NATALIE LISBONA: As sirens wail I text a friend in her shelter. She tells me a missile has just killed seven... it could easily have been us

Daily Mail​

6 hours ago

Yesterday was terrible, and relentless. A day of strikes which begins in the early hours of Sunday morning, 2.19am in fact, with the hideous, piercing shriek that rings out from my phone and means a fresh Iranian attack is imminent.
Once again I scramble to get three kids, two dogs, bottled water and a flashlight into the bomb shelter in our backyard. Then I text my colleagues in London: 'We're being attacked.'
It's the third day of the Iranian missile onslaught and civilians are still being targeted by the regime. The Houthis – Iran-backed militants in Yemen – also join in by sending missiles.
The middle of the night seems a favourite time to attack, probably to grind down our morale by depriving us of sleep. Though of course the attacks continue in the day.
Since there is no internet or wi-fi in the shelter we turn on an old-fashioned radio.
The door is shut tight with a special lock – Israelis had them installed after Hamas 's October 7 massacres, when many terrorists forced their way into shelters, shooting those inside or throwing grenades.
There is enough of a mobile signal to send an SMS to my friend who lives in the city of Bat Yam, next door to Tel Aviv, asking if she and her family are OK.
And then the sirens wail again, putting me in mind always of Second World War films about the Blitz.
At first we hear the loudest roar – enough to silence my chatty kids, and even Lula, the lunatic chihuahua, for once. Our other chihuahua, Super Ted, is shaking like a leaf. At a guess it was probably an Israeli fighter jet.
Then several very, very loud booms. At one point I could swear a gush of air blew inside the shelter, but I am weary and half asleep.
'I am really scared, Mummy,' one of my teens cries. What on earth can I tell her?
My friend texts me: 'That was the loudest noise I have ever heard.' Just a few blocks away from her home in Bat Yam, a direct hit from a ballistic missile has killed seven, including two children, with more than 100 injured and others still unaccounted for.
At the time of writing, there are three still missing, likely to be trapped under rubble. It doesn't bear thinking about. 'It could have been us,' she says.
'I am shaking,' she tells me after sending a video taken from a friend's balcony yesterday, in which a huge ball of fire crashes through the night sky at ferocious speed into a civilian area.
The Israel Defence Forces say that those who died were not in their bomb shelters. Why on Earth not? My only conclusion is that they have become desensitised.
I have now lost count of the times we have had to run to the shelter. It's all a big blur, and the only way I can remember is by checking my phone for the time stamps on the air-raid alerts.
The most recent at the time of writing, 4.08pm and 8.34pm. No doubt we will be back in the shelter before dawn.
Israelis are constantly asking, 'How long is this to continue?' I have been told it could be weeks.
On Saturday night, before the onslaught, we were laughing about a message being endlessly forwarded on WhatsApp that advises people to pack cash and passports in case they have to make a run for it.
My friend has done exactly this, but I joke that we wouldn't get very far because all the airports are closed.
In one video now all over social media, a man jokes that he only survived the missile blast that devastated the front room of his home because of divine intervention – a sudden call of nature that sent him to the lavatory.
In the face of adversity, the Israelis are full of humour.
It is a nation that can cope with suffering. Since the State of Israel was born almost 80 years ago, its citizens have had to survive the countless terror attacks, long before October 7.
They cannot forget, though, that more than 50 of their compatriots are still being held hostage by Hamas in Gaza. The country is feeling it.
One friend, a mum of two, told me: 'I am in a state of shock and sadness, how much more should Israelis endure?'
These latest attacks feel like something different. One of the world's crazed regimes launching its vast arsenal in a fanatical attempt to wipe you from the face of the earth.
But Israelis realise their present suffering cannot be avoided. They have no choice but to fight for their future.
If Iran were to get nukes, the whole world would be held hostage to the mullahs.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday raised the terrifying prospect that the Iranians were planning to give nukes to their proxies – Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Dana Berry, a mother of two, sums up the national mood: 'We are nervous but confident. It's not easy for families with children but I believe it's for the better.
'The world will be a safer place today than it was yesterday,' she says.
This morning I receive a flurry of messages from people asking if we are OK. I wonder how many times they must have asked us this now.
Sleep-deprived and drained by constant worry for loved ones, Israelis know they are suffering for a greater cause: the safety of the world against a nuclear armed rogue state.
The question is, when will this all stop?