October Shadows: An Explorations of Trauma and Healing After October 7

-Major funding for this program was provided by... Additional support was provided by... [ Birds chirping ] -It's 7:00 on a July morning in central Israel, and the temperature is already in the triple digits.

In ordinary circumstances, the heat would force Keren-Or Solomon to postpone her journey.

But the animal that she and her fellow volunteers plan to rescue has languished for a month.

Its condition gets worse by the day.

Keren-Or expects the rescue to take four hours, an uncomfortable trip, but not intolerable.

She's had worse over the course of 18 years running a rehabilitation sanctuary.

-The farm is called Keren-Or Farm.

It helps all kinds of animals and people with their trauma.

We have dogs on wheelchairs.

We have horses without legs or eyes, blind cats, all kind of animals.

But the mutual thing to all of them is that they were all traumatized in a way.

They've all been hit or harmed.

And we give them a chance for life.

So, he's an old horse, and he was, uh -- His owner passed away, and his sister took care of the horse.

And she couldn't pay for that treatment anymore.

And he's not getting all the right attention.

-So he's probably having some injuries right now.

-He's probably having some injuries, and he's all torn up in many places.

-That's bad.

-Keren-Or learned about the horse from a farming family who'd taken in the animal out of pity.

But the vet bills soon exceeded their means, and they had no choice but to send the horse to the slaughterhouse unless Keren-Or wanted it.

She did.

[ Birds chirping ] [ Gearshift clicks ] -Let's go.

It's very individual because each animal has his own trauma, so it changes between the animals.

But they just let us help them.

And then when they start healing, eventually you can see all the love they give us back.

And you can see that they're just like any other animal.

-The rescue started off well.

The horse was docile, enduring an examination that revealed numerous injuries.

-So, we can see he has scratches here.

Also here.

-Mm-hmm.

-We think maybe it's because of the fence because it was, like, for kind of long time alone.

And also he has a broken hoof.

-The horse's tolerance vanished only when it was led to the trailer.

It refused to enter for three hours.

-These are hurt animals.

They don't trust you when you come.

[ Horse whinnies ] I'm post-traumatic, so I can understand that.

And most of our volunteers here are also post-traumatic.

And so we understand the distance at first when we meet them and we understand that it's a process.

But at the end of the process -- or even the middle of the process -- the therapy is not just for that animal.

It's also for me.

And when I make this connection, even without a therapist in the room, the magic can happen because people feel that someone needs them and they can see that they helped to rescue someone else.

[ Laughing ] Ahh!

-The journey was one for the record books.

14 hours after they set out, the rescue party arrived at the farm, horse in tow.

Keren-Or Farm is home to 350 animals and nearly as many volunteers who attend them.

Hundreds of people receive therapy here.

I've come to the farm today for the same reason I traveled to Israel in the wake of the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023.

Then, as now, I needed to bear witness as a journalist to the lives shattered by violence, to the resilience of those engaged in recovery and reconstruction.

Here, among survivors and bereaved families, it's possible to glimpse their pain and strength.

-Before October 7th, the people that came here are mostly special-needs people.

Some are Holocaust survivors.

Some -- Some kids that just want to learn how to play better with their friends.

You know, some -- I call it light issues that are fixable.

But since October 7th, we had to open a trauma center, uh... ...for the non-fixable traumas, um, so that we can learn how to live beside it.

Um, we have -- We've opened a special center.

It's called Hilly, like my sister.

[ Wings flapping ] Uh... Did you see that?

-Wow.

Yeah.

Let's try that again.

-Why?

That was my sister showing us she's here.

[ Laughs ] I believe that.

[ Birds chirping ] -The spirit of Keren-Or's sister watches over the farm.

This Keren-Or believes.

The volunteer staff includes a number of survivors of the Nova Festival, where Keren-Or's sister lost her life.

It's a work in progress.

In addition to the stables, hutches, and kennels, a therapy garden was recently constructed for disabled dogs.

The garden is named for Hilly Solomon.

-This place was built by her friends from the army, and we thought about how we can help dogs that we saved from the war, with kids from the war, and soldiers and the Nova survivors.

And when they help this dog, they help themselves.

So we made this monument, which is the same size as Hilly.

And it's her real picture with her dog in the army -- and the thing that she always says, "See the good."

[ Cow moos ] So now everyone that comes here for therapy, they think about seeing the good, and it's right in front of them.

And then they see the animals so happy.

