David E. Rosenberg
The one thing that everyone could be sure of as the events of Oct. 7, 2023, unfolded was that Israel would emerge from the Hamas attack a changed country. It was not just the immediate trauma of the roughly 1,200 dead and 250 hostages, but also how much it upset the assumptions that Israelis had made in the years before—that the country was more safe and secure than any time in its history, that the Arab world was slowly accepting the inevitability of a predominantly Jewish state and prepared to push aside concerns about the future of Palestinians, and that Israel’s high-tech prowess could not just generate prosperity but also ensure security as well.
A final reckoning on such a cataclysmic event will take years to emerge. In the meanwhile, the most dire predictions—Israel becoming ensnared in prolonged, deadly, and destructive wars with Hezbollah and Iran; a tanking economy; and a deep crisis of confidence—have failed to materialize. The conflicts with Hezbollah and Iran ended in Israel’s favor with relatively little collateral damage. Economic growth has slowed, but Israel has absorbed the shock better than many expected. Trust in the military and many of the country’s key institutions has not declined significantly, if at all.
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