16 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY OCTOBER 3-9, 2024 www.montereycountynow.com War Torn One year after the October 7 attack, Israelis remain divided in ideas about how to move forward. By The Arab Weekly FORUM A year after Oct. 7, Israelis are united in experiencing the trauma caused by Hamas’ attack on their country, but are divided in their views on how to end the war. In the aftermath of the attack, the deadliest in Israeli history, a movement of national solidarity emerged, with volunteers preparing meals for soldiers and welcoming displaced people into their homes. This shared grief offered Israelis some comfort, but the health ministry says the country now faces “the most serious mental health crisis in its history.” Questions around the fate of scores of Israeli hostages taken by militants on Oct. 7, 2023 into Gaza have made it painfully difficult for people to move on from the trauma. “Israelis’ sense of security was shattered,” said Merav Roth, an Israeli psychoanalyst who treats former hostages and families of the dead. This was “both because they identified with the victims and because security forces were unable to prevent the invasion of the country. This invasion of the home, individual and collective, is unprecedented in the history of Israel and terrifying for Israelis.” The Oct. 7 attack by Hamas militants resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians, on the Israeli side. Of 251 hostages seized by militants, 97 are still held in Gaza, including 33 the Israeli military says are dead. Israel’s retaliatory military offensive has killed at least 41,455 people in Gaza, most of them civilians. In Israel, disagreements over the government’s war policy have deepened since a short-lived truce in November that saw 105 hostages freed, with questions emerging over how to bring home the others. Not a Saturday night passes without thousands of protesters taking to the streets of Israel’s commercial hub Tel Aviv, and sometimes other cities, demanding that the authorities “Bring them home now!” But those Israelis who demand an agreement with Hamas “at all costs” to ensure the hostages’ release are countered by those who fear such protests undermine the government’s position and could inadvertently boost the militants. Tamar Hermann, senior research fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, said this split broadly echoes the left-right political divide, which hardened before the war because of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s judicial reforms proposal. Pushed by Netanyahu’s far-right coalition partners, that proposal sparked months of protests, often involving tens of thousands of Israelis. “Obviously everyone thinks that the hostage issue is terrible, but what divides opinion is how much we are prepared to pay for the release of less than 100 people [still captive in Gaza],” Hermann says. Meanwhile, residents of northern Israel complained the state was abandoning them long before the war, but their grievances have grown considerably since Hezbollah started launching cross-border strikes last fall in support of its Iranbacked ally Hamas. The near-daily attacks forced tens of thousands to evacuate, many yet to return home, as military operations escalate in Lebanon to Israel’s north. This story first appeared in The Arab Weekly. OPINION “This invasion of the home is unprecedented.”
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