Sderot

<div class="tags">Tags: South</div><div itemprop="description">

Although it is only 45-minutes or so from Tel Aviv, one would think that Sderot was on a different continent, at least based on the daily news. One kilometer - hardly more than half a mile – from Gaza to its west, the city where 70% of its children have been diagnosed as traumatized has a unique narrative. The situation of Sderot and its neighbors on the Israel side is the core consideration for both the move to evacuate the settlements from Gaza in 2005 – in hopes of a reduction of tension – and the 2009 “Cast Lead” War with Gaza, brought about when the tension and violence not only didn’t decrease, but became untenable.

Built on farm land that was associated with the nearby Arab village of Najd, occupied by the Negev Brigade in May 1948, Sderot was established in 1951 as a transit camp for Kurdish, Moroccan and Persian Jews. “Sderot,” the Hebrew word for boulevard, was recognized as a local council in 1956. Its population was boosted by the FSU wave of immigration in the 1990s, though it declined in the next decade due to the violence, which also resulted in high unemployment. Sderot has been compared to the Liverpool of the 1960s as there are several rock bands and artists that emerged from the bomb shelters and produced music with a special international or world sound. Some of the artists and bands include Teapacks, Shlomo Bar, Kobi Oz and the Ethiopian singer Hagit Yaso, who won Israel’s version of American Idol in 2011.

</div>