Not Gaza’s toy? 7 things to know for May 5

1. Hellfire and death: For the first time since 2014’s war with Gaza, an Israeli was killed in a Palestinian rocket attack.

• The man, Moshe Agadi, 58, from Ashkelon, was a father of four. Haaretz reports that according to family members, he was not in a bomb shelter when the rocket hit, at around 2:30 a.m.
• The mayor of the city records a video saying that everyone is in mourning, noting that Agadi was a well-known figure in the city.
• His brother Shai tells Army Radio that everyone in the city knew him. “He made sure to be respectful of his parents and pursued mitzvot [Jewish religious commandments]. Why does his mother have to lose her son in the twilight of her days,” he mourns.
• “This needs to end,” a neighbor tells the Walla news site, reflecting frustration over yet another round of violence.

2. No holding back: Agadi was killed and eight others were injured over a 17-hour period beginning Saturday morning that saw over 400 rockets shot at Israel, one of the highest single-day totals ever, though there have been plenty of flare ups.

• Unlike other rounds of escalation, there are no reports of intensive efforts at a ceasefire beyond a pro-forma statement from UN envoy Nickolas Mladenov that he’s working toward one.
• The army is signaling that it won’t be holding back, and while it carried out less than 200 strikes in Gaza, it managed to take out several multi-story buildings.
• “The message to Hamas: You will pay dearly for continuing rocket attacks,” reads the top headline in Israel Hayom.
• Haaretz writes that defense sources say “extensive assaults on the Gaza Strip will continue with no intention of halting the attacks.”

3. The Eurovision trap: Yedioth Ahronoth’s Alex Fishman also predicts war is on the horizon, but says that for now Israel will hold back whether it wants to or not, thanks to wanting to keep things calm for the Eurovision song contest and the thousands of tourists expected to visit, something his colleague Yossi Yehoshua says is akin to being “held hostage by Eurovision.”

• “Hamas knows it has an opportunity for two or three weeks to push Israel while its hands are tied,” Fishman writes.
• ToI’s Avi Issacharoff writes that “Hamas is clearly prepared to take the risk of a still wider conflict, gambling that Israel desperately wants a ceasefire at this moment. The next 10 days are thus going to be extremely complicated for Israel. The Gaza terror group smells blood.”
• “Were we not in such sensitive times — Memorial Day and Independence Day this week and then Eurovision — Israel would have gone all in yesterday,” Israel Hayom’s Yoav Limor writes. “Partially against Hamas, all the way against Islamic Jihad, which is responsible for the latest flareup.”
• Haaretz’s Amos Harel writes that thanks to Eurovision, “there is a good chance the escalation will end in a compromise and with concessions for the Palestinians.”

4. What rockets? Israel’s tough spot may be because of Eurovision, but the song contest itself is doing a great job at either being blissfully unaware of what’s happening, or keeping a poker face and pretending everything is fine.

• The first rockets Saturday morning were fired just as Cyprus took the stage for the first official rehearsal, with nine other countries following.
• According to Israel Radio, more delegations are expected to arrive in Israel in the coming days and none have cancelled, yet.
• Asked by Channel 12 news about the rocket fire, Serbia’s Nevena Božović asks “what rockets?”
• We are responsible for singing and the host country is responsible for security, a host at a meet-and-greet session says.

• While some journalists/super fans covering the Eurovision contest let on that they know a bit more, they too seem unconcerned, as in this video from Ynet.
• A website that is all Eurovison all the time doesn’t mention the flare up even in passing, though it goes into grotesque detail about each performer’s costume.

5. Ignoring the intel: In Yedioth, analyst Shimrit Meir writes that “All of this was expected ahead of time. You don’t need an intel division to know when Ramadan is starting, when Nakba Day falls out and when Eurovision in. The question is what was the army and the political echelon, meaning [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, paying attention to and why did we need to get to the brink of war, just a month after the last flareup.”

• Even worse, Haaretz reports that even beyond looking at a calendar, “defense sources warned the political echelon in recent weeks that if significant steps are not taken to implement understandings with Hamas,” the group would be unable to hold back other groups from pushing tensions upwards.

6. So where is Netanyahu? As of 10 a.m. Sunday he has yet to say anything official on the matter.

• The most that is said after he meets with defense chiefs is an unnamed senior defense official offering to the press that Netanyahu told the army to “hit them hard.”
• Plenty of people have what to say regarding their thoughts of Netanyahu’s policies vis-a-vis Gaza, though.
• “Imagine if Netanyahu fought Gazan terror the way he fought Blue and White in the last elections,” Maariv’s Ben Caspit writes.
• Yedioth’s Ben-Dror Yemini predicts that with Netanyahu heading back into office with an even more right-wing group, their priorities will mean they will only make sure the problem continues to fester.
• The new government “will almost certainly be worse since the power of the annexationists will have only grown. That means immunity for terror groups. That means that the abuse of Israel will only continue… the main thing is that they are able to build another outpost or neighborhood.”

7. A tragedy, but who to blame? On the Gazan side, six people have been killed, including four fighters and a mother and baby.

• While Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry and others blamed Israel, Israel’s Arabic spokesman tweeted that it seemed like it was a failed rocket launch that killed them.
• “The two were killed by Hamas and Islamic Jihad weapons and not an Israeli raid,” he writes.
• Others in Gaza disagree, though.
• “The Israeli plane fired a missile near the house and the shrapnel entered the house and hit the poor baby” the baby’s aunt tells al Jazeera.
• “They were sitting at the yard in their house with their mother. They were shocked by a missile landing on them,” Abu Nidal Abu Arar, a relative living next door tells the Associated Press. “This occupation is criminal.”