McCain Visits Sderot Ahead of Solidarity Day

UNITED NATIONS — Sderot, the embattled southern Israeli town near Gaza, is fast becoming this year's political mecca for candidates seeking to show their solidarity with Israel.

Senator McCain visited Sderot yesterday, and pro-Israeli American activists are holding a "global Internet rally" for the town today, streaming live and prerecorded videos, among them offerings from the three major American presidential candidates. The candidates' videos have already been used at Sderot solidarity events around America and have been posted in the last two weeks on YouTube.

"Living under a 15-second alert is no way for children to celebrate Purim," Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee and the first candidate to visit the town this year, told reporters, referring to yesterday's Jewish holiday. "No nation in the world can be attacked incessantly and have its population killed and intimidated without responding. That's one of the first obligations of government, to provide security for its citizens."

"Sderot is a symbol of our existence," Israel's deputy defense minister, Matan Vilnai, told The New York Sun as he toured the United Nations yesterday. "Today it is in Sderot, yesterday it was on the Lebanese border, and tomorrow it could be anywhere else. This is the real test — not just for the army, but for the Israeli society and how it withstands a fierce attack deliberately aimed at citizens and meant to kill women and children."

"When I think of what it must be like to attempt to raise children, go about your normal lives, while under daily rocket attacks from terrorists in Gaza, I am overwhelmed by your courage and sacrifice," Senator Clinton, who is seeking the Democratic nomination, said in her videotaped message of solidarity with Sderot.

The situation in Sderot is "intolerable," Senator Obama, a Democrat of Illinois, said on his video. Sderot's residents should know they are "not only in our thoughts and prayers, but that we are going to actively work with them to bring an end to these rocket attacks, to ensure that we are building a lasting peace that will allow Israeli and Palestinian children to live side by side in peace and security."