8:00 am, August 26 2014: Updates on the Israel-Hamas War:

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UPDATE 8 am:

Missile that did not quite crash all the way through the ceiling of a mall in downtown Ashdod yesterday.

Ashkelon home this morning:

Missile damage from this morning. The family fortunately made it to their bomb shelter in time.

**The scope of the missile and mortar attacks on southern Israel yesterday is difficult to comprehend. Sure, there were a few missiles fired at Tel Aviv which the media spent most of the day trying to determine if they were really fired or not, and there was the late night salvo again from Lebanon that hit the area around Kiryat Shmona with another 4 missiles.

But southern Israel was absolutely pulverized.

In some cases, nearly 20 incoming missile and mortar alarms sounded in 1 minute. In other cases, the mortar attacks went on for 10 to 20 minutes at a time and included 10 to 20 mortars at a time.

In all, more missiles and mortars were fired yesterday than on any other day of this war so far: 270. This number includes: 130 missiles and 140 mortars.

Because it is hard to read the breaking news ticker to the right, a partial list of the attacks yesterday is appended below.

**So where does this leave us this morning? For all of the talk of a ceasefire being close at hand, southern Israel is already being hit again this morning including here in Ashdod. Nevertheless, a ceasefire is likely in the coming hours.

But more than this, the specter of the Obama Administration is rearing its ugly head again as reports are surfacing that Obama and John Kerry are piecing together a U.S. plan that bypasses the Egyptian proposal that is on the table. The U.S. plan is being formulated with the assistance of Jordan, Qatar, Turkey, the Europeans, and others.

**Your humble servant never thought he would say this in the absence of a military victory over Hamas, but perhaps the time has come for a disgusting, humiliating ceasefire.

Why you may ask?

1. The Netanyahu government does not possess the will to fight. Unable to make a decision, it has abandoned the people in the South. Interestingly, the entire country is beginning to see this; a poll released yesterday, shows that PM Netanyahu’s popularity has plummeted in recent days. From a high of 88% just weeks ago, it is now at 38% and falling fast.

What is the main reason given by people for their change of opinion? Netanyahu’s abandonment of the South.

2. The IDF General Command does not possess the will to fight or the capability to stop the missile and mortar fire. It remains content to continue to bomb empty buildings and open spaces in Gaza–and kill the occasional terrorist–and just hope that the terrorists run out of missiles and mortars. There is no sign that the terrorists are on the verge of running out of anything.

We residents of the South are willing to fight to the end, but we do not have a government or IDF General Command that will support us. What we are not willing to be are sitting ducks, used as cannon fodder by a Netanyahu government and IDF General Command that has no strategy to win against Hamas. 

The residents of southern Israel deserve quiet–a quiet we will never receive from a government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, a Defense Ministry headed by Moshe Ya’alon, and an IDF headed by Benny Gantz except in the form of a “ceasefire” to Hamas (and even then there will be no real quiet).

And we residents of the South now know, as if we didn’t know it already, we will never have any security.

It is no coincidence that the parents of murdered 4-year-old Daniel Tregreman announced yesterday after his funeral that they are leaving southern Israel and never coming back. 

Addendum:

Yesterday’s attacks (in reverse order, starting with the last, first):

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