You get some proportions, and you said, "Okay, I'm feeling good now.

That's what I'm here for.

That's what this place is for.

And if it helped me, I'm sure it can help so many other people."

-I know Keren-Or for a long time.

We know each other for more than a decade.

We met as activists for animal rights.

But after the 7th of October and the loss of Hilly, her sister, I connected again with Keren-Or in a much more personal level.

And we sat and thought what we can do for sisters and brothers who lost someone, mostly in the Nova Festival, and it began from there.

-July would be best.

-Dr.

Shiri Raz is director of the therapy center at Keren-Or Farm.

She and the certified therapists who practice here are all experienced in trauma and loss.

-So, we want to talk about the open day for the community.

And I want to make it more therapeutic than last time.

I want to give them, like, a taste of what we're... -Yeah.

-Many of my therapists have connection, personal connection to trauma and loss.

Many of them come from families who lost a member of the family in the army or in terror attacks.

And I think this connection is very important because, like Jung said, the wounded therapist is the therapist that can really understand the pain.

So, every therapist is going to hold a workshop.

-Keren-Or is not a therapist.

She has no professional training.

But her personal experience of trauma affects every aspect of life at the farm.

-...that would like to get help here.

-On the October 7th -- "Black Saturday," as we call it -- um, I woke up and I saw so many WhatsApp messages from all over the place.

And I figured that something is going on.

Um... I saw the people.

The volunteers here said that there was an alarm at the farm and they don't know what to do.

And I was eight months pregnant.

And then I opened the news, and then I saw that there was a big festival, music festival in the south.

These kind of festivals I used to go to 10 years ago, 15 years ago when I was young.

And my youngest sister loved those festivals.

So I just opened my phone and I just texted her and I said, "You're not there, right?"

I didn't even ask if she's there.

I just -- I just -- I just said, "You're not there, right?"

Um, she didn't answer.

It took a while until I understood that she's not okay and she's not there.

Um... We went looking for her everywhere.

She was there with two friends.

With a lot of friends, but two friends stayed close to her until her final moment.

Um, one of them was shot twice and survived.

And one of them was shot at the head and didn't survive.

And so we had some bits of information from this and from her and from him and from the other families.

And, um... We -- We realized that Hilly was -- was there and she was running away.

And there were terrorists everywhere.

And she was -- She was very tiny.

She was small.

Big, huge heart, but very small in her body.

And the anxiety at the moment was too hard.

So she threw up and then she fainted.

So she couldn't keep on running.

So her friend lifted her up, and, um, he tried to help her.

Um... That's it.

They just -- They started -- They just left the cars and went under the car and just laid there.

Um, and the Hamas went through, and they thought -- They want to confirm that they're dead.

So they shot them.

And killed them.

They killed... -Keren-Or was broken.

Um, she was broken.

I never saw her like that.

She is such a strong woman, um, but she was completely broken.

And it was very, very hard for her to -- to get up again.

We all understand because we all felt broken, but for her, it was, of course, more personal, larger.

Um, it was very hard to see her like that.

But she has such a resilience.

You know, Keren-Or is a model of resilience.

She is a model of turning pain and grief into action.

She was the first one in her family to really realize that her sister will not come back.

And then she had to get up.

She has her children.

She has her husband.

She has her parents.

She is responsible for almost 300 animals, 250 volunteers.

And she is a role model and an inspiration for all the brothers and sisters and parents who lost someone in this terrible day.

-These donkeys all came from Gaza.

Yeah, they were going to sell their skin and fat for the cosmetic industry to China.

From 2005, I've been carrying PTSD from a suicide bombing that happened when I was just there.

And the smell... ...is a smell you can't forget.

You know, it's just -- Psychologically, I can't -- I can't erase the smell.

Even now, talking about it, I can smell it again.

And after October 7th... I was watching all those movies and the social media, and it felt like I was there because I was already carrying my PTSD and all the smell came back.

So I wouldn't leave the house for about five months.

I was -- First of all, I kept smelling death everywhere, so I wouldn't -- I wouldn't want to be the weirdo outside, walking around with tissue with a smell of mint just to not smell death everywhere.

And I was also scared of everything.

And I wouldn't let my kids go to the playground because I was too scared that something will happen.

And after five months, I decided I'm opening here a special group for grieving sisters.

And then I didn't realize it, but after a few minutes, I realized that I'm out of the house.

And I didn't do it for me.

