“A short while after the announcement, Iron Dome intercepted five Gaza rockets fired at populated areas in the southern town of Ashkelon. A siren was activated in the city around 9:20 pm and local residents reported hearing explosions.

“Earlier in the day, Iron Dome shot down five other rockets fired from Gaza. The IDF said some 150 rockets landed in Israel so far during the latest round of fighting in the south.”

Ten interceptions out of 150 rockets is greater than six percent hitting populated areas. That doesn’t sound like many, but it seems to be more than in the past. It sounds like Hamas has improved the accuracy of its rockets, so that a greater proportion of them is threatening to hit populated areas, thereby triggering the Iron Dome missiles to shoot them down. The rockets are a lot cheaper than the Iron Dome missiles and system are. In a war of attrition, Israel is being forced to spend enormous resources to counter these cheap rockets.

At the time of Operation Cast Lead I said (and posted here) that Israel needed to clear Hamas out from the Gaza Strip completely, lest Hamas coordinate attacks on Israel in the future with other enemies to confront Israel with a multifront war. With Egypt moving into the enemy classification again, that logic is even more applicable. When that happens the number of rockets launched, from both Gaza and Lebanon (as well ar Iran most likely), will probably swamp Israel’s defenses, especially if Hamas (and Hezbullah) have increased the accuracy of their rockets.. The Central Position is valuable only if you use it to attack your enemies piecemeal, not wait for them to coordinate a combined strike against you. In that case it merely means that you are surrounded.