9:30 p.m.

The siren sounds and we all dash to the sixth floor of the hotel, which has been designated the shelter for the duration of the attack. The hallways are jammed with guests from the other 20 floors. The air is thick with perspiration, and children cry as parents try to force masks onto the petrified youngsters. Many people are shaking. Some pray. Most just wait and stare at the ceiling. I have my Walkman tuned to army radio and wait impatuently for an update. The all clear siren sounds 45 minutes later. It was a false alarm.

1:45 a.m.

I have three beers with Vernon to calm the nerves and go to sleep.

Saturday January 19, Tel Aviv 7:15 a.m.

The air raid siren sounds even louder, it seems, than it had yesterday morning. People are shouting "Tilim, tilim (missiles, missiles)!!" in the hallways. Army radio is on instantly. The routine is the same. Masks and down to the sealed room. I am about out the door headed down to 6, when Ze'ev and Mike (the two cameramen) rush into our room. 1424. They head straight for the balcony. I can't believe it. These guys want to take pictures of a missile attack from the open-air balcony! "You guys are fucking crazy," I said. "We've got to get out of here." They aren't interested. "Mike," calls Vern, "see what you can get on the radio." I figure I'll give him a quick update and then run downstairs. I walk out on the balcony to tell him there is still no hard information. Before me is the vast expanse of greater Tel Aviv, known as the Gush Dan region. Not a thing in sight is moving. "Come on baby, come on baby," the photographers mumble, their cameras cocked and focused, fingers on the shutter release. Just then the first SCUD comes in in. The explosion rocks the hotel. The glass shakes, the balcony shudders. A plume of smoke and debris shoots up 400 feet at a site about one and a half miles west by southwest of the hotel. "Boom," another explosion, from the north. "Holy shit, holy shit," screams the photographers as autowinder race furiously. "I've got three confirmed hits," Vernon says over the phone to the Inquirer in Philadelphia. As a chopper hovers over the site, Army radio announces that the attack was conventional. I pull of my mask and discover that I had been sweating like a marathoner. I have just witnessed a missile attack on Tel Aviv.

7:20 a.m.

Just as the all-clear sounded, Vernon grabs me and we race downstairs to our car. "We're gonna be the first ones at that missle site," he proclaims. We jump into the little green rented Mitsubishi with the words "Foreign press" written on the doors in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. We race in the direction that we had seen the first missle land, falling in behind a fleet of ambulances and army jeeps that led us right to the spot where the SCUD had landed.

7:35 a.m.

We pull up to the sidewalk and come to a screeching halt. the street, as far as the eye could see, is littered with debris--shards of glass, plastic window shades and pieces of twisted, gray shrapnel. All the buildings are pockmarked, scratched up. Dazed residents pour out of their houses, many still in their pajamas. The police work quickly to seal off the area of impact.

7:45 a.m.

A large sedan pulls up and out jumps Tel Aviv mayor Shlomo Lahad. Pols never miss a beat. In tow, oddly enough, is Zubin Mehta, the director of Israel's Philharmonic Orchestra. Lahad's presence has a powerful effect on the residents of the area. They seem to regain their bearings as he parades confidently around an area that 20 minutes ago had been filled with deadly flying metal. He jokes with them, saying "Saddam did you a favor. Now the city will give you brand new homes." The crowd erupted in laughter.

8:00 a.m.

The press that had arrived, now numbering about 30, follows the mayor around like puppy dogs. We turn a corner, and before us are the mangled remains of a community center. At the base of the center's outer wall, there is a crater 16 feet deep and 25 feet long. The two foot thick concrete walls of the center's bomb shelter have been disenterred and cracked into an infinite number of tiny pieces. Steel rods, separated from the concrete walls they had once reinforced, are strewn all over the place. Soldiers are down in the crater, exhuming shrapnel.

8:15 a.m.