Foreign worker lightly hurt as Qassams pound Negev

[oberliner]

Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip on Sunday fired a barrage of Qassam rockets toward the western Negev, which exploded in open fields in the Eshkol region. A foreign worker was lightly hurt by shrapnel in one of the blasts.

Also Sunday, a Hamas militant was killed and another wounded by Israel Defense Forces fire in the Gaza Strip.

Eshkol-region farmers expressed concern last week that their workers would leave the area, after a rocket attack on a poultry coop in Moshav Ami Oz near Moshav Yesha injured two foreign workers from Thailand.

"If the workers leave, agriculture in the area will collapse," said the chairman of the agricultural committee in the Eshkol Regional Council, Mordi Biton. Biton added that Israelis will not come to work in the area because of the security situation.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/991136.html

[Igel]

1. "Empty"?

"Empty", to my mind, means "nobody and nothing"--either people or buildings/infrastructure would render it non-empty. There was at least one worker there, and apparently others.

Just more attempting murders of civilians; if it hurts farmers, so much the better. Gotta restore the true object of worship--one's honor--to it's proper place in one's pantheon.

[oberliner]

2. I'm not finding the word "empty" in this article

It's possible Ha'aretz has updated it and made some changes, but the version up there now says "open fields", not "empty fields."