Dozens of Palestinian citizens and foreign workers have been denied entry to shelters as Iranian missiles rained down across Israel.
Four members of one Palestinian family were wiped out in the northern town of Tamra after a rocket struck their home late on Saturday. Locals said the family had no warning or anywhere to hide.
The strike on Tamra, located in the Lower Galilee region near Haifa, marked one of the deadliest single attacks on Palestinian citizens of Israel since the beginning of the current escalation with Iran, though it was unlikely to be deliberate.
Mohammad Diab, an emergency volunteer who responded to the scene, described finding body parts scattered and survivors trapped beneath debris. "It was a very difficult and chaotic evening," he told CNN.
Tamra's mayor, Musa Abu Rumi, said that only 40 percent of the town’s residents had access to either private safe rooms or functioning shelters. Unlike most majority-Jewish Israeli towns, the town has no government-funded public bomb shelters.
"The government has never financed the construction of shelters in our town, because they have other priorities," Abu Rumi said. He added that temporary shelter was being offered in local schools but argued this was not a long-term solution.
At least two million Palestinians, descendants of those who refused to leave their homes during the creation of Israel, live in the country today. They make up around 20 percent of the population and have long warned of being discriminated against in national security planning and access to public safety infrastructure.
This lack of civil defence infrastructure in Palestinian localities within Israel is not new. A 2023 report by the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) warned of a "significant gap in protection" between Jewish and Palestinian communities in the north of the country.
The report said Israel’s civil defence planning has prioritised Jewish-majority areas, despite Palestinian communities being equally exposed to cross-border attacks from Lebanon and, increasingly, from Iran.
Under Israeli law, all residential buildings constructed after the 1990s must include fortified shelters. Yet Palestinian towns often lack enforcement of these requirements.
A statement from the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) said that most Arab towns in the northern district lack protected areas entirely and called the neglect "a systemic failure" that puts Palestinian citizens at risk during times of war.
'Ingrained racism'
Footage also emerged online of groups of Israelis denying foreigners and Palestinian citizens entry to shelters during Iran's retaliatory strikes.
In Jaffa, Palestinian residents reported being locked out of a communal bomb shelter that they had previously used during past security escalations.
Jewish Israelis in nearby older buildings reportedly continued to have access to the same shelter, highlighting the discriminatory nature of the restriction. Ktelat described the incident as unsurprising: "This is our reality, and it’s not something new to us."
The incident in Jaffa has been condemned by Palestinian civil society figures and politicians.
Abed Abu Shahada, a local activist and former city council member, said the denial of shelter "highlighted the ingrained racism in Israeli society" and underscored how Palestinian citizens are "abandoned to their fate" in wartime.
Another viral video that circulated shortly after the Tamra strike appeared to show residents of Mitzpe Aviva nearby Jewish Israeli town with at least 13 public shelters for just over 1,000 residents, cheering the missile attack on their Arab neighbours and chanting: "May your village burn".
The chant, popularised by Israeli pop singer Kobi Peretz, has been widely condemned by lawmakers, including Knesset member Naama Lazimi, who described the scenes as "shameful and disgusting".
Knesset member Ahmad Tibi dubbed the video evidence of "the culture of racism that has spread in Israeli society and the escalating fascism".