The southern district police commander said on Friday that police are taking steps to prepare for a Qassam strike on the southern city of Ashkelon. Commander Uri Bar-Lev said that police have been placed on high alert in Ashkelon and have expanded their presence in the city and in communities near the Gaza Strip.

At least 16 Qassam rockets fired from the Gaza Strip by Palestinian militants landed in the western Negev, at least nine of them hitting Sderot, Friday.

Two Sderot residents were lightly wounded and several were treated for shock Friday as a result of the rocket attacks. In one such attack, a Qassam hit a residential building in the Negev town.

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A woman was treated for shock after a Qassam rocket destroyed a residential building in a separate western Negev town Friday night.

The rocket fire intensified this week, sparking an Israel Defense Forces operation in the Gaza Strip that began Thursday.

Palestinians fired some 30 rockets on Israel on Thursday, and about the same number on Tuesday. One of the rockets fired Thursday slammed into a high school on the outskirts of Sderot, lightly wounding two people. Two others were wounded Tuesday, one of them in moderate to serious condition.

Hamas' military wing has announced that it will execute anyone who attempts to interfere with the rocket fire on Israel, Israel Radio reported Friday.

Arcadi Gaydamak unveils plan to provide security for Sderot families

Billionaire Arcadi Gaydamak announced plans for providing security for Sderot's residents, during a tour he made of the city with a contingent of private security experts.

Gaydamak's plan would not entail the securing of private free-standing homes as was originally thought. Rather, his plan would call for building large, secure buildings for 3,500 families in the city, at an estimated cost of NIS 60 million. He said the project could be finished within four months.

Opposition leader Netanyahu makes visit to Sderot
Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu said during a Likud faction visit to Sderot on Friday that Israel's government has a duty to protect the town and evacuate its citizens.

Netanyahu said the evacuation of Sderot's citizens is the job of the government, not of a tycoon. He was referring to Russian-born Israeli businessman Arcadi Gaydamak, who privately funded the evacuation of 1,600 citizens Wednesday and their accommodation in hotels.

Netanyahu reiterated that only military measures will lead to the cessation of Qassam attacks.

He said comprehensive military action is required to gain control of the areas in Gaza from which the Qassams are fired, but that the government has no such long-term plan.

When asked whether he believes a ground operation in Gaza would necessitate a continued military presence in the Strip, he said this was not a concern for him. "There would be no reason for the IDF to stay in Gaza, just as they didn't stay in south Lebanon after the Second Lebanon War," he said.

"More pressure needs to be put on the Palestinians," he added.

The Ministry for Immigrant Absorption and local municipalities have cooperated to arrange hotel rooms for hundreds of evacuees from Sderot across the country, from Tiberias on the shores of Lake Kinneret in the north to Israel's southernmost town, Eilat.

Ten busloads of residents left Sderot on Friday and another 20 buses are scheduled to depart on Saturday evening.

Ministry director, Erez Halfon, said "We are implementing a range of activities for Sderot residents, and will provide financial aid and holidays for families and victims of shock."

The municipality of Red Sea resort-town Eilat petitioned hotels to donate guest rooms, for which the municipality of Sderot selected and transported eligible residents. The evacuees will remain in Eilat until Wednesday. Those being treated for symptoms of anxiety and shock were visited by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the trauma ward of Eilat's Beit Yoseftal hospital yesterday.

Manufacturers: Qassam fire costs industry NIS 65m
Qassam fire in recent days has cost NIS 65 million in damage to industry in Sderot and the western Negev, the Manufacturers Association of Israel said Thursday.

Some 85 percent of the 40 large factories operating in the western Negev are suffering from employee absences since last week's increased hostilities, according to Yehuda Segev, the director general of the Manufacturers Association.

Some 150 workers have abandoned their workplaces this week, Segev said.

"If there is no improvement in the security situation in the Western Negev, the number of workers abandoning [their workplaces] will increase significantly at the beginning of next week, since additional workers and their families left Sderot this weekend to spend time somewhere safer. Most likely, they will not return to work on Sunday," said Segev.

