This is my personal experience:

We live in a building of 18 apartments with a shelter in the basement.  The original tenants are Jewish people who bought their apartments here in the ‘70s and are now quite old.  The ones who died left their apartments to their children who rent them out.  Most of those tenants are young and Arab, and on weekends usually go back to their villages.

We are in charge of the building.  That means Ezi is not only responsible for the maintenance of the shelter, for providing a chemical toilet, water, electricity, etc. And for knowing where the tenants are and who needs help.  There is no internet, but we’re now working on getting the lines down there so that people can be updated on the situation during an attack, and find out about the situation of their loved ones. 

My kids and grandkids live in buildings that are not as safe, and we try to connect after each attack to find out how they are.

These preparations have not been necessary in the past because attacks were never this long and this destructive.  Standing in the staircase was usually sufficient preparation for a rocket attack. 

Last night dozens of houses all around the country were destroyed.  One case: a thousand-pound rocket attack in Tamra, a quiet Moslem village, killed a family of four, and there have been other victims all over the country. 

I knew one of the tenants in our building comes from a village not far from there, and was relieved to see her enter the shelter.  “Where were you last night?” I exclaimed.  “We were worried.”  She smiled.  She is Bedouin and very calm and practical (except when someone takes her parking space). 

Iran is 80 times the size of Israel and has been promising our destruction since the Ayatollahs took over their country.

The old people (including me) sit together and reminisce about meeting in the shelter in previous wars. “Yes, Desert Storm – that was when we wore masks.” “Oh, in the ’73 war we only came down here once.”  This seems to comfort us…

One of the younger families sleeps in the shelter and ask us to be quieter.

Some of the people from visiting buildings or people caught in the street at the time of the attack sit in another corner and chatter.  They try to be considerate, but they are a bit hysterical as well. 

I hope this gives a little microcosm.