Yossi Schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine) 28.04.2026
In the past, Israel was supposedly characterized by a lot of violence within the Palestinian population, which was attributed mainly to the criminal gangs. No studies have been conducted on the reason for the appearance of the criminal gang, since any study would have revealed that the reason was the discrimination of the Palestinian population that are citizens of Israel. Moreover, among Jewish citizens, there was widespread joy “let the Arabs kill the Arabs”. However, the violence did not stop in Lebanon and Gaza, or among the Palestinians citizens of Israel, and it is spreading like an epidemic among the Jewish citizens of the Zionist state. This month alone 11 soldiers have committed suicide. This was a response to the cruel deeds they committed.
Very few people around the world with mental problems are violent. Based on [mental health research in 2026], here are the key facts regarding mental health and violence:
Small Fraction of Violence: Studies indicate that only about 3%–5% of all violent acts are attributable to individuals living with a serious mental illness.
More Likely to be Victims: People with severe mental illnesses are actually over 10 times more likely to be victims of violent crime than the general population.[i]
Yet in Israel there is a strong link between mental problems and violence which reflects the class nature of Israel and its role as the front line of imperialism in the region.
An article in Haaretz reveals data on the mental state of Israel’s citizens [ii] It attributes it to the war but it is the inhuman acts by the Zionist criminal army.
The article says:
“The data are unequivocal: The war has ignited a mental disorder on a clinical level for millions of Israelis
One in five Israelis exhibits symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. Seven percent of the population suffers from OCD, four times as many as in the rest of the world. There is also a sharp increase in depression, anxiety, and addictions
Ahead of each Independence Day, the Central Bureau of Statistics solemnly publishes the size of the country’s population. A much less festive figure, which is not studied and is not published, is the number of residents of the country suffering from acute mental distress. It seems that here too we are dealing with a very large number of people today – who are not counted, in every sense.
Since October 7, Israel has become a country with a disorder. Quite a few studies have identified severe effects on at-risk groups. They pointed to, for example, a spike in postpartum depression, an increase in depression and anxiety among Holocaust survivors, increased symptoms of anxiety in autistic children , and even worsening pain among fibromyalgia patients. But in this ongoing war, it turns out, the entire population is a group at risk. When you put the dots together and present a complete picture, you get a frightening presentation. A very large part of the country’s residents suffer from mental disorders on a clinical level.
“We’re reaching a situation where most of the population is already on the side of the injured and not on the side of the ‘vaccinated,'” says psychologist Prof. Eyal Kalantroff of the Hebrew University. “It’s a price that needs to be said, written on the product.
Kallantroff specializes in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Six months after the October 7 massacre, he wanted to examine the impact on the residents of the Gaza envelope. The finding was unusual: about a third of them were very likely to have OCD.
“The most common symptom was compulsive tests,” the researcher says. “Even if they lived in a hotel at the Dead Sea, they compulsively checked doors and windows. I’m not talking about getting up for a moment and checking if everything was locked, but about checks that last more than an hour a day, and in most cases 3-4 hours.” Other symptoms were hand washing, cleaning, tidying up — all at the level of hours a day.
As part of the study, a control group of people who had not been directly exposed to trauma was also examined. Their OCD rate was 7%. The rate of people suffering from the disorder worldwide is fairly constant, beyond different countries – less than 2%. “7% is a crazy number,” says Kallantroff. The team of researchers continued to follow a representative sample of the population every six months, at five points in time. The rate of 7% was maintained.
Seven percent of the population is hundreds of thousands of Israelis. Eight and a half seats. What can they expect when the war ends?
“It’s a serious and chronic disease. It can be treated, but there is no doubt that many years will still suffer from it. Even if tomorrow morning we turn into Switzerland, it won’t go away.”
Convincing and surprising evidence of the mental state of Israel’s residents comes from the sewage. Prof. Ariel Kushmaro of the Department of Biotechnology Engineering at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev monitors stress hormones, as well as caffeine, nicotine, and anti-anxiety medications in wastewater. Coincidentally, his research began just before October 7. This revealed that compared to the September 2023 baseline, there was a jump in monitored substances with the outbreak of the war. Caffeine levels in wastewater increased by about 425%, and cigarette consumption doubled.
The strongest evidence of the stressful state of the population comes from the body itself. Levels of cortisol, a hormone secreted in stressful situations whose high levels are linked to increased blood pressure and heart damage, increased by about 50 percent. “This suggests that the response to the events was deep and physiological, not just a change in habits,” Kushmaro says.
Arrangement: Aharon Erlich
In parallel to the sewage monitoring, questionnaires were administered in the cities sampled. “It was found that 20%-30% of the respondents exhibited post-traumatic symptoms,” says Kushmaro. “So it is possible to draw a certain parallel between the level of post-trauma and the state of stress in the wastewater.”
The subject of trauma is one of the most studied since the outbreak of the war. “PTSD is a dynamic disorder,” says Prof. Yuval Neria of Columbia University. “Fifty percent of people who develop it recover within a year, so longitudinal studies need to be done.” Here, too, the study began unplanned about a month before the war, in an attempt to examine the rate of PTSD in the population following the regime coup. It was found that about 16% suffered from symptoms of PTSD. A month after October 7, the rate jumped to 29%. Two years later, the number stabilized at about 20%.