I did it for them.

But when I came here, I wanted to stay because the air outside, the outdoor therapy, being outside made me breathe again.

Sitting with other sisters that went through the exact same thing I went through made me feel normal again.

It's hard.

It's a big trauma to understand and to realize what you've been through.

But at some point, you want to say, "Stop.

I'm not a victim."

It's something that happened to my family, and it's the worst thing that could ever happen, but my sister wouldn't want me to sit and cry for the whole day.

She would want me to get out of bed and do something.

So I just thought, "How -- How can I help other grieving sisters on behalf of my sister's name and other survivors --" [ Wings flapping ] "Other survivors that went through what my sister went through?"

And now they're trying to realize what happened.

So, opening this open space for them and helping them is what helped me.

-Bereaved Israelis find comfort where they can.

Since an official memorial to the victims of October 7th has yet to be erected, places that serve a utilitarian purpose draw survivors, family members, and sympathizers.

-[ Speaks a global language ] -Ronen Arad's 25-year-old son, Nevo, was murdered at the Nova Festival.

The site is just a few miles down the road.

Two months later, Ronen located his son's car here.

He had it towed to his kibbutz, where it now resides in a memorial garden.

Ronen lives with his wife and three children in Sa'ad, a kibbutz two miles from the Gaza border.

He's a man of deeply rooted faith and given to contemplation on the meaning of October 7th.

Ronen is a psychotherapist.

I assumed that his professional experience would give him a clinical perspective on his personal loss.

I was wrong.

-[ Speaks a global language ] -For two years, the Arad family has struggled with the loss of a son and brother.

Only recently has Ronen noticed a shift in the family dynamic from desolation to acceptance.

The family gathers often in the evenings to discuss everything from the mundane to the profound.

-The 7th of October happened to all of us.

Everyone in Israel knows someone that were hurt or lost his life on that Saturday.

And we all saw the videos, and we all saw and heard the evidence and the testimonials of that day.

And, yes, I think that Israel -- all of the people in Israel are in secondary trauma.

Or I think that we won't heal.

I don't think that "healing" is the word.

I think that we will learn to live with this.

We will never be healed from that.

-Keren-Or recently purchased a tract of land adjoining her farm.

She's drafting plans to shelter more animals and to aid more survivors and bereaved families.

Her ambitions are a function of need.

-Yay!

[ Dog barks ] We have, by now, about 21 therapists, which all specialize at trauma.

And I think it's a small amount because we need a lot more therapists.

When you think about all the people we've lost in less than 12 hours -- and each one of them had his own family and the first circle of their kids or their parents and their siblings.

And so if you take that circle and you go and spread it more and more and spread it all around, you see there are about thousands of people that need therapy.

And that's just the grieving families.

I haven't still spoken about all the kibbutz and all the -- the Army and so many other people that we've lost along the way.

-You've provided therapy to hundreds of people in need.

-Yeah.

-Is it possible you've neglected your own emotional well-being?

-I... I started therapy about a month ago, um... because of two reasons.

One of them is because I understand that, um, doing all of this, it can be like a bandage, but you need to fix the problem from the root.

And so I need to go to therapy and understand what I've been going through all this time.

And the second reason is for my kids.

And I first started therapy just about five months after, uh, my s-- after October 7th.

And that was to just to be able to come out of the house because I couldn't go out of the house at all for five months.

Um, everything made me so suspicious, and I just felt like everyone is here to hurt and to do something to my family.

And so I was so protective.

So, at some point, I said, "Okay, for my kids, I have to go to therapy and to stop preventing from doing stuff and let them be at the kindergarten, let them be at the playroom, let them just be kids, and stop stopping them having a normal life just because you're scared of everything."

So I stopped for a while therapy.

And then I saw everything that's happening here, and I said, "Okay, maybe -- maybe I need to start, as well, to fix the problem."

Like we said, from the roots and not just a bandage.

And it's important, I think.

It's a long way.

But it's the right way, I guess.

[ Beeping, machinery whirring ] -"Dissonance."

I can't think of a word that better describes the ambient sound of Kfar Aza.

The kibbutz lies two miles from the Gaza border.

Here, on the morning of October 7, 2023, a force of 250 Hamas and Palestinian militants breached the perimeter fence and within one hour captured the entire kibbutz.

Scores of residents were massacred.

Hostages were taken before the IDF neutralized the terrorists.

Since then, the din of war in the Gaza Strip has drowned out the rhythm of this once pastoral community.

