Ninety-nine red balloons Floating in the summer sky
by Shimi Cohen
"Ninety-nine red balloons
Floating in the summer sky
Panic bells, it's red alert
There's something here from somewhere else
The war machine springs to life
Opens up one eager eye
Focusing it on the sky
Where ninety-nine red balloons go by"
An incendiary balloon landed in the yard of a house in one of the towns in the Sha'ar HaNegev Regional Council and was extinguished immediately.
There were no injuries.
The balloon launches were renewed last week, after over a month during which only a few incendiary and explosive balloons were reported.
The last round of consistent balloon launches was in June.
Countless incendiary and explosive balloons have been launched by Gaza's terrorists in recent years.
They sometimes have books or toys attached to lure children. Some have sparked large wildfires, mainly damaging crops.
Since May 2018, the State of Israel has been dealing with incendiary balloons inflated by Hamas from the Gaza Strip towards settlements in the Gaza Strip.
In the summer of 2018, Israel responded mainly with non-military measures or limited military operations and low intensity against the phenomenon, due to the limited harm of this terrorism, which did not lead to deaths or significant damage to property. Israel has refrained from escalating and is embroiled in a widespread confrontation with Hamas.
Molotov cocktails are a weapon that is considered primitive, but is new on the modern battlefield. In doing so, Hamas shows initiative and creativity, and uses tools that are accessible wisely. Evidence of Hamas 'tactics' success is the decision by Assad's army to make similar use of incendiary balloons against rebel-held areas in Syria.
The use of incendiary balloons inflated expensive Hamas media capital.
The tool itself - balloons - communicates innocence and children, and is well photographed. In this situation, it is difficult to formulate angry condemnations from the international community and other weighty factors in the world despite the arson.
In the Arab world, the images and videos of the arson distributed indicate the alleged great damage that Hamas is doing to Israel, and gives the organization prestige as a player that manages to stand with Israel for a long time.
As I stepped into the fire to take photos, I ignored the heat and the destruction.
When it's all over I thought to myself, it's just an innocent balloon …
And NANA's song started playing in my head.
A song that even talked about hope and not about war: the 99 balloons represent the many dreams that each person had. At the end of the song, she just wants to prove that the German people did have dreams by finding one balloon - she finds one balloon, a dream, and lets it go.
No more wars
No more bloodbath
Peace
