TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) – Music fills the air in downtown Tel Aviv as customers stream into outdoor seats and clink glasses. There is laughter and there is life. But all around patrons looking down from lampposts and shop windows are photos of hostages taken in Gaza, with Israel at war and permanently scarred by the deadliest attack in history. It’s a clear reminder that I’m there.
As the war between Israel and Hamas reaches its one-year anniversary, on the surface it may appear that much of life in the country has returned to normal. But as the war enters its second year, many Israelis remain reeling from the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, hostages still being held and a new front with Hezbollah in the north. of Israelis are depressed, discouraged, and angry.
Despite people’s efforts to maintain a sense of normalcy, uncertainty about the future has cast a pale shadow over virtually every part of daily life.
People sit at a bar near a sign calling for the release of hostages held for nearly a year by the militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip on Monday, September 10, 2024 in Tel Aviv, Israel. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
“There’s always a conversation about the situation,” activist Zeev Engelmayer said. Daily postcard projects featuring illustrations of hostages and Israel’s new reality have become a staple of anti-war protests. “In every situation I see, even people sitting in coffee shops, they talk about it. There’s no escaping it. It gets into every vibration of our lives. I’m here.”
Shaken Israelis feel hopeless
The Hamas attack, which killed around 1,200 people and kidnapped 250, shattered Israelis’ sense of security and stability in their homeland.
Many people are upset about the progress of the war. Nearly 100 hostages remain in Gaza, with fewer than 70 believed to be alive. As the region braces for further escalation, Israelis have experienced attacks including missiles from Iran and Hezbollah, explosive drones from Yemen, and shootings and stabbings.
They have seen Israel become increasingly isolated internationally, accused of committing war crimes and genocide in the Gaza Strip.
A sign calling for the release of hostages held in the Gaza Strip is posted on a tree on a beach in Tel Aviv, Israel, Saturday, September 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
A couple rides bicycles near a yellow ribbon sign calling for the release of hostages held by the militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip for nearly a year in Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday, September 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad) Zwigenberg)
“I’m almost 80 years old, but we grew up in this country with a sense that wars are short and quickly won,” says Israeli historian Tom Segev with a new sense of completeness. He spoke of a sense of hopelessness. “We’re not used to playing the long game.”
Segev said Israelis have long felt that their country is a success story, having emerged from the ashes of the Holocaust and survived many regional threats. They have strived for the same kind of normalcy as people in Europe and North America, but their reality for decades has been anything but, he added.
“I think history is going backwards,” he said of the past year. “Everything we have accomplished on the road to normalcy has not come true.”
Reminders are everywhere. At the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s graduation ceremony, a large yellow ribbon was placed in front of the stage. A graduate who did not attend because his brother was killed in Gaza the day before was honored.
People on a beach walk past a sign calling for the release of hostages held in the Gaza Strip by Hamas for nearly a year in Tel Aviv, Israel, Friday, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
An off-duty Israeli soldier carries an M-16 rifle as he walks past a poster calling for the release of hostages being held in the Gaza Strip in Jerusalem, Friday, September 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Internal departments expand
Israel’s long-standing divisions briefly eased in the aftermath of the Hamas attack, but have since intensified. Weekly protests calling for a ceasefire agreement to free the hostages are mainly attended by secular Jewish Israelis opposed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government.
A September poll by the Israel Democracy Institute, a Jerusalem-based think tank, found that 61% of right-wing Jewish Israelis, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s support base, support continuing the war.
Most Israelis were preoccupied with their own trauma and paid little attention to the ongoing destruction in Gaza, even though the Gaza Health Ministry put the Palestinian death toll at more than 41,000. Ta. Israeli media has reported little about the devastation. Israelis calling for a ceasefire are overwhelmingly motivated by the plight of the hostages.
A soldier and a woman wait at a bus stop next to an air raid shelter in the southern Israeli town of Sderot on Monday, September 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
People travel by light rail in Jerusalem on Wednesday, September 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Young people chat in the back of a car in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Many Israelis are furious with the leadership and military for failing to stop the Hamas attack. Tens of thousands of people are expected to attend an alternative ceremony to mark the anniversary, in a statement against the government’s official memorial service. The state ceremony is being pre-recorded without a live audience due to concerns about heckling and confusion.