Six months ago, another sound was added to the mix -- the sound of construction.

A district of the kibbutz where young adults once resided in efficiency housing and where many were slaughtered is now in the final stage of renovation.

Materials were donated.

The workers are volunteers.

-We were recruited on October 7th, around noon.

This was our first mission.

We came here to clear the area from terrorists.

-Oded Derry is a reservist commander in the Israel Defense Forces.

His unit was deployed to Kfar Aza during the onslaught.

-We fought in the industrial area.

We had a few encounters with terrorists.

We took them off and then we moved on to our next mission.

So we came here to rebuild what Hamas destroyed.

And it feels like, I don't know if happiness is the right word, but more complete.

You feel complete with yourself, helping to create life back here again.

-Any elation the volunteers experience is confined to the small district they're reconstructing.

30 meters away in the adjacent district, visitors experience an opposing emotion.

The homes here, efficiency units designed for young adults, haven't been touched since October 7th.

The bullet holes, cinders, wreckage are reminders of the lives lost.

Crime scenes like these remain throughout the kibbutz, deterring all but a few residents from returning.

-Walking the land here, it's what I did from the moment I was born.

And I have lots and lots of very good memories from this place.

And I always wanted to come back and live here.

-Ayelet Khon was born, raised, and lived most of her life in Kfar Aza.

She and her husband, Shahar, were the first to move back to the kibbutz.

For one year, they were the only returnees.

They've now been joined by 20-some people, a fraction of the pre-attack population of 700.

Her generation of kibbutzniks grew up in a socialist environment that many describe as magical.

Ayelet bristles at the word.

-It's a bit of a problem to call someplace magical, because it means that it's from the fairy tales, and it's not from the fairy tales.

It's a man-made heaven.

It was worked very hard to achieve.

But for me, it was really welcoming and loving and gave you a sense of security and of confidence, and that makes all the difference.

-The home next to Ayelet's is undergoing a gut renovation.

Ordinarily, that would be cause for celebration and the anticipation of new tenants arriving.

In this case, the renovation conjures up bad memories.

The district where Ayelet and Shahar live is closest to the Gaza border.

On October 7th, it was the first invaded by Hamas terrorists.

-We heard the guns, but didn't think that it's so close to us.

About a three-quarters of an hour after the whole thing started, I got a call from Noam, our neighbor, and he said to me, "Can you go and check on Mira, my wife?"

Okay, I'll go.

I told Shahar, "I'm going to see what's going on with Mira."

It's literally the same porch, just with a small divider between us.

And Shahar said, "No, the noise is too strong.

I don't want you to go outside."

And we were still thinking mainly bombing.

Afterwards, Shahar told me that he was suspected that there are terrorists inside the kibbutz.

But, um -- But he didn't know just because of the very strong missile attack.

He was suspected that it's covering for something.

You don't send so many missiles if you don't try to cover for something.

So -- So he went outside and he came after a few minutes, and he told me that Mira was murdered.

-The renovation crew has removed most traces of the murder.

Only recently has Ayelet ventured into the house at the request of the owner to keep tabs on the renovation's progress.

-So we are standing in the living room of our friends Noam and Mira.

On the day of the event of October 7th, she was alone in the house, he was not in the house, and she was alone in the house with two dogs.

And the terrorists came into the house.

They came and they murdered her with the dogs.

And now it's being renovated.

You can see that the walls are being covered.

All the bullet holes and cracks.

There's only one -- one thing that was left.

And this is this bullet in this window.

So this is the bedroom of Noam and Myra.

And watching it stripped of all its homey feeling is very, very hard.

Like, this is the most private place of anybody.

His bedroom.

When we strip bare the bedroom, it's like we're stripping bare the family.

It feels like another symbol of the hardship that we are experiencing here in Kfar Aza.

So this is what I feel.

-Ayelet and her husband survived the attack in their home's safe room, steel shutters locked, electricity cut, no food, no water, total darkness.

-We were in the safe room for 30 hours and we were evacuated literally under fire.

And all the time we said we're going to -- we want to come back to Kfar Aza, all the time, from day one.

And we said we were going -- we will be back in Kfar Aza.

And people said, "How could you be there?

There's nothing -- there's nothing in there."

And we said, "We don't care.

Our house is still standing and we are coming home."

And then on December 10th, which was Hanukkah, we came back to Kfar Aza.

