Our government & it's leaders should be ashamed of themselves. Thank you Arcadi!

Marcell, I am moved by your comments and my thoughts are with you. Just one observation. You say Mr Gaydamak has no ulterior motives. Please, think again. His motives may come from a heart full of indignation, just like ours feel, but he is a businessman and a politician-in-the-making. We have no evidence that his motives are completely pure. Please Israelis, do not trust leaders so blindly. Not ever again. You have been misled too many times.

Thanks to both of you for your comments regarding the idea of a federal Israel I agree Israel is too tiny for such a complex net of governments, but this idea comes to me regularly, as I read of different sectors of the population at odds with each other. You see how some areas are neglected economically or militarilly. Others try to impose values that are incompatible to another section of the population. All this strife weakens the country. I'm a believer that much energy is being wasted this way and your enemies are taking advantage of it. I'm only an observer, but I truly believe it would be worth the trouble and expense to spare future generations this kind of constant wearing down on the citizens. More local administrative control and a Senate where the major areas of the population have equal representation, would go a long way to solve their problems. I just hope this is an idea that might germinate some day.

that a private citizen must go in and provide financial and logistical help, when the government is useless to do anything, not evacuate children, nor provide military protection to its own citizens I dont know how the citizens of israel live like this, their leaders should be thrown in jail for such incompetence.

Thank you for your thoughts. Of course, you are right, in that Gaydemack has already indicated that he will go into politics. However, when I compare his concrete deeds so far with those so sadly lacking of Olmert, believe me, this man deserves to be given a fair chance to prove/disprove himself. After all, what have we to lose at this stage of the game? As we speak, a few hundred families are safe out of harm's way, thanks to him - and in my book, this counts - big time.

All the best to you and to all the residents of Sderot. G-d bless you.

To those who are discussing motivation, you need to look at demographics. Sderot is mostly a poor city with immigrants. During the 90s there was avery large influx from the former Soviet Union. Maybe, and its only my thoughts, he is taking care of his own? Clearly no one else is! I was in Sderot last summer, during the Lebanon war. Lebanon, rightfully so, was in the news. In Sderot I kept hearing "BOOM, BOOM" but where was the media? Where were the politicians?

As far as I know, there is a fair mix of Russian, Moroccan and other ethnicities in Sderot. I think it is besides the point whether Gaydamak is evacuating a Russian or a Ethiopian or any other group; they are all people under fire from the enemy and we should just be thankful that they have been taken out of harm's way by a businessman using his own funds to do so. I do know that he evacuated families with children first, as well as senior citizens. Olmert has not evacuated a single soul, nor has he provided protection in the form of safe rooms to even one of the communities on the Gaza border! We urgently need the funds that the Knesset approved almost a year ago to build these safe rooms, and which we still haven't seen a singel agura of. If we had a safe room connected to each home, there would be a safe place where our children could at least sleep at night or run to during the day (it takes between 4-8 seconds for a Kassam to reach my kibbutz - not enough time to run to the communal shelters). If Olmert has decided not to retaliate, he should ensure that the civilians are at least protected, while we wait out this difficult time. Meanwhile, the school is still closed today (no alternative, really!) , the children will be taken by bus to kibbutzim further afield for a fun day; but they will be back to face more bombs this evening.