War, Post-Trauma and Suicide – A Monologue

 by Gil Eliezer

This text was written at the beginning of the week after Eliran Mizrahi, of blessed memory, took his own life. I felt that I had to write this and that it has to be made public. But here’s a serious trigger warning: Whoever doesn’t want to read it, and especially those who don’t want to read it, I ask you to please at least read the second-to-last paragraph. It’s the most important one.

I don’t know what to think anymore, I have no idea. I mean, I know what I think about this place and this time. I also know what I feel. I know myself. I know that if I managed to function during the war, I can also function in my normal routine. But I have no idea what “normal routine” means anymore. Or if there is such a thing. And if "normal routine" is what I think it is, then you should all know that you have failed, abandoned and let us down, and you continue to do so every moment of every day. I understand that your routine is to ignore the war and those who return from it. You’ll say, "Not true, we really appreciate it, we remember and think about it all the time." Say whatever you like. But you don’t.

היחידה של גיל לנוכח ההרס בעזה I צילום: גיל אליעזר

Daily Trauma

Yesterday, I woke up sad. Really sad. I thought about the children of Arnon Zamora, who was killed during the hostage rescue. He has two children. I checked as soon as they published his name. Two children. I assume they’re young because he was also quite young. His wife lost her life partner, the father of her children. And they’ll live their entire lives without a father. The rescue of the hostages moved me greatly, and I was so happy about it, but I couldn't stop thinking about the children of Arnon Zamora. Then I read about Eliran Mizrahi, who killed himself. And he’s the one I woke up with. Raise your hand if you are reading this and also woke up with Arnon Zamora, of blessed memory, and with Eliran Mizrahi, of blessed memory. Be honest with yourselves.

So I’ll write some personal things here now, even though I would prefer not to, because they’re personal. In most of the jobs I worked, I didn’t share these things. Most people I meet on a daily basis don’t know them. Even in the reserves, I don’t talk about it much, only with a few very specific people. I would never open up about it in a Facebook post, but last week a 40-year-old reservist, a father, husband, brother and son to his parents, committed suicide. A person who made the choice to end his life. I have to write. You can never truly know what goes through a person's mind when they decide to end their life. By chance, he also appeared in a film about what it’s like to come back from Gaza. And I’ve understood for a long time that indifference kills, and it’s probably what killed him, too.

"יש מצב שאני מפלצת?"

White Nights

Three years ago, minus a month, I went for a day of training in the reserves. The next day, on the bus on my way to work, my life changed completely. Such a cliché, but so true. There were three or four weeks that I don’t really remember. That is, I remember things that I did: I worked a lot, traveled a bit around the country, attended events and met friends. I remember the facts, but in my memory, that whole month is a mix of sleepless nights, hot days filled with noise and crowds from the moment I opened my eyes until I somehow fell asleep again, and smoking joints at five in the morning because, well, an hour and a half of sleep isn’t enough, and that was the only way to get back to sleep. I hardly told anyone then, and almost no one noticed. At the time, I didn’t expect my co-workers or friends to notice such things if I didn’t tell them. That was then, when we had a relative routine, and we all knew that many people were scarred in the army, but it was impossible to know who and how. But today is not then.

Listen, all of you who weren’t there: the month after Gaza looked to me exactly like July-August 2021. Even now, I remember that I did things, but the first image that comes to mind is me sitting alone in my apartment in Mitzpe Ramon, staring at the wall. Chain-smoking cigarettes and joints and staring at the wall. Not really thinking about anything. Mainly trying to figure out where I was in the past two months and where I am now. Trying to understand what I’m supposed to think about the fact that the city I’m in now is a regular city, its buildings completely intact, unbroken windows, walls with no shell damage. There isn't a single bullet hole. The strangest thing for me was seeing a road. Just a road. There were no roads left in Gaza. And all the parked cars are regular cars parked normally. They haven’t been run over by a tank, they aren’t burnt and riddled with holes. They also aren’t the cars from the border settlements. You’ll have to take my word for it, those of you who weren’t there to see for yourselves, can’t understand. Not just the war side but coming out as well.

And I remember going to this bar in Mitzpe and not understanding how I went back two months. Maybe everything that happened didn’t really happen? I used to joke that one day I would show up to work completely flipped out and say, “You wouldn’t believe the dream I had, I dreamt that terrorists took over the border area, massacred and kidnapped people for a week, and I was in Soroka hospital and saw the families of the murdered and people without legs and with holes in their bodies, and then about a thousand mortars fell on me, and then we entered Gaza and it looked so real. What a crazy dream I had, you have no idea.” I’m lucky that I’ve been dealing with this for a few years and already understand the implications. In fact, I know myself and understand that I didn’t go crazy because that’s what I would think if I was experiencing it for the first time. I know it wasn’t a dream. I also made sure there were photographs and written documentation of everything, for those moments when it seems like maybe I imagined it. It seems you all don’t understand that.

היחידה של גיל בלחימה בעזה I צילום: גיל אליעזר

Transparent

Last week, Eliran Mizrahi shot himself. No one knows why. I think there’s always something irrational about this act, something incomprehensible. But I have a strong feeling that what happened is that he survived months of hell and then came home to his wife and four children, two of whom have autism, and realized he could no longer be their father. If there were gunshots and explosions, he would take care of them just fine, but this routine no longer existed for him. What do I mean by a strong feeling? He explained it in his own words. And he killed himself two days before he was supposed to return to Gaza. But sure, you can never know what goes through the mind of someone who chooses to commit suicide.