-Ayelet and Shahar now spend their days restoring their own home and planning for the kibbutz's future.

October 7th isn't as much a memory as a presence indelible as the commemorative tattoo on Shahar's forearm.

-People will move back.

Not all of them.

For people to move back to Kfar Aza, people need to feel safe.

For that to happen, we can't have the noises from Gaza.

We can't have airplanes flying above us to put bombs in Gaza, because that means that it's not safe over there, that there are still problems over there.

We can't have artillery shooting at them because the noise is just, um... It's horrible.

Some people can't handle this noise.

And definitely we can't have the feeling that what happened before will happen again.

We have to be -- to feel safe.

Right now, most of the people from Kfar Aza doesn't feel safe.

If Kfar Aza is not rebuilt, Hamas won.

If Kfar Aza is rebuilt and the people that are living here are different than us, I'm not sure it's a win for the Hamas, but it's I think for people from Kfar Aza that will decide not to come back, it will stay an unfinished business for the rest of their lives.

So I think for the people of Gaza, it would be the right move to do.

And when I talk to people, whether young or old, that's what I tell them.

But you can't argue with people's feelings.

And some of the people, they feel they will never be safe here again.

But I will never judge anybody that will decide that he -- he can't handle it, and he will never come back here.

-It's a long walk from the parking lot to the graves at Caesarea Cemetery in Israel's Haifa District.

Hannie Ricardo doesn't mind the distance.

It gives her time to prepare for the task ahead.

At least once a week, she comes here to tend her daughter's grave site and those of the neighboring dead.

-There are a lot of graves here that people are not coming to clean or visit them.

So I try to do my best to clean them, too.

I know Oriya's neighbors and it's going to be flowers all over here.

Not only Oriya's grave.

-Oriya Ricardo was murdered at the Nova Festival on October 7, 2023.

She was 26 years old.

-So this is my dearest Oriya.

-Like each of the 378 victims, she went to the festival for music, for community, for a few hours of freedom from the routine.

Here, it's the routine that comforts Hannie.

For an hour, the distance between her and her daughter feels a little less vast.

-[ Sighs ] -That's an unusual bench.

-The bench I thought of making something too so we can sit here.

And then on one of the Nova Community Day, we made these signs.

This is Oriya's sentence.

"I deserve to be happy."

That's a sentence I -- I found in one of her notebooks.

And it's -- it's a mantra I used to tell her, you know, that she deserves whatever she wants.

I find myself sometimes doing things I never thought of doing because she did it.

Oriya had many tattoos.

And the last one she did with one of her friends that survived the party, Carmel.

It said unique, and Oriya did it on the arm.

And I said -- I -- I never had a tattoo before.

I was -- Most of my life I was against it.

Totally against it.

And then yesterday I went with Carmel and the little dog, Barbizon.

We went together to the same place where Oriya did her last tattoo, and I did the same one.

Hey, Oriya.

Look at this.

Exactly the same place where Oriya did it.

So now I have unique as well.

And she was unique.

-Hannie invited us to observe this hour of communion not out of ceremony, but for clarity.

By opening a private space to our cameras, she asks us to witness what absence looks like.

Not for a day, but for a lifetime.

-Going through that kind of tragedy doesn't bring you to a place where you actually want to live.

You don't.

But, um... I know that I'm going to wake up the next morning, and it's up to me what I'm going to do with that day.

And I do have days where I simply can't do anything, when the pain takes over.

And, um, there's nothing you can do about that.

But for the most part, I create, I do.

I, um... I want to live.

-Are you having fewer days with pain?

-No.

It's a 24/7 thing.

It's how you deal with that.

It doesn't go away.

It gets even harder with every day that passes.

-Hannie Ricardo lives at the intersection of music and trauma.

Perhaps because her great-grandfather was a musician prisoner at the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

She's a professional singer with a unique specialty that has led her to research around the world.

-It's not exactly that I'm specialized in music and trauma, more of music of Jewish composers who perished in the Holocaust.

When I decided to go back to research in New York, my professor and I came to the conclusion that the topic would be music under trauma, because you need to find -- the narrative is huge, and you need to find a specific thing about it.

And it came like music under trauma.

And that was prior to October 7th.

-The research topic led Hannie to the Kaddish.

-Kaddish is the Jewish requiem.

It's the prayer for the dead.

And my composers, as I call them, they didn't have anyone to say Kaddish about them.

