Israel] looks like a net but if you touch it, it falls apart."

For once, Hassan, you got it right. Scientists tell us the stuff spiders spin is stronger than steel. And so are the people of Israel. Israelis have been under terrorist assaults since the fedayun attacks from Egypt in the 1950's. They have endured two intifadas, waves of suicide bombers, 4,000 rockets during Lebanon War II and 4,500 rockets from Gaza. They are strong as cobwebs. The reason has to do with social capital.

In an age when Color Red sounds daily in financial markets, when companies' income statements drown in red ink, and when financial capital evaporates, social capital becames all-important. A series of studies published by Technion's Samuel Neaman Institute, a think tank, in 2005 reveals why. What follows are excerpts from those studies.

Social capital, according to researchers Karen Amit and Nicole Fleischer, is "those aspects of society, such as trust, networks, and community, that strengthen cooperation and coordination for mutual benefit and support." Amit is from the Ruppin Academic Center, while Fleischer heads the Carmel Institute for Social Studies, in Zichron Yaakov.  

Social capital underpins resilience. It is what helps the people of Southern Israel maintain daily life during eight years of rocket attacks. It is financial capital that buys F-15's, but it is social capital that ultimately defeats terror. Over the years, Israeli society has built social capital. 

Prof. Nehemia Friedland, President of the Tel Aviv/Jaffa Academic College and a world expert on resilience, says that social resilience "is expressed in the commitment of various segments of society to join forces for the achievement of common goals, in their ability to cope with threats over extended periods of time, and in their ability to adapt to changes." Israelis, both Southerners and Northerners, have it in spades. 

Technion Prof. Alan Kirshenbaum, a sociologist, asks, “How have Israeli citizens managed to survive a ferocious terror campaigns against both the state of Israel and its Jewish citizens over an extended period of time?.”    

"The 'normal' of the past is transcribed into the 'normal' of the present and future, where terrorism becomes a part of everyday life", he explains. We no longer question the presence of armed guards at every café, restaurant, shopping center and most kindergartens, in Israel, though no such guards exist, for instance, in Libya, Indonesia or Venezuela. We adapt. Terror becomes part of our lives. Color Red becomes part of our lives. Color Red becomes normal.          

In a separate study, Dr. Shaul Kimche and Prof. Yohanan Eshel, of Tel Hai Academic College's Psychology Department, studied the resilience of Kiryat Shmoneh residents after Lebanon War II. Kimche told a Haaretz reporter that, “the public appears to be significantly stronger [during Operation Cast Lead] than it was in the Lebanon War." The social resilience stems from the people's belief that military actions are 'premeditated and taken with care' and that they will improve their situation.  

Color Red: This is Personal

I asked my daughter, "what do you do when color red is heard and you are far from a shelter, and can't make it in 15 seconds?"

"We lie down on the ground and shelter our heads, and trust in God who watches over us," she says. "Sometimes we sing a song, say Psalms or tell a good joke."

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These, I believe, are the real stories of Color Red. The people of Israel cannot be defeated.