Consider This from NPR - A Mental Health Hotline In Israel Has Been Overwhelmed Since The War Started

Episode Date: October 23, 2023

The violence between Israel and Gaza is entering its third week. As the number of dead and wounded continues to rise, survivors of the October 7th attack by Hamas are still reeling from shock. And thousands of friends and family are left mourning loved ones and wondering how they'll pick up the pieces of their lives. The Natal helpline has existed for 25 years to help people experiencing PTSD from war. But for the last two weeks they have been in "emergency mode" and calls are surging. NPR's Ari Shapiro speaks with Emi Palmor, chair of Natal, the Israeli helpline.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

As the violence between Israel and Gaza enters its third week, the number of dead and wounded continues to rise. Thousands of friends and family are left mourning loved ones and wondering how they'll pick up the pieces of their lives. This is really our way of living, really. All tragedies, all sadness. Bashir is Palestinian. He asked that NPR use only his first name out of concern for his family's safety. His wife's sister was killed in Gaza, along with her six-month-old grandchild, while they were sheltering in a Greek Orthodox church. Christian churches across the region dedicated services to the victims of that bombing. In Israel, members of the communities attacked by Hamas are moving through grief, shock, and anger. Dan Alam survived one of those attacks, but says more than 100 of his neighbors did not.

We're just still trying to figure it out how we're going to deal with so much funerals, and we don't know where to bury them. I'm just grieving for my friends, my parents' friends, my community. I just don't know how to deal with it. Rabbi Amihai Laulavi has been counseling survivors of the Hamas attacks. They just want to tell their story again and again. We know that that is usually the response to trauma. Storytelling is our tool of healing. These people who've been through so much loss, some of them have loved ones whose fate they don't know right now. Many have buried people this week. I cannot imagine the trauma they went through. Consider this. How do you help

traumatized people grieve when they're still in the midst of a war? An Israeli helpline has existed for more than 25 years to help people experiencing the terror of war on both sides. From NPR, I'm Juana Summers. It's Monday, October 23rd. It's Consider This from NPR. My co-host Ari Shapiro reported from Israel last week. Before he left the country, he spoke with people in Israel who are coping with the violence of a war that continues to escalate. When one event traumatizes an entire country, how can you measure the impact? One way is to look at phone calls to a mental health hotline since the war in Israel began. We had 6,000 calls in the first week, which is about 25% of what we get in an entire year. Emi Palmore is the chair of Natal, an Israeli helpline that

has existed for more than 25 years to help people experiencing PTSD from terror and war. She's had a long, impressive career in government. She describes herself as very cool-headed. And even she has been fighting a feeling of helplessness over the last two weeks that she's never felt before. I took down all the shutters, my house in complete dark. I just, I don't want anyone looking into my house. I don't want to see a shadow. I'm afraid of shadows. And I'm functioning like a machine. Since the attacks of October 7th, what has changed for Natal,

this hotline that has spent more than two decades building this infrastructure? So when everything started, unfortunately, we had people answering calls from people in their safe rooms nearby Gaza. When you're in a safe room, that is not PTSD. That is there's a threat outside my door. Wait, because I also asked myself the same question. The people reached out to Natal probably because they have been previously treated by Natal or a friend of them was treated by Natal. So these are already traumatized people. It's not like a number that everybody knows by heart.

And so what did these therapists do when somebody on the other end of the line says... It's the volunteers, first of all. What did these volunteers do? First of all, I want to say the moment the missile attacks start, Natal already changes into its emergency mode. Okay. So we're starting to have more people answering the lines because we know that people will call. We are starting to publish. We have like strips on TV and trying to raise awareness quickly that we are there and that we can accept calls. If there is such thing as a typical call today, can you describe for me

what a person on the other end of that phone is likely to need? They will say that they can't sleep, that they can't breathe. Physically, they can't breathe. They're suffering. They have obsessive thoughts, that they're being afraid afraid of just like i told you about myself you know i i'm afraid of shadows all of a sudden you know my very basic sense of security is is it strange for you as a person who oversees this hotline to help people with trauma to suddenly be experiencing these symptoms yourself to realize that you could be a client as well as you ask me if i'm surprised yeah not only that i'm not surprised i'm so aware of what natal is doing i'm so aware i've spoken to so many people who got help from natal who

