Sderot Barrage of rockets raises doubts over IDF's ability to destroy Hamas

The two men, faces blurred and voices disguised, are screened by a dense scrub of fig and trailing vine in northern Gaza as they film themselves loading a rocket launcher.

- Beaumont Sderot

It is daylight and the fighters, wearing civilian clothes, work quickly and calmly, the sound of fighting audible around them as they prepare the weapon in less than a minute. Metal scrapes on metal as four missiles are slotted into tubes and wires connected to a timer for launch at the nearby Israeli border city of Sderot and neighbouring communities.

Posted on social media by alQuds Brigades of Islamic Jihad in Gaza, the footage appears to show missiles being prepared for the attack last week that damaged a storage shed in a neighbourhood of low villas lining narrow streets.

In Sderot, it is hard to escape the consequences of the strikes. Damage is visible where rockets have hit walls or punched through red-tiled roofs; blue sheeting covers one badly damaged building.