Prof. Yossi Levi Belz, head of the Lior Tzfati Center for Suicide and Mental Pain Research at the University of Haifa, who led the study, says: “16% with PTSD is a lot. In other words, we entered the war in a very bad situation, with the public with exposed nerves because of the coup. 20% is ostensibly not much more than 16%, but it’s much more than the 5-6% that is customary in industrialized countries. There is a chronic situation here of a country that produces such a large amount
In a recent study conducted at the end of March on a representative sample of the population, 95% of participants reported at least one symptom of trauma-related mental distress. Overall, 21% of those sampled exhibited traumatic symptoms above the clinical threshold — more than twice the rate before October 7.
“This is a significant risk index,” explains the study’s leader, Prof. Yael Lahav, head of the Mental Trauma Research Laboratory at Tel Aviv University. “It is known that 50%-80% of people who present symptoms at a clinical level close to exposure to trauma may develop PTSD later on. If symptoms are not treated quickly, the likelihood of developing PTSD is high, and at the moment the waiting lists for treatment are unusually long, especially since there are not enough therapists who specialize in trauma.”
Is it possible to identify the consequences of mass exposure to trauma?
“Today, people are in survival mode. Only after it is over will we be able to clearly identify the prices. Those who have PTSD experience severe impairment in their functioning, as do those who suffer from post-traumatic symptoms without passing the clinical threshold. This is a disorder that deeply affects society, and it also has economic costs. I hope that there will be an organized national program for treating those who suffer from it, although at the moment it doesn’t seem like that.”
NATAL tried to quantify the economic impact of widespread exposure to trauma. A report published in January estimated the damage to the economy at NIS 100 billion per year, of which NIS 40 billion is the direct cost of impairing the ability to work of hundreds of thousands of people and the cost of treating them, and NIS 60 billion is the indirect cost of PTSD related phenomena such as an increase in accidents, violence, addictions and serious illnesses. The cost is expected to last for at least five years, and will reach about NIS 50 trillion. “We made very conservative calculations,” says the director of the organization’s research department, economist Dr. Yifat Reuveni. “Since the publication of the report, we have received many additional data, and there was also a second round with Iran, so it is clear that in practice the costs will be much higher.”
All the researchers with whom Haaretz spoke emphasize that the mental difficulties that arose during the war will not disappear once it ends. One of the most difficult disorders to get rid of is addiction.
The Israeli Center for Addiction and Mental Health (ICA) has been monitoring the epidemiology of addiction for about eight years. At the beginning of the study, one in ten Israelis had a problem with substance use or was coping with addiction – compared to an average of about one in seven in industrialized countries. The coronavirus has brought the number in Israel to one in seven and the war to one in four – one of the highest in the world. Among those who developed post-traumatic symptoms, the rate is one in two, and among evacuees and 18-26-year-olds, it is one in three. “You have to remember the enormous damage of addiction,” says Prof. Shauli Lev-Ran, founder and academic director of ICA. “It destroys the body, the mind, and ultimately society.”
How many of those who use the substances in a problematic way are actually addicted?
“Diagnosis of addiction is done in a clinical way that requires a lot of resources, and not through simple questionnaires, so there is no data on a change in the actual rate of addiction. Problematic use is one that causes social, occupational or educational problems with difficulty controlling the impulse. It is known that between 20% and 25% of those who use problematic substances develop an addiction. I estimate that more than 5% of the population is dealing with addiction, compared to about 3% before October 7.”
What can be expected after the end of the war?
“Six months after the start of the war, the post-traumatic symptoms moderated, but the problematic use of substances did not. After you develop a habit of using substances to regulate negative emotions, the habit remains even when the trigger for emotions passes.”
Lev-Ran does not indulge in despair. “This is an opportunity to bring the field of addiction in Israel to the standard that is customary in advanced countries. As of today, we are lagging behind, but the gap can be narrowed. If we don’t act on a scale commensurate with the magnitude of the problem, it could be a cry for generations.”
A natural mechanism that helps the body and mind cope with trauma is sleep. However, for many, this channel has also been disrupted. Prof. Alex Gilles-Hillel of the Hebrew University’s School of Medicine has been monitoring the sleep of Israelis since October 7 every six months, examining a representative sample of about 1,000 people. Prior to October 7, 5% of the population in Israel suffered from clinical insomnia (1% acute and 4% moderate). At the end of 2025, the last measurement point so far, the rate reached 28%: 7% acute insomnia and 21% moderate.
Insunmania is defined as a chronic disease that lasts beyond three months in which there are more than three nights a week of sleep problems that lead to functional impairment. The disorder is linked to depression, anxiety, and an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, malignant diseases, and car accidents.
What will happen when the war ends? Will we go back to sleep?
“It’s hard to say how many people will continue to suffer from insomnia if and when it’s all over, because there’s no such case in the world.”
Perhaps we can take comfort in the fact that, in addition to drippers, USB drives and Iron Dome, Israel also contributes to the world the souls of its residents as a unique field of research. “In fact, this is the first time that there is a lab that is an entire country, as well as tools to quantify the sleep of the residents,” says Gilles-Hillel.
Kallantroff notes that for many years, researchers have wondered whether trauma increases the risk of OCD. “It was considered an open question, because you can’t do a study on two groups and cause one to be traumatized. October 7 did just that.”
Endnotes:
[i] Illinois Criminal Justice Information https://icjia.illinois.gov/researchhub/articles/mental-illness-and-violence-is-there-a-link/
[ii] גדעון לב הארץ https://www.haaretz.co.il/magazine/2026-04-23/ty-article-magazine/.highlight/0000019d-a967-df26-a1bf-a9ef644c0000