For Minnesota Jews and Muslims, a shared darkness since Oct. 7

Eilat Harel hasn't felt quiet — not in her brain, not in her heart — since Hamas' Oct. 7 attacks in Israel. She's plagued by nightmares. She'll watch the news with her husband in their Minnetonka home, and both will burst into tears. She sobbed for 10 minutes straight before a recent service at Adath Jeshurun Congregation, staring at hundreds of photographs of Israeli hostages.

"It's just an overall black sadness," the 56-year-old said. "Not one image. Just black."

Experiencing war from afar is incomparable to living in conflict zones, where mental health struggles are alarming. For those with deep ties to a conflict zone thousands of miles away, struggles become more subtle, a secondary trauma. Regardless of their views on the massacre of Oct. 7 and its devastating aftermath, a sense of helplessness is rife among many Minnesotans, whether someone like Palestinian-raised Said Isayed of St. Paul, who fears for his family's safety in the West Bank, or Harel.

Not unique among Minnesota Jews, Harel's connections to Israel are deeply personal. Her parents were born there. She lived in Israel during childhood, served in the Israel Defense Forces, met her husband in Israel. She runs the Israel Center for the Minneapolis Jewish Federation, where she is chief impact officer. Her daughter moved to Israel last summer and is enlisting in its military.

The feeling, Harel explained, is like a big ocean wave pulling you underwater. It's dark. Undercurrents tug you in different directions. You're dazed, unsure which way is up.

As she spoke, a muted television monitor was tuned to an Israeli news channel. It showed an Israeli soldier's funeral.

Shared heartbreak

On the second floor of a building in northeast Minneapolis, Said Isayed sat inside his integrative medicine studio, staring at an Arabic-language news site and mourning the state of the world.

"What world will my kid live in when we're in 2023 and killing people is still OK?" Isayed said, his 15-month-old son toddling just outside.

Isayed grew up in Hebron, the historic West Bank city under Israeli military occupation since 1967. He trained in traditional Chinese medicine in China, where he met his wife, a Minnesotan. They moved here in 2016.

Muslims in Minnesota, especially those of Palestinian ancestry, tend to frame the conflict in starkly different terms than Minnesota Jews. The divide reflects the war's underpinnings: Israel says its bloody Gaza response is necessary for the nation's security and continued existence, but Palestinian leaders decry Israel's actions as war crimes or worse.

While Israeli sympathizers in Minnesota say no other country would countenance Hamas' attack without retribution, Palestinian sympathizers emphasize the context of Palestinian oppression since the Jewish state formed 75 years ago.

Often, the only common ground is through shared emotional reactions: a doom-scrolling obsession with news, a constant heartbreak over innocent lives lost, a daily struggle to focus on much else.

Isayed is the oldest of seven. His family still lives in the West Bank; some work in his family's six-generation herb and spice business in Hebron. Isayed remembers relative peace in the 1990s followed by a crackdown in 2000 during the Second Intifada. His family would go weeks without electricity. More Israeli settlers moved in, making inequalities even more stark. Isayed remembers an Israeli attack on a government building that exploded his bedroom windows.

"I did not realize that people have trauma, that people have mental health issues — because everyone there is just experiencing the same thing," Isayed said. "If you oppress people more, it affects mental health ... If you start with treating people equal, you might have a common ground."

On Oct. 7, Isayed spoke with his mom, who feared a violent Israeli reprisal not just in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip 40 miles away, but also in their city. Since then, Isayed has remained glued to his phone. He is devastated by videos of children suffering or dying, but he feels obligated to bear witness. He hates American military aid going to Israel: "Your tax money is going to kill your own people. That doesn't feel good."

Recently, a Jewish patient asked Isayed if treating a Jew was triggering. "Don't be silly," he replied, emphasizing he differentiates between everyday Jews and the more radical settlers near his family in Hebron.

He has little faith the war will change anything. Still, he keeps watching.

"Growing up there, there's so much anxiety, you just have to live. Because life doesn't stop," he said. "The world is too big to control. That's the reason I focus on people that I can touch and help."

Fear and worry among Muslims and Jews

"My gut is in a grind," said Melissa Cohen Silberman, a Jewish retiree in Golden Valley. "I talk about it. I think about it. I literally feel like I've done 1,000 stomach crunches. I'm constantly nauseated. I've lost at least 5 pounds."

Muslims and Jews in Minnesota speak of a pervasive fear that's amplified by social media. Some Muslim women say they're wearing hats to hide their hijab — Islamophobia internalized, as if they're expecting bigotry to happen. Some Jews who wear the Mogen David, or Star of David, have tucked it under their shirts, or fear putting a "We Stand With Israel" sign in their yards. Jewish and Muslim students at area schools have experienced harassment related to the conflict. Local activists who bridge gaps between Muslim and Jewish communities feel heartbroken that years of work are undone.

Jonathan Bundt, a mental health professional in Hopkins who specializes in trauma, experienced two emotional waves since Oct. 7. The first was immediate and profound: How could an attack so inhumane and indiscriminate ever happen? The second wave, after people chose sides, is more complicated.

"I had to disengage from the stories, from the cable news networks, from social media. It's too overwhelming because there are so many victims in all of this," said Bundt, who has worked personally and professionally with people on both sides of the conflict. "How do I protect my family? How do I protect my own soul from all of this?"

Those feelings are echoed in Minnesota's Muslim community.

"I've never seen my community more worried — worried about the future," said Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' Minnesota chapter. "There's a feeling that at work, there's a single story. People will put out statements saying we really feel bad about what happened in Israel, and we're standing with the Jewish community. There's nothing wrong with that. [Except] you completely omit the fact that Muslims are also in pain."

Feeling helpless half a world away

Bilal Alkatout has never been to his parents' homeland. One from Jerusalem, one from Ramla — they left after the 1948 war, Palestinian refugees with Syrian passports living in Kuwait. Alkatout was born in Florida, raised in Anoka, lives in Minneapolis.

Since Oct. 7, he's pondered deep questions: Why wasn't he one of the victims? Why is he here while others are there? He felt he'd left his people behind.

"The world became very small," he said. "And this connection to a place I've never been became real and sad, so sad."

Lately, he's been irritable. He restarted therapy. He feels hopeless: "The world," he said, "feels really desolate."

Leave out their peoples' history, and look past their divergent views on who's right and who's wrong. Alkatout's emotional experience mirrors Eilat Harel's: helplessness about a cataclysmic event half a world away.

Harel sees nuance: She's an Israeli patriot but doesn't support Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. She feels it's easy to criticize Israel's response from America when you're not living with an existential threat.

She manages news consumption and practices self-care. She sweats on the elliptical and the exercise bike. She watches "The Boys" and "Suits." She listens to Israeli songs of peace.

And ever more frequently, she's been inviting Jewish friends for shabbat dinner.

"I need a hug," she tells them. "Can you guys come over?"