So maybe I should write -- I'll take the lyrics of the Kaddish and put them to music and put quotations from their music in it, and this way it will be their Kaddish.

But it was stuck, you know, and I stopped composing it around August of 2023.

So it was there.

It was beautiful.

I loved it.

It was seven minutes of music, but that was it.

And then, um, October 7th happened.

And of course, I didn't do anything with music, and writing wasn't at all in my thoughts.

And then when it hit me that, you know, this is Oriya's Kaddish.

It has to be Oriya.

And I started to write it.

And if in five weeks I had the whole thing.

And I remembered the conductor, when I let her listen to a few bars that I wrote, she said that "It is beautiful, but what about an orchestra?"

And I said, "But I never wrote for an orchestra."

And she said, "But you never wrote something like that."

I said okay, and... I don't think I thought about what I was doing.

I knew that I had to write it.

It was an urge in me to do it.

It's not that I said, "Okay, now I'm writing, now I'm composing, now I have this and --" No, I heard the music in my head and I put it into the computer.

That was it.

And it was linear.

I heard one voice, and then I heard a second and a third and a tuba and a trombone and a trumpet and the oboe, which is the most important instrument in that piece.

It was -- It came together and I couldn't stop.

The premiere was on October 7, 2024, at the Israeli Opera House.

A month before it, I realized that I'm going to sing the solo part.

Once I decided that I'm going to be the soloist and to sing for my daughter, the part I played before, it was the call for Oriya, my personal call for Oriya.

And for me, it's not only Oriya because I say Oriya is my daughter and all the rest are my children.

And there is seven minutes in this piece that is dedicated for the victims of October 7th of the Nova Festival.

On October 7th, we had a rehearsal, noontime.

I also had a solo song with a piano and I started to sing and I couldn't.

I-I collapsed and I said, "No, I'm waiting for the -- the concert and let's see what happens."

And all along there was someone there that was learning the part in case I fall apart.

But I went on stage.

Norel Mansouri.

Shahar Mansour.

Sharon Refai.

Eli Yakob Rafael Refai.

Oriya Ricardo.

It was hard.

And there were minutes or seconds that I thought that I'm not gonna make it till the end, but I did.

But with all the stress -- It was October 7th.

It was a year since I lost my daughter.

And I made this huge project.

I worked on it for six months during this mourning period.

So I was left with no more energy and I collapsed.

[ Applause ] [ Singing in Hebrew ] [ Crying ] It's not enough to say we will never forget.

It's not enough.

We have to do something.

We have to create the meaning.

Although I have days when I don't want to get out of bed and sometimes it's really hard to -- to tell myself to get out of bed, make the decision to do something.

It's hard, but... I'm alive.

And if I won't do something, then we lose the right to do anything.

That fuels me to stay on my feet and fight.

So I have a lot of fights, but good ones.

You know, it's -- One is, of course, to keep my daughter's memory alive, to keep the memory of the Nova music festival victims alive.

And people will see the photos and they will see them.

They will hear the names.

And I won't let October 7th be forgotten.

No.

-Remembrance is both a priority and one of the most difficult tasks for bereaved families.

-We're a religious family.

We are believers and we are not afraid of a long road.

And during that road, you may have obstacles.

And you have illness and sickness, but you are walking toward something and that tomorrow will be much better than today.

-Eyal Golan was raised in the rural community of Porat in central Israel.

The name means "fruitful vine," an apt description for the agricultural enterprise known as the moshav.

For 50 years, the Golan family has been a member of this farming collective unique to Israel, which combines individual ownership with shared infrastructure.

Since October 2024, the family's allotment has been fallow.

Farm work stopped when Eyal's younger sister, Shirel, committed suicide on her 22nd birthday.

-My dad was a farmer that grew flowers, and we helped him a lot in the greenhouse and we picked the flowers by ourselves.

I was at the age of 7.

And when she was at the age of 5, she came and helped us.

And to see this little girl running around the trenches in the greenhouse and picking up flowers, and to see that she's carrying four or five flowers and they are bigger than her.

And it was, um... [ Sighs ] -Let's take a break, Eyal, okay?

-Day four, scene one, take five.

-I wonder if you can describe again what Shirel saw on October 7th.

-Shirel on October 7th when she was at the Nova Festival, at first they saw the rockets and then when she -- when they started hearing the shooting, they ran eastwards.

And her instincts told her to get down, and she did with her boyfriend, Adi.

