I have a fixed meeting with Aharon Peretz of the Etzel Eitan restaurant in the center of Sderot, a sort of Pavlovian "date," if you will. When Hamas fires rockets at the towns on the Gaza border, he knows I will show up for lunch. This week, a journalist asked to interview him, and he said that there was no need. He already has a journalist of his own. Although the restaurant was closed on Saturday, I was there in a heartbeat on Tuesday. His mother, Rivka, with her beautiful wise eyes, was there as usual. "I came here when I was six years old, 60 years ago," she said. "And I won't run away from them. Let them run away from me." When the warning siren sounded, she did not leave her watch over the frying pan and did not stop chopping up vegetables. Television crews came and went, along with shoppers from the nearby market. Then a group of budding journalists from the United States arrived. They are in Israel for a month as part of an academic program under the auspices of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. "We were deciding whether or not to come to Sderot," one of the program's guides told me. In the end, they skipped the Haaretz Peace Conference, where Economy and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett was reportedly punched by a peacenik, and brought the students here. They roped me in to give an impromptu lecture: Why there is wisdom in the policy of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon, which enables only jumps from operation to operation to achieve temporary calm, and no chance of true peace with Gaza. And then we heard two explosions, and we had to ask one of the students, who had suddenly paled, if she was all right. When she had calmed down, they explained to her that what she heard was the Iron Dome intercepting rockets. Then a Sderot resident entered the restaurant and spoiled the sense of calm that had just been restored by saying that there had been an air raid siren and people were looking for cover. On Tuesday, even more so than on Saturday, war was in the air. Not panic, but certain indications on the sidelines. Cars zoomed by junctions in the Eshkol region, traveling well above the speed limit. Show me a police officer who is going to volunteer to stand by and write tickets. In the afternoon, three pillars of black smoke loomed in the distance. The Israel Defense Forces had bombed Gaza. On the radio, the Palestinians said 12 people -- people who did not heed the Israeli warnings -- were killed. It won't be long before someone demands an investigation into Israel's practices. The residents of the south have not been neglected War is in the air on the Gaza border, but the feeling that residents had of being neglected and abandoned is fading. When Tel Aviv also became the target of rocket fire from Gaza at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, a certain feeling of solidarity was created. This too lends something to the resilience of Israelis in the southern towns of Netivot and Nahal Oz. But now, it is time for further consideration: Netanyahu and Ya'alon did not want to be dragged into a military operation, and they gave Hamas an opportunity to stop firing rockets, even at the expense of losing popularity on the homefront. I believe this is a responsible and balanced approach. But it has become clear that Hamas is not stopping the rocket fire and Israel, against its will, has expanded its military operations. It is time to give up the slow and steady approach in favor of a forceful operation, which Israel is prepared to carry out. With Israel forced to engage in a full-scale military operation, the timetable will change. Everything must be done forcefully to ensure the operation ends as quickly as possible. Slow and steady can be effective before a campaign begins, but not now.