Yesterday, I watched the movie "Back from Gaza," which featured Mizrahi. He and many others who were there and experienced what they experienced, mainly talk about what it's like to return to a society that doesn’t give a shit about them. Just like that. Not in the Knesset committees and not in the Channel 14 studios. You abandon them … us. Not by shouting or cursing or disrespecting in any special way. Simply because you don’t care. Because you dare to say, “Enough, today we're not talking about the war,” “Let’s change the subject,” “Let’s talk about something more positive.” Who are you, who saw the massacre and the fighting in the South, and stayed home? Who are you, who during this whole time woke up in your bed every morning, drank coffee and had breakfast, then went to work or school, came back, had dinner, took a shower, changed clothes, and went out with your friends? You came home every night and went to sleep in your bed, your room, your house, with no equipment, uniforms, shoes. Earplugs. Without a weapon in your hands and without being ready to wake up in the middle of the night and have to fight terrorists. Without the smell of fire and death in your nose. Who are you to decide that you’ve had enough of talking about the war?

How dare you say you don’t have time because of work shifts and exams? How does it make sense to you that your friend came back from Gaza, and most of us have already managed to return to the reserves at least once since then, and you tell him, “You come to me.” “Let’s arrange a meeting but at my place because I have other plans and I don’t have a car.” Why just say empty words? Why say something you don’t mean? Just say you don’t care. Because we see that anyway.

Take Responsibility

I am not writing this as a cry for help or anything like that. But what if I was? What if this text suggested I might do something? A small suspicion. What would you do? What can you do? What would you suggest? Let's say that what you’re reading right now sounds to you like a person nearing such a choice (and I am definitely not). After all, you won't come here. It's too far. It's fine for me to make the long trip to meet you but not the other way around. So what, will you call me? Send a message? And what will you say in it? What do you even know? You haven't talked to me since the first few weeks. You usually don't even respond to messages. If you’re worried now that your friend, someone you claim to care about, is going to hurt himself, but you haven’t bothered to meet him, or you met for an hour or two and spent half the time talking about yourself. What will you ask? What will you say? How can you help someone who’s given up on life and knows that even if you suddenly express concern or care, just as you weren't there for them up until now, there's also no reason to rely on you in the future?

Do you really think you can deny it, ignore it, say "later," "tomorrow," "we really have to get together sometime," and then, at the critical moment, recognize that something is wrong, even though you haven't talked for months, and you'll know how to approach them and find the right words to say to convince the person not to pull the trigger/cut/jump from the chair/floor the gas pedal as hard as they can? You probably also believe that everything will be fine and things will work out even if you don't do anything. The war will end and the hostages will return, and someone will go fight for you in Lebanon so they won't shoot from there either, and someone will rebuild the settlements around Gaza, and someone will rebuild the North, and you're fine because you think about it and you care. You don't care.

And after thinking about it, maybe just do it now? Maybe understand that you have absolutely no idea and that there are people around you whose lives have completely changed and will stay that way from now on, and your behavior now is simply pushing them out of society? Showing them that they have nothing to look forward to here? That they can go back to the war, at any rate it's the only thing they know how to do now, and honestly, if they die, it solves a problem. Because they can’t manage and don't really want to do regular things. Think about that the next time you stand in silence on Memorial Day.

"אתה עובד על אוטומט"

An Endless Loop

Last week, Eliran Mizrahi chose to exit this world, leaving behind four children, a wife, family and friends. Early yesterday morning, I found the film he appeared in. I started watching it at 3:38 AM and finished around 5:00. It's a film that everyone must see. And if you want to get a slight understanding of what it's like, take two or three days and just watch it in a loop 22 hours a day. You can mix it with other horrific videos because, in the end, the people in the film aren't experiencing the interviews they gave. They’re experiencing the actual events. Go to work on two hours of sleep (even with PTSD, you have to go to work every day) and keep watching the film on repeat even at work. For the people in it, it’s been playing non-stop for nine months.

And then let's see you. After three days of sleeping only two hours a night, when everything in your daily life reminds you of something from there. Even without the fear, the loss, the itchiness in your legs. Just not sleeping for three days. That’s not much time. Let's see you think about something else. Maybe then it will seem different to you when someone changes the subject because they're tired of the war. Maybe you'll understand that there are people among us who are in life-threatening situations, who have no hope at all, and realize that this is how it will be from now on. They’ll see everyone else moving forward in their lives while they can't even be parents to their own children.

Towards the end of the film, Eliran explains that he can't pay his bills. It simply doesn't interest him. "Because I'm alive! I'm alive! I can't believe I'm saying this!"

He so desperately wanted to live.

תפיסת עמדה בבית בעזה I צילום: גיל אליעזר

The Importance of Support

Do you think this war will end and everything will go back to the way it was before? This is the new normal. This is how it will stay. For the rest of your lives, you’re going to meet people who survived combat, the party, the massacre in the kibbutzim, whose dearest ones were held in Gaza for more than half a year and most of them died there. For the rest of your lives. Even in a retirement home at age 80, you will meet us. And what will you say? Thank you? We appreciate it? Can you believe yourselves?

And if any of my friends who are reading this feel the same way: that they can't cope, nothing makes sense, there are terrorists in the next room, the smell of the wounded suddenly appears, and the ground jumps in the middle of the night – I'm here. Give me a call. Even if we only met once in a military course or seminar and haven't spoken since. Even if it's the middle of the night. Even if we weren't friends when we met. Even if we didn't know each other at all. If we were ready to wake up in the middle of the night to fight for the lives of our friends in Gaza, then of course, I'll wake up to answer the phone. I will personally go wherever necessary to meet you. It’s not even a question. It can't be that someone who came out of there alive would eventually choose to end their life here. I can't believe that even needs to be said.

Watch the film. And good luck to all of us in this despicable and ungrateful society we live in. I hope you never find yourselves on the other side.

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