The government has been operating distribution centers throughout the country which provide ‘protection packs’ with gas masks for many, many years. It has regularly called on the public to go to such a center to take ‘protection packs’. Some 60% of the population has acted responsibly, heeded the government’s instructions and taken protective packs. Some 40% of the population has not bothered to do so. They have nobody to blame but themselves.

Furthermore, the country has been making many other investments in protective measures including building regulations (i.e., the construction of mama”dim) and missile defense systems some of which which, despite what the article reports, are as capable of intercepting missiles bearing chemical warheads as they are of intercepting missiles with conventional warheads and which are primarily deployed to protect the civilian population.

The author’s pathetic description of the Israeli public as ‘clinging to electronic and other media’ for information is but an indication of the article’s overall alarmist and whining slant.

If they were prepared then (and they were giving everyone gas masks at that time and training them for it) how are they unprepared now?