The IDF Home Front said on Thursday that even after being hammered by two major wars with Iran and years of ballistic missiles and rockets on multiple fronts, it still expects that it will take over 30 years to provide safe rooms nationwide.
Currently, the home front said that only 67% of the population has safe rooms.
Projected switching over to safe rooms and the building of new safe spaces is set at a pace of around 1% per year, said the IDF.
Further, the military said that its most ambitious scenario would be to push for the country to reach a 3% annual increase in safe spaces, a pace that would still leave large parts of the country vulnerable to Iranian ballistic missiles and other aerial attacks for at least 11 years.
There is currently no plan, even under consideration, to try to achieve full nationwide protection within two to five years, or anything close to that time period.
No one willing to carry out large-scale emergency safe room build
Essentially, the IDF Home Front’s message on the issue was that no one is willing to carry out large-scale emergency rebuilding to add safe rooms – which would require widespread temporary displacement – let alone large-scale demolitions of existing unprotected residences to make it easier to rebuild new units with safe rooms from the outset.
Despite more than 50 Israelis being killed by Iranian ballistic missiles in under a year, thousands more wounded, and over 40,000 property damage claims – not to mention those killed, wounded, or displaced in attacks by Israel’s other adversaries – the overall feeling from the home front is that living under continued missile fire is seen as less burdensome than an emergency program that would make the country significantly safer more quickly.