recovered from natal that i'm able to report you what i'm experiencing because i understand that it's not that I can't sleep, not because I had coffee, not because my adrenaline can't go down because I've been so active during the day, but because I understand that I'm afraid to close my eyes. Which in a way is, I want to say it's good because it represents the elimination of stigma around this, that you can recognize it, that you can describe it, that you can talk about it wasn't always the case. Yes. And actually, I know that we take it for granted already, you know, that everybody talks about the trauma. Everybody says trauma. Everybody knows that therapists are volunteering around the country trying to support whoever they find. And yet,

to understand what truly PTSD is and that it will need serious treatment in order to enable people to be able to function. Can I ask what might be a complicated question? And this is not a political conversation, nor do I want it to be. Do you ever fear that the country's leaders are making decisions from a place of trauma? It's not a political question because we can say that about 75 years of politicians in Israel, first of all, yes. Second, yes and yes, because you know probably

that the remembrance of the Holocaust is a very present topic in our leadership's talk, speeches, but first of all, our current leaders, let's speeches. But first of all, our current leaders, let's say at least some of them are second generation like me, that they were raised by people who came from the Holocaust. Who came from trauma. And came from a major trauma.

I can tell you from my home, which is like a good home, you cannot be tired, you cannot be sick, you cannot be hungry, you cannot complain, you cannot say something is difficult about my life. So I have children. I know what it means to raise children while not giving any legitimacy to something that is hard in your life, even if it's objective, even if it's, you know, proportional to what you're experiencing. Natal's services are in Hebrew. Israeli Arabs speak Hebrew in many cases. Are the calls that are coming from Arab Israelis different from the calls that you're getting from Jewish Israelis? And if so, what are you hearing? I'm sure, because I speak to my Arab friends, that what it means or the impacts and what it means to be Muslim, this is one thing. What it's doing to the relationship between Arabs and Jews in Israel, Muslims and Jews in Israel. The fact that the residents of this country are now terrified from everything. So you can imagine that if you're Arab, they're

afraid of you on one hand. And on the other hand, it puts you at risk because you're an immediate suspect for, you know, doing the most trivial things. So this hurts the very delicate balance of coexistence in Israel, which is an issue in regular days and definitely will be an issue for the next, you know, decades. You've been very candid about your own experience of fear and panic and pain in the last couple of weeks. If you don't mind my asking, have you ever used Natal's resources yourself? It's really, really interesting because, first of all, this week, I've been telling my relatives to call Natal. And last night I was sleepless.

And I said to myself, maybe it's about time that I will call the helpline. And I didn't yet. But first of all, I just want to remind you that when I meet, you know, we have meetings in Natal, I'm surrounded by therapists. And we can tell, by the way, one day, I don't want to say who it it is but it was like one of the leading professionals in Natal and I was talking with the CEO afterwards and I said what's wrong with her and she said her son was just enlisted to the reserve and she's she's she's been crying the entire morning and my son has just come back and my daughter's boyfriend is in the reserve and I really don't know how to divide my prayers. And I think that this is something that I've experienced

in a previous war that I went through in Israel, that you always pray, you have to pray, not because you're religious, you know, like we say, we pray, you know, for the safe return. And all of a sudden when it's everyone, and when you see that so many peoples have lost entire families you ask yourself at the end of this am i going to be spared from death in my family and you say to yourself statistically what are the chances and then you start asking yourself, so who is number one? So you haven't called yet,

but it might be time. I think that now that Biden has already done everything he can for my security and my well-being, Natal is the next thing. Emily Pallmore, thank you so much for talking with us. Thank you for being interested in our well-being and supporting our mission. That was my co-host Ari Shapiro from his reporting in Israel, speaking with Emi Palmore, chair of Natal, the Israeli helpline. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.