Sonny, 66, has no idea what would happen should a rocket hit one of the towering circular containers about 100 meters (109 yards) from his building in Haifa.
He, like everyone else in the port city, just 30 kilometers (less than 20 miles) from the Lebanese border, has been left in the dark about the risks from the industrial area — and so fears the worst. Both the tanks and his apartment block featured in drone footage released by Hezbollah, the Lebanese terror group that has been exchanging rocket fire with Israel since the start of the war in Gaza.
“When we hear the [rocket] sirens… it’s scary,” said Sonny, a guitar repairman with silver skull bracelets, tapping his chest with his fist to evoke a pounding heartbeat.
“During the Gulf War, one missile fell not far from here. And all the houses… It’s truly scary,” added Sonny, who also plays bass in a rock band.
His neighborhood of Kiryat Haim is part of the Haifa municipality, but cut off from the city by a large industrial zone that includes an oil refinery, a commercial port and an oil storage facility. There are dozens of immense tanks, one of which looms close to his block behind a chain-link fence. READ MORE