Israel’s system for victims of hostile acts stays centered on proving the extent of an individual’s incapacity somewhat than serving to them rebuild their lives, survivors, mental-health consultants and political representatives warned at a Tel Aviv convention on Sunday.
The convention was organized by 121 Engine for Social Change by means of two partnerships it leads: Or BaOfek (“Mild on the Horizon”), which advocates for victims of hostile acts, and Tikva LaNefesh (“Hope for the Soul”), which focuses on mental-health and resilience coverage.
The convention passed off at Riverside in Tel Aviv, and was sponsored professional bono by Rafi Pomrock, the CEO of the Dynamo Group and a member of 121’s public council. It was hosted by journalist Rina Matzliach.
Based in 2017, 121 describes itself as a nonpartisan social-policy group that works with civil-society teams and professionals to advance laws and authorities coverage.
Or BaOfek was established following October 7 to press for adjustments to a system of recognition and rehabilitation that the group argues was not constructed to deal with tens of 1000’s of bodily and psychological accidents.
Victims of terror’s employment, monetary conditions falling aside
On the convention, 121 offered interim findings from a survey it carried out amongst 145 victims of hostile acts. Solely 27% had returned to the identical scope of employment they held earlier than their damage, whereas 35% weren’t working in any respect, and 34% had returned solely partially.
Practically two-thirds of respondents – 61.8% – mentioned their monetary state of affairs had deteriorated even after receiving allowances and compensation, whereas 35.2% mentioned a first-degree relative had been pressured to scale back their workload due to the respondent’s situation.
Two-thirds mentioned that they had not obtained steady and constant steering from the state, and respondents gave the help they obtained in navigating their rights a median rating of two.5 out of 5.
Taken collectively, the findings underscored how the implications of an damage can prolong past the particular person formally acknowledged by the state, affecting the employment and funds of whole households and putting extra burdens on family members offering care.
Roni Katz, whose son Arad survived the Supernova music pageant bloodbath, mentioned in a video offered on the convention that she had been pressured to cease working to look after him across the clock.
“My son Arad returned from Nova in a extreme psychological situation, and since then I’ve been caring for him continuously,” she mentioned. “I misplaced my supply of earnings, however I obtained no response from the state – no monetary help, no steering, and no therapies that would have helped me cope.”
Ron Segev, one other Nova survivor, mentioned he had beforehand labored 12-hour days as a salesman however may now not perform as he had earlier than October 7. Segev mentioned he was presently acknowledged as having a short lived incapacity by means of the top of 2026, with a everlasting willpower anticipated solely in 2027.
“As a substitute of a system that focuses on incapacity percentages, I want a private rehabilitation observe that determines what I want with a purpose to return to functioning and to life,” he mentioned.
Recognition is just step one
Recognition as a sufferer of hostile acts and the willpower of a incapacity ranking are two separate phases of the method.
An individual looking for recognition submits a declare to the Nationwide Insurance coverage Institute (NII). The declare is then transferred to the certifying authority within the Protection Ministry, which determines whether or not the incident meets the authorized definition of a hostile act and whether or not the particular person needs to be acknowledged as a sufferer.
As soon as acknowledged, an individual looking for incapacity compensation should file a separate declare and seem earlier than a medical committee, which determines whether or not the acknowledged damage created a short lived or everlasting incapacity and assigns a proportion to it. The committee could assess solely accidents related to the hostile act for which the claimant was acknowledged.
A incapacity ranking beneath 10% doesn’t entitle the sufferer to incapacity compensation. Scores between 10% and 19% typically result in a one-time grant, whereas these rated at 20% or above obtain a month-to-month incapacity cost.
Recognition can fund medical therapy related to the acknowledged damage even and not using a 20% incapacity ranking, however lots of the broader rehabilitation, therapy, and household advantages rely upon crossing larger thresholds.
The “One Soul” reform, for instance, applies to victims receiving month-to-month compensation with a incapacity ranking of at the very least 20% for post-traumatic stress dysfunction, one other psychological damage, or a head damage.
Given the unprecedented quantity of people that entered the system previously three years, the excellence is important.
Roughly 82,000 civilians have been acknowledged as victims of hostile acts between 2023 and 2025, excluding these killed, based on NII knowledge offered in a latest Knesset Analysis and Data Heart report.
By April 2026, roughly 38,000 had utilized for a incapacity willpower. Of these, round 88% have been decided to have a psychological incapacity, together with roughly 6% with a bodily incapacity and one other 6% with mixed bodily and psychological accidents. Amongst these with psychological disabilities, the biggest group obtained rankings between 20% and 34%.
Non secular Zionist Occasion MK Michal Woldiger mentioned on Sunday that the committees supposed to find out these rankings had themselves grow to be an impediment to restoration.
