A crowdfunding campaign was well on its way to raising NIS 500,000 for bomb shelters in Bedouin communities in the Negev as of Sunday, grassroots peace organization Standing Together said. It had already raised NIS 428,327, it said.
“Over the course of the last few days, we all saw the crazy damage caused by rockets from Iran,” it added. “We all anxiously saw the impact at Soroka Hospital. But what we don’t all know is that tens of thousands of Bedouin residents of the Negev don’t have basic shelter and are totally exposed to the Iranian rockets.”
Life under Iranian attacks
Hundreds of Bedouin families were sleeping under bridges or railroad overpasses for protection, Standing Together said. “This is a critical moment that calls for solidarity between us: Every donation will help us toward the goal of protecting people – right here and now,” it said.
The campaign said it hopes to provide small shelters (migunit) for Bedouin communities, and each such shelter costs about NIS 60,000.
Last week, State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman said there was a lack of shelters in Israel.
“In 2020, we published an extremely severe report about the protection gaps in the State of Israel,” he said. “At that time, it was found that close to 2.6 million residents were living without adequate protection. Moreover, budgets allocated to the issue were not utilized, and government plans were left unfunded.”
Hadash-Ta’al MK Ofer Cassif said the problem was especially severe for Arab Israelis.
“Millions of citizens in Israel live in homes that are not fortified and without access to public shelters – particularly in south Tel Aviv, the Negev, and in Arab towns and villages – placing them in real and immediate danger in the face of the growing threat of rocket fire,” he wrote.
Eliav Breuer contributed to this report.