Sderot or Najd?

We've all been serenaded by Israel's stories of hurt and suffering from Sderot. That's the tiny village right next to the border with Gaza. They have been pelted by Qassam rockets from Gaza that were the only thing to fly out of Gaza after Israel's crippling blockade (Egypt hasn't helped much either).



I even met the prick of a mayor, Mr Eli Moyal of Sderot during a propaganda tour (the picture above is mine) trying to convince us that Israel is peaceful and they are suffering big time because of the rockets. I suppose it's hard to understand that hungry, poor, and humiliated people will do almost anything to get noticed and get even.

That was a pig of a talk, we were harrassed by Israeli security goons, but we still managed to get to the talk and be heard. It was fun. I hope to be able to ask people like Netinyahu some proper questions soon, mind you, compared to the big cheese, Moyal is just a small sardine.

Anyway, the purpose of this post is to shed the light on Sderot's history, which in fact was that it was called Najd, and was an Arab Palestinian town before the Israelis razed it to the ground and build Sderot on its ruins in 1951. How very convenient. I wonder what the Arab Mayor of Najd would say about this?

Hold that thought, and read what wiki has to say:

"Sderot was founded in 1951 (...) on the land of the former Palestinian village of Najd. Najd was a Palestinian Arab village, located 14 kilometers (9 mi) northeast of Gaza City. On 13 May 1948, Najd was occupied by Jewish soldiers from the Negev Brigade as part of Operation Barak. The inhabitants were expelled and fled to Gaza, and the village was then completely destroyed and leveled to the ground. In 1951, the town of Sderot was built over the village lands."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sderot

A typical shining example of brave Israeli history. The honour. The gallant bravery!

I'm a man of numbers, and I have been trying in vain to get some statistics on how many Sderot residents died because of these Gazan rockets, but I have found nothing. I found statistics however claiming that half of the village's residents are "casualties" of the attacks. Hmmm that means about 10,000 of 20,000 or so residents.

Ynet : Study: Over half of Sderot residents are Qassam casualties

So, 10,000 Israelis are casualties? What is the Israeli definition of a casualty? Ok.. let's look at nearby Gaza:

in 19 days of war, more than 1000 Gazans died, and 4800 were physically injured.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/14/gaza-city-fighiting-israel-un

That means physically hurt by an Israeli explosive device.

I still cannot find details of even one Sderot death from these painful rockets, even though there are 10,000 "casualties".

Amazing, that the propaganda machine managed to alert us to the plight of the modern Nadj residents (aka Sderot) while neglecting to mention the original resident's plight. The next step I guess is to find one of the original, pre 1948 residents of Sderot/Najd and capture their words on video.