“The overwhelming majority of medical committees at this time are anti-rehabilitative,” she mentioned. “They concentrate on the query of how injured an individual is, as an alternative of asking what that particular person must return to functioning.”
Woldiger mentioned the committees mustn’t essentially be abolished, however their objective and strategies needs to be modified to help individualized rehabilitation.
Comparable criticism was raised at a June 9 assembly of the Knesset Labor and Welfare Committee on medical committees for disabled IDF veterans and victims of hostile acts. One participant advised the committee {that a} psychiatrist had diminished her incapacity ranking by 20 proportion factors after asking whether or not she had begun learning – an instance of the worry that indicators of restoration may be interpreted as proof that help is now not required.
Trauma that doesn’t match present definitions
Yashar Occasion candidate Inbar Yehezkeli Blilious argued that the authorized standards themselves have to be reconsidered as the character of publicity to terrorism adjustments.
“Terror has modified, and the legislation should additionally change,” she mentioned.
Folks could maintain extreme psychological hurt regardless of not being bodily current at an assault, she mentioned, together with by means of watching occasions unfold in actual time on their telephones or by means of movies. The place critical hurt may be demonstrated, the state ought to think about increasing recognition to incorporate them, she mentioned.
Yehezkeli Blilious additionally referred to as for earlier intervention by means of the well being funds and for help to be prolonged to siblings and different members of the family affected by a survivor’s situation.
Some victims could return to work whereas persevering with to require long-term help, she famous, which means employment alone shouldn’t be handled as proof that rehabilitation is full.
Prof. Mooli Lahad, founder and president of the Neighborhood Stress Prevention Heart, warned in opposition to treating each extended response to the conflict as PTSD. Some individuals are experiencing different types of unresolved misery, together with what he described as “ambiguous loss,” requiring a broader therapeutic vocabulary and response.
Particular person therapy stays vital, Lahad mentioned, however can not succeed absolutely when an individual returns to a household, office, or neighborhood that lacks the power to help them.
“Actual therapeutic is available in an ecology of therapeutic,” he mentioned.
After years of constant conflict and repeated makes an attempt to recuperate, individuals are additionally experiencing what he described as “therapeutic fatigue.” Strengthening communities would permit them to offer a protecting construction round people and households, he mentioned.
“The extra we heal communities, the extra they are going to wrap across the people themselves,” Lahad mentioned, including that resilience needs to be understood as a muscle that have to be regularly strengthened.
The strain on these communities is already seen all through the general public mental-health system.
A State Comptroller’s survey carried out in April 2024 discovered that 35% of adults reported average or extreme post-traumatic stress signs, 32% reported signs of despair, and 21% reported nervousness.
Amongst respondents who mentioned they or somebody near them had been current on the October 7 occasions, 54% reported average or extreme post-traumatic stress signs.
Within the first six months after the assault, well being funds and resilience facilities supplied psychotherapy to roughly 58,000 adults and kids. By the spring of 2024, the typical interval between requesting care and starting therapy, together with the diagnostic course of, was round six-and-a-half months.
The state comptroller warned that delayed therapy may trigger signs to grow to be entrenched and result in long-term injury to victims’ employment, household lives, and social functioning.
The native welfare system anticipated to kind a part of the neighborhood response can be struggling. A June State Comptroller’s Report discovered that solely 18% of the extra municipal social-work positions allotted in response to the conflict have been stuffed in 2023, rising to 32% in 2024 earlier than falling to twenty-eight% in 2025.
In a nonrepresentative survey carried out for the report, 54% of municipal social employees mentioned that they had skilled excessive or very excessive burnout for the reason that conflict started. The principal difficulties they recognized have been workload, staffing shortages, and the rising variety of circumstances.
Collectively Occasion consultant Liran Avisar Ben Horin referred to as for a shift from responding to crises solely after they grow to be extreme to actively figuring out folks in misery.
Simply as workplaces are required to nominate officers liable for stopping sexual harassment, they need to think about appointing a mental-health officer capable of acknowledge indicators of misery and join staff with therapy, she mentioned.
The convention’s proposals various, however they shared a central premise: Israel can not deal with psychological rehabilitation as a short lived emergency undertaking or cut back restoration to the share written beside an individual’s title.
“The conflict created a brand new actuality that the State of Israel has nonetheless not adequately addressed,” Liat Eilam, government director of 121, mentioned.
Israel should redesign the rehabilitation course of round an individual’s return to functioning, prolong help to households carrying the burden of care, and construct a nationwide mental-health and resilience system rooted in native communities, she mentioned.
“These are two nationwide missions that should stand on the prime of the priorities of the subsequent authorities and Knesset.”