“What we lost on October 7th, and what we have yet to regain, is a sense of security,” said Muri Segev, executive producer of the popular sketch comedy show “Eretz Nehederet.” “Despite everything, we have been able to build a fairly open and Western life here.
A man stands at the entrance of an empty souvenir shop at Carmel Market in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwiegenberg)
“Especially in Tel Aviv, we live our lives without thinking about the fact that our lives are actually just temporary pauses between wars and eruptions of violence. yeah.”
In the early months of the war, the show’s sketches were gentler and focused on what brought Israeli society together, such as the reaction of large numbers of civilian volunteers. As time went on, sharper satire was featured, such as reconsidering negotiations if the hostages were the children of Israeli politicians and released within two hours.
Some aspects of life have returned to normal, with crowded beaches, lively cafes, and concerts and sports scheduled to take place. But residents are also checking their nearest air raid shelters, coping with school closures if violence escalates, and avoiding domestic travel hubs that are currently off-limits. Heartbreaking news, such as the deaths of six hostages in August, is regularly received.
People on the beach in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, September 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
“It’s a nightmare. We’re just getting used to it,” said Maya Brandwein, a 33-year-old graphic designer who witnessed Tuesday’s Jaffa shooting that killed seven people. “I have little hope. I’m sure the situation will get worse.”
“I don’t know what to do,” said Dolor Roches, a 47-year-old graphic designer, at a coffee shop in Tel Aviv. Then I go home and keep running through the mud. ”
Some people simply cannot go home. More than 60,000 people have been evacuated from Israel’s northern border with Lebanon. Thousands of people in the southern town that was looted on October 7 are living in temporary housing. Tens of thousands of reservists are on their second or third tour of duty, putting strain on their families and jobs.
“As the war drags on and there is no end in sight, there is also some kind of very great anxiety about the future and, for some, whether there is even a future here,” Muri Segev said. .
People listen to a concert by Israeli singer Yoni Blok, who has written new songs about the current war, at a record store in Tel Aviv, Israel, Friday, September 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Life and war meet in this cafe
Cafe Otef feels like any Tel Aviv coffee shop. Patrons laugh while drinking specialty coffee next to the playground. Light rock music plays. But next to the sandwiches and cakes, there are chocolates made from the recipe of Dvir Karp, who was killed in the October 7 attack, and cheese from Kibbutz Beeri, where more than 100 people were killed and 30 were taken hostage. There is also. The tote bags and T-shirts on sale proclaim, “We Will Thrive Again.”
The cafe, named after the area next to the Gaza border, is run by residents of Reims, one of the kibbutzim attacked. This is the second store in the new chain, each aimed at helping people in a town in southern Israel whose lives have been forever changed.
People walk next to the market stand of Elkanah Bobot, who was kidnapped from the Nova Festival and has not been released from Gaza, at the Carmel Market in Tel Aviv, Israel, on September 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Women walk past graffiti calling for the release of hostages held by Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip for nearly a year at Carmel Market in Tel Aviv, Israel, Friday, September 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg) )
A sign calling for the return of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza is displayed during a soccer team Hapoel Jerusalem match in Jerusalem, Saturday, September 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
A worker sweeps the floor at an exhibition by Israeli graffiti artist Benji Brofman displaying portraits of victims of the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, Sunday, September 29, 2024 in Jerusalem. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
“The war has been going on for almost a year now. We feel that if we don’t live, we will die,” said cafe owner Reut Karp, Deville’s ex-wife. She lives in temporary housing nearby, along with most of the people on the kibbutz.
The cafe gives her purpose as her community deals with trauma and the anxiety of returning home. It’s strange to see people walking through the door and going about their normal lives, but she and her staff find solace in the everyday.
“We have to get out of bed and continue to live and work and hope,” Karp said. “Because without this hope, we have nothing.”
An off-duty Israeli soldier carrying an M-16 rifle walks through the streets of Tel Aviv, Israel, Friday, September 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
