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My daughter Merav is a proud Zionist. But even Zionists get scared sometimes. And living for the past two years in the Gaza border community of Sderot, where she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s studying at Sapir College, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a lot to be frightened of.<\/p>\n
In a heartbreaking post<\/a> that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been circulating on social media, Merav described the weekend of July 15, when 150 missiles were fired from Gaza. One landed just a block away from her apartment. After the hundreds of incendiary kites and balloons that have turned the air outside Merav\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s idyllic student dorm room into a smoky hell, that was the straw that broke this Zionist camel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s back.<\/p>\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We grabbed our backpacks and started stuffing them with whatever was near, threw them in the car and hit the gas, driving 140 km an hour through the eerily empty streets of Sderot, as though we were being chased,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Merav starts her piece. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t breathe normally until we passed Bror Hayil, a kibbutz outside the immediate radius of the current missile attacks.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not like Merav and her husband Gabe didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know what they were getting themselves into when they moved to Sderot. After four years of mostly calm following the conclusion of Operation Protective Edge, they knew that violence could return to the region. But they found the laid back lifestyle of Israel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s south enticing.<\/p>\n They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not alone.<\/p>\n The Israeli communities adjacent to Gaza have been booming<\/a>. Hundreds of families have moved to the region\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s cities and kibbutzim since 2014.<\/p>\n Some come for idealistic reasons: to fortify the vulnerable border. Others cite the natural beauty (although the fire kites have blackened that), affordability compared with Jerusalem or Tel Aviv and the child-friendly atmosphere. One new resident interviewed says that, despite the violence, he feels his kids \u00e2\u20ac\u0153are safer here than in the big city.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n In the last year alone, eight new homes have been built on Kibbutz Nahal Oz and another 12 houses are being planned \u00e2\u20ac\u201c \u00e2\u20ac\u0153no small feat for a community overlooking Gaza,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d reports<\/a> journalist Amir Tibon.<\/p>\n The same pioneering spirit pervades the student body at Sapir. Merav and Gabe live in a college community called Ayalim<\/a>, part of a national organization that recruits young people to move to student villages across Israel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s periphery. Ayalim\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 22 campuses provide low-cost accommodation and scholarships in exchange for community service.<\/p>\n In Merav\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first year, she volunteered with Holocaust survivors. Last year, she mentored<\/a> a teenage girl.<\/p>\n Ayalim (and Sapir as a whole) remind me of my own college days in the U.S. \u00e2\u20ac\u201c there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a real small-town campus environment, unlike Israel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bigger universities which have a high percentage of commuters. The students make Shabbat dinner together and run a local pub. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a fantastic humus place nearby (owned and operated by Ayalim graduates).<\/p>\n The city regularly invites top Israeli musicians to perform; most recently Sderot hosted its first Blues Festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n If I were going to college in Israel, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d want it to be in Sderot.<\/p>\n All that changed when the Hamas-fueled demonstrations broke out along the border and rockets returned to the skies.<\/p>\n