7 hours ago
‘We can't sleep underground for ever — Iran must fall'
As night falls, the two sisters pack their essentials and leave their shared flat to head underground. They do so in the full knowledge that there may be nothing to return to when they emerge from Tel Aviv's subterranean vaults.
'We sleep here a week, since the start of the war. It's the safest place you can be. When there's a siren, we don't have to move. Even if there's a huge boom. This is the most protected place in the city,' said Yehudit Batat, 92ft deep inside a light railway station that has been carved into the alluvial sands on which Tel Aviv is built.
Just the day before, an Iranian missile evaded Israel's air-defence system and hit close to their home in Ramat Gan, in Tel Aviv's diamond exchange district.
For a week, residents without safe shelter, including single people afraid no one would find them if they were injured, the elderly, families, the homeless and immigrants have made use of Tel Aviv's vast underground realm, from car parks and hospitals to bus and railway stations. They are all hiding from Iran's powerful missile volleys.
'I'm sleeping in a public place, not in my bed, in my house, where everything is familiar to me. It's hard to fall asleep when there's noise in the background and there are fluorescent lights, but I prefer to sleep under these terms and know I am in a safe place,' said Yonatan Luzon, 15.
Yonatan had camped out in the corner of the station with his two dogs, grandmother, mother and all his neighbours, as their building's shelter was too mouldy to hide in. Despite having missed out on years of schooling, with the wars almost immediately following the Covid lockdowns, Luzon believes Israel is doing the right thing by going to war with Iran.
'I think the war is right. Iran will have a nuclear weapon; if we didn't get rid of it, a catastrophe far worse than what what is happening now will happen,' he said. 'It's really hard to grow up here. I had plans that will never see the light of day.'
Many Israelis have pinned their hopes on President Trump to finish the job — to use America's weaponry to hit the site of Iran's nuclear enrichment programme at Fordow, built into the side of a mountain 70-80m deep and impervious to Israeli strikes.
Holding her daughter's hand as they walked through the rows of mattresses that lined the station walls, Katya, a swimming instructor, said Trump 'has to' go in. 'They won't let them [Iran] get the weapon. He has to go in. If not now, then when? We can't sleep here for ever,' she said.
Noa, a kindergarten teacher who arrived at the shelter with her three sons, the youngest of whom was only two weeks old, said she hoped Trump would 'finish it off' so they could go back to their normal lives.
'I think that he wants to finish Iran because they tried to assassinate him, and because he doesn't want them to have a weapon,' Noa, 35, said. 'All those countries he's got friendly with — Saudi, Gulf [states] — they don't want that either. He has a responsibility to finish this off, to go all the way.'
Yonatan added: 'I think Trump will go to war. I heard they have a weapon that can destroy the Iran nuclear facility, and it's the only one that can do it — and we don't have that. So I hope yes, he'll go in.'
In the car park of the Dizengoff shopping centre, which was targeted by a suicide bomber in 1996, Ronen Koehler has organised tents to house those who need safe shelter as part of the 'Brothers and Sisters in Arms' social justice movement, initially formed to stop the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, enacting judicial reforms.
'It's absolutely one of the safest places,' Koehler said. 'It's four floors down. I think someone even told me it's certified at an atomic level. These are iron-plated windows.'
Tel Aviv almost has a mirror city beneath its sunny surface. Near the military headquarters, an underground network of tunnels dating back to the time of the Templer settlement — German colonies in the late 19th century — is reportedly used for military purposes, possibly leading to the so-called Fortress of Zion, the military command in the heart of Tel Aviv.
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Building deep underground has allowed hospitals to shelter its most vulnerable. At the largest hospital in Israel, Sheba Medical Center, more than 500 people have been moved into underground facilities, and they are attempting to move many more.
In Tel Aviv, which has borne the brunt of Iran's missile attacks, the belief is that if America cannot destroy the regime in Iran, Israel can. 'We don't need Trump. Israel doesn't,' said Tracey Papirani, 65, who emigrated with her entire family from New Zealand two years ago. 'We'll have to see what happens tonight; on the news they said something big is coming,' she said.
'Most Americans know, or they should know, that Iran hates them even more than Israel,' Papirani said, as her two grandchildren ran around barefoot on the filthy car park floor. 'They call us the Little Satan, but America is the Big Satan. They're possibly weeks away from a nuclear bomb. If they finish us, where do they go next? [Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei is not shy. He's saying it like it is. Israel's got this. They've had to take it all on, because no other country has had the chutzpah to do it. We've had to do it, because they were very close to annihilating us.'
Batat and her sister were born near the Kiriya, a military base just outside Ramat Gan, before the Israel Defence Forces' headquarters were even built there. They too believe the army can take on Iran, with or without America.
'Donald Trump is crazy,' Batat said. 'He helps us. He provides weaponry; he arms our military. Rockets, interceptors, all of that — he's good. But he doesn't want to go to war. You know why? So World War Three won't break out. All the world powers will have to go in, and then it's a world war.
'Bibi [Netanyahu] says that they will get what they can, and if they can't, they'll bring in the Mossad to blow up the place — they'll send them in by foot, not by air. Israel will do it alone. We have no other choice.'