And after, about 300, 400 meters, they heard a loud explosion and they saw this mushroom of cloud.

[ Clears throat ] And she realized that the same vehicle that she came off with -- came off of him got tackled by a Hamas ambush.

And she heard the rapes.

She heard the shooting.

She heard the screaming.

She even smell the human flesh burning.

And she was a witness to everything.

-Eyal has a family of his own in Tel Aviv.

But since his sister's death, he returns often to the moshav to tend what's neglected, to comfort his parents.

The Golan family is observing one year of mourning for Shirel.

Candles are lit to her memory every day.

Her likeness appears on photos and drawings across the compound.

Eyal has taken on the role of family caregiver, working to ensure that his parents and siblings emerge from this emotional crisis.

Today, 11 months after Shirel's death, her parents remain inconsolable.

-At the same time the Golan family was contending with Shirel's mental health crisis, they were also struggling with the farm's viability.

Their principal crop was flowers for the export market.

Shirel and her partner Adi lived together at the farm in a rear loft.

They escaped the Nova attack by hiding under a bush for hours.

They were later rescued by a police officer.

In the months that followed, Shirel suffered from severe post-traumatic stress, exhibiting symptoms such as social withdrawal, disassociation, emotional numbness.

Her brother Eyal was first to recognize Shirel's condition because he too suffers from PTSD following an earlier terrorist attack.

-You need to be one to know one.

You need to be post-traumatic to recognize that your baby sister is suffering from post-trauma.

And when I saw Shirel at the first time after October 7th, I saw the initial symptoms.

She suffered from survivor's guilt.

And always asked, always said, why I got saved and my friends didn't?

And what about my friends that were kidnapped?

And I told my parents, "Listen, you need to take her now to see a psychologist, to go and ask for help."

-Shirel received therapy in clinics for several months from the state health system.

Her therapy ended when her therapist was activated for military duty.

She later attempted suicide with an overdose of prescription pills.

She was hospitalized and later released without further therapy.

-On October 20, 2024, on her 22 birthday, my parents wanted to take her to a trip to see the Western Wall to Jerusalem.

And a day before it, she told her -- she told my mom, "Listen, I want to continue to sleep.

Don't wake me up.

Go and have fun."

And that morning, my mom sent her messages and tried to call her, and at first she answered.

And after two hours that she didn't respond, my mom called Adi and asked -- asked him if -- if he can come and check up with Shirel to see what is up with Shirel.

And then Adi ran to the unit that they were living together, and she saw -- and he saw her hanging.

My parents came, and when I saw them, I immediately took my mom hand to hand.

And she asked me one thing.

"Where is Shirel?

Where is my baby daughter?"

And the only thing that I could do was to hug her.

-Shirel Golan's funeral was attended by legions of family, friends, and October 7th survivors.

A sizable contingent of media was present as well.

-I think Shirel Golan's suicide might mean different things.

At first, when we're thinking about the trauma of the war, it's not a regular trauma.

That's something that is important to understand because those people, the survivors, they were there alone for many hours.

All the... All how you -- you understand your safety was completely ruined at this -- at this day.

It's not the same as if you're a soldier and you go to fight in the army, so you sort of know what you're going through.

You sort of know what you're going into, right?

But when you go to a festival and you go to just have fun with your friend and party your life, you don't have even a small thought that something like this could happen.

So the surprise is very big.

And also, the change from feeling so good and so happy, dancing your life in a party, to a horrible horror, and that's very shocking.

-The Golan family's mourning exposed the burgeoning mental health crisis among October 7th survivors and family members who lost loved ones.

There have been a number of suicides connected to October 7th.

The state health ministry does not compile data on these deaths, and did not respond to my multiple requests for interviews and information.

-A lot of the survivors have suicidal thoughts.

They met with -- They met with death.

A lot of them are dealing with -- with mourning of their friends that died there.

Suicidal attempts and also actions are sometimes happening in families as well, in families of survivors or of people that died.

-And do you think the Israeli mental health systems were prepared for the psychological aftermath of October 7th?

-No, nothing was prepared at the mental health system in Israel.

I mean, it was in a pretty bad condition even before.

You know, Israel was not putting a lot of facilities and effort in the mental health system.

-In the months following Shirel Golan's suicide, her siblings and parents have openly criticized the Israeli public health ministry for neglecting the psychosocial needs of October 7th survivors.

-Following their religious custom, the Golan family is concluding the year of mourning.