He added that according to an association survey, 92 percent of industrial factories in the area have reported that they are unable to hire temporary employees to replace their regular workers who have left. Twenty-five percent of the industries have moved their offices to safer regions, and 25 percent have also said that they have seen a drop in local orders.

Since the middle of 2006, 90 percent of industries in Sderot and the Western Negev area have reported a drastic decrease in the number of customers, suppliers and service providers who have come to the factories.

"The government is marching confidantly toward the second Winograd Committee report concerning its failures in dealing with the future of industrial areas in Sderot and Sha'ar Hanegev," claimed Segev. The cabinet must define the Sderot and Western Negev region as "confrontation line" areas, as the North was defined during the Second Lebanon War.

This would allow workers in the region to be granted tax breaks. In addition the government must allocate NIS 50 million for protection of the factories to allow the 5,000 employees to work in a safe environment without having to miss work.

Defense Min. halts evacuation of Sderot after 2,500 leave city
The Defense Ministry on Thursday halted the evacuation of the western Negev city of Sderot after some 2,500 of its residents had already left the city.

Eight hundred Sderot residents had been evacuated by the Defense Ministry earlier on Thursday to facilities run by the Association for Soldiers' Welfare in the area. However, the evacuation was later halted due to the large number of residents demanding accommodations and low availability.

Dozens of Sderot residents stormed the office of Sderot Mayor Eli Moyal after learning the evacuation had been cut short, demanding action to protect them.

In addition to the 800 residents evacuated by the state, Russian-born Israeli businessman Arcadi Gaydamak also provided some 1,600 residents with hotel rooms in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Be'er Sheva, which he personally funded.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert visited Sderot on Thursday and told residents of the border town that the government would stand firm and work to reduce the Qassam attacks.

Olmert's spokeswoman Miri Eisin said the prime minister told Sderot residents during a visit lasting several hours that "we have to stand strong" and pledged government help. But, as Israel mounted a series of air strikes and a ground raid in Gaza, Olmert made no comment on operational specifics, she said.

Also meeting relatives of some of those injured in recent days was Defense Minister Amir Peretz, who himself lives in Sderot.

"The prime minister ... expressed his empathy and how much he and the government are there for the people of Sderot," Eisin said, adding that two rockets had landed during the visit.

"He talked about the fact that we have to stand strong," she said. "That we have to get down the amount of attacks."

Olmert has opposed evacuating Sderot, Peretz' home town, where one rocket slammed into a house near the defense minister's own on Wednesday. Peretz has proposed that sizable numbers of residents be brought out of the city for a "break" from the rocket attacks, which have continued sporadically for the last five years.

Many families also left the city on their own accord to stay with friends or relatives in other cities. Schools in the city were closed Thursday for the second day in a row.

In response to increasing Qassam attacks on Sderot, the Defense Ministry has implemented two command centers in the town. It has deployed over one hundred soldiers whose task is to go from door to door, checking if residents require assistance.

Dozens of welfare services workers have also been sent to verify the condition of the town's 2,300 elderly citizens, 350 disabled people and 80people with intellectual disabilities who are known to the bureau.

Deputy Defense Minister Efraim Sneh said the systems put in place Thursday were prepared seven months ago, during the last bout of concentrated rocket attacks on the town. They were not applied at the time because the attacks waned.

Sneh denied that the measures have been implemented as a response to the evacuation funded by Arcadi Gaydamak.

Approximately 320 elderly and disabled citizens were evacuated by welfare services. A further 75 disabled people and their families were evacuated to hotels in Arad, in Israel's south, for a three-day holiday financed by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee.

Around 150 elderly citizens were evacuated to two hotels in Jerusalem, and the families of 20 intellectually disabled residents were accommodated in Jaffa Community Center for one week funded by the National Association for the Habilitation of the Mentally Handicapped in Israel.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack urged restraint on all sides but said Israel had the right to respond to rocket attacks from Hamas.