even months after October 7th, it is still October 8th, the day after, in the State of Israel. The country remains in mourning, a depressed state of being that alternates among rage at Israel’s enemies; rage at its leaders; anxiety about the hostages in Gaza; excruciating doubt about the future of the country; and bewilderment that so much of the world has turned its attention to the horrific, ever-growing number of dead and wounded Palestinians. Insofar as Israeli television covers Gaza at all, it is usually through the lens of military strategy, the loss of Israeli soldiers, and the fate of the hostages. As was the case for so long in the United States after 9/11, empathy often turns out to be a limited, and predominantly domestic, resource. The main outliers in this emotional landscape are the two million Palestinian citizens of Israel, men and women who exist with a kind of double consciousness, at once living alongside their Jewish neighbors and getting catastrophic news on their phones from Gaza, sometimes about the loss of relatives and friends.

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