In a community where the rhythms of agriculture prevail, the Golan home and fields remain silent.

A few trees are fruiting in the greenhouse where Shirel ended her life For Eyal, it's less a place of sorrow than of hope.

-There has been a void that I can separate it into two factors.

The first factor is emotional void.

The emptiness of us missing our daughter, our sister all day long, every day, every single day.

And the second factor is the physical void.

Since Shirel's death, no one wants to refurbish it, replant it.

It's like, leave it -- leave it as it is.

Don't do anything.

-The farm's decline has motivated Eyal to revive it.

With plans to plant new crops, he aims not only to restore what was lost, but also to reinvigorate his parents.

-I'm a dreamer.

And as a dreamer, when other people see empty place with bushes and snakes, I see Shirel's dream is going to be revived.

And to do so, I need to write a plan, a very detailed plan of how to bring plants, how to bring workers, every step of the way, and my wish, my hope that it will be green again.

-Hannie Ricardo is also planning a return to normalcy.

Since October 7th, her world has been defined by an absence that has left little room for anything else.

Now, after nearly two years, Hannie is resuming her musical career.

-I think that after October 7th, if we learn something that you cannot predict what happens next.

You don't know what happens the next moment.

Your life can change overnight, for better or worse.

Mine changed for the worse.

And that's my reality today.

So that's the journey.

And it's just the beginning of the journey.

-Hannie, has there been anything you've discovered about yourself through our conversations?

-That I'm stronger than I realized.

To do all I did, and I guess every parent living through that kind of pain, we are brave.

-Change is also evident on this afternoon in early May, as Hannie prepares to host a party, her first since losing her daughter.

The decision to bring friends into her home feels more foreign than familiar.

As Hannie navigates the complexities of grief, the gathering is a reminder that even in the wake of loss, the need to connect remains.

-I haven't done this in a long, long, long, long time.

Ever since October 7th.

I didn't have -- I didn't cook.

I just, you know, put a steak on the stove and that was it.

That was my lunch, dinner, whatever.

And I decided to make a real lunch where I'm cooking, like I'm actually cooking.

And that's a huge, huge thing because it means another step in getting back to life.

But yet I'm doing it.

I want to have friends again around the table.

Not only once, but more.

And we want to make the best of the reality we have around us.

I know for sure I do.

-Most of Hannie's guests survived the Nova attack or lost loved ones there.

-Amen.

-Wow.

-Amen.

-Amen.

-Amen.

-L'chaim.

-Limor Zarfati is Hannie's closest friend.

Despite their bond, they joke that they wish they'd never met.

-Amen.

-Amen.

-Amen.

-Amen.

-Love you.

You too.

-That milestone was reached on a March dawn in Caesarea.

It was impossible to tell if Hannie and her friends were shivering from the chill or from anticipation.

It didn't seem to matter.

Hannie's smile was enough to warm everyone.

-I've been struggling to rise up.

I did it pretty well since October 7th, but I do everything I can to rise up.

And always in my life, I made sure that people are coming with me on my road.

It was never alone.

It was never just for me.

And this is when I decided that it's not going to be my air balloon solo ride.

I'm going to bring my friends, and I have survivors here.

I have bereaved mothers like me that became friends of mine, close ones.

And I have my adopted kids from Nova.

And I know I made some people very happy today.

-Wow.

-This bottle I found in Oriya's apartment when I, um... Uh... When I got there after the Shiva.

And it's been in my fridge ever since then.

And I said when I get to a special occasion, I will open it.

I think that today is a special occasion, and we're going to open it, and we're going to drink it in her memory and to life.

[ Conversations in Hebrew ] Whoo!

L'chaim!

L'Oriya.

L'Oriya.

It's my -- It's my 60th birthday, and I decided that I'm going to celebrate my birthday in every possible way and do things I've never done before.

And, ohh, part of it is this.

It's, um... I have a terrible fear of heights, and I can't believe that I made the decision to go up in the air.

And I see it, and it's huge.

And I say, "Oh, my goodness."

But it's part of the rehabilitation.

You have to choose to live, and I choose to live.

And this is part of my journey.

And I'll make thousands of journeys like this one, because when you do something like that, you feel alive, and we are alive and... [ Speaks Hebrew ] We're going up, and I'm gonna be as close as possible to my daughter's spirit up there in the air.

[ Speaks Hebrew ] [ Speaking Hebrew ] Whoo-hoo!

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