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As the news of the attacks began to circulate in communities around Israel, the first reactions were shock and disbelief. Surely, the numbers were exaggerated, people thought. An attack of this magnitude couldn’t happen in Israel. Memories of the Yom Kippur War flooded in and the thought that history thought to never be repeated was occurring all over again. Israel’s intelligence services can hear conversations in Jericho and Ramallah, find hidden tunnels from Lebanon, and even steal tons of material from a warehouse in Tehran. Is it possible that intelligence services could miss an attack that required months of planning?! The news of killed, kidnapped, and raped Israels were too much to contemplate. This was the Yom Kippur War all over again, and the invincibility Israelis felt for the past few decades had been shattered. Juxtaposing Israel’s reaction after what is being called “Israel’s 9/11” with America’s actual September 11th attacks, one finds a remarkably different reaction. While America flew its flags at half-mast in public signs of mourning, Israelis immediately flew their flags high in support of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers called up for reserve duty to eliminate the threat facing the nation. Israeli soldiers, police, and first responders didn’t put black bands on their arms as a sign of mourning over fallen comrades. Israel didn’t declare a day of mourning. Other than funerals and shiva houses, there weren’t public displays of bereavement. We don’t know how the attacks of the Simchas Torah massacre on October 7th will transform Israel years from now. At the moment, when the Israeli people are at war, it is too early to fully understand the effects that the attacks have had on Israel and her people. Since the attack, Israeli society has pulled itself together into a united block, fighting its enemies, supporting its refugees, and praying together for the return of the hostages. Israelis on the right and the left, religious and secular,