Since we’ve been living in The Land, we’ve become accustomed to seeing the cranes just about every day. No, not as in The Cranes Are Flying or as in the migratory birds that come and go our way every spring and fall. I mean the large pieces of machinery needed to erect high-rise buildings. The ones you see in Jerusalem. The ones you see in Tel Aviv. The ones we kept seeing in Ashkelon as our tour bus left the city in the morning and came back in the late afternoon. What I didn’t expect to see (and I suspect I wasn’t alone in that) was the evidence of their presence in Sderot, that battered community. But, sure enough, as we entered from the south, there, for all to see, were a row of high-rise buildings, clearly constructed in the last few years, right smack-dab in the line of fire of the missiles from Gaza. I think we all had the same questions, directed at all and sundry of the locals we met on our trip. What are you doing? Why are you here? Isn’t it kind of dangerous in these parts? Continue reading →