How is the rise of antisemitism impacting Diaspora Jews? Mental health experts discuss

The ongoing mental health crisis about diaspora Jews calls for building resilience, not pathologizing, spiritual and mental health leaders said at a recent Mental Health IsReal event

By SHIRA DICKER/THE MEDIA LINE NOVEMBER 14, 2024 22:26

ILLUSTRATION - Map of Europe with warning sign, reflecting the 400% rise in antisemitism (photo credit: Canva)

Rising global antisemitism and the ongoing war in Israel have led Jews around the world to experience heightened anxiety. A gathering in New York City two weeks ago put on by Mental Health IsReal (MHI), a new initiative for Jewish mental health started after the October 7 attacks, aimed to address that crisis.

Dennis Prager—co-author of the 1983 bestseller Why the Jews?—had a message of tough love for the attendees: Stop being surprised by Jew hatred. It has been with us from time immemorial. 

“Vulnerability and pain is not unique to Jews, but we are the only ones targeted for extinction,” Prager told the crowd. 

He admonished the audience for their ignorance about the rise in antisemitism. One of the starkest indicators in how bad things have gotten is the recent rerelease of Why the Jews?, which is unfortunately still all too relevant. 

Prager was joined on stage by author and spiritual guide Rabbi Manis Friedman and social media influencers Tanya Zuckerbrot and Lizzy Savetsky. Anzhelika Steen-Olsen, who helped organize the event together with MHI founder Rona Ram Lalezary, moderated the panel. 

Ori Danino (credit: courtesy of the Hostage Families Forum)

“We as Jews cannot ignore the toll antisemitism is taking on our collective spirit,” Steen-Olsen told The Media Line. “We need to discover our pride and our strength.”

She said she was especially glad to have the influencers participate in the event. “Tanya and Lizzy are brutally honest,” Steen-Olsen said. “They discuss their own mental health issues. They show up and speak out. They are the voices behind the voiceless.” 

Steen-Olsen is the CEO and founder of the nonprofit women’s advocacy project SHER and a board member of MHI. “Promoting mental health is near and dear to my heart,” she explained, especially given her experience immigrating from Russia as a teenager. 

According to its mission statement, MHI aims to create a “robust virtual platform that connects Jewish wellness practitioners, trauma trainers, individuals seeking healing, and community activists from across the diaspora.” The event was partially meant to raise funds for the organization’s goal of providing free virtual therapy sessions. 

The event also included a presentation on healing modalities led by mental health practitioners. “We are living in tough times. … We are really being bombarded,” trauma specialist Rivki Jungreis said in her presentation. “It is normal for us to have very adverse, anxious reactions.”

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Jungreis, who is a licensed clinical social worker, provided examples of helpful tools including breath work and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy.

She described her therapeutic work as deeply rooted in her religious awareness and her belief that God gave humans the capacity for healing. “We have to listen to our bodies. We have to bring breath into our being and heal ourselves,” she said.

Michelle Friedman, a Manhattan-based psychiatrist and chair of pastoral counseling at the Yeshivat Chovevei Torah Rabbinical School, noted that the word trauma can be overused. Although young people can do themselves a disservice by relating to holiday meals with politically divergent family members as traumatic, Friedman said, political polarization within families can indeed be traumatic. 

Overall, Friedman said, the aim of mental health work should be to “develop stronger psychic protoplasm, to galvanize, not pathologize.”

In his remarks, Rabbi Manis Friedman said that people find life’s randomness to be harder to deal with than evil per se. “Today, people are clamoring—‘tell me the purpose why I am here,’” he said. “People want to know how do I serve God, because we need to have a purpose.”

Rabbi Friedman said he is not too worried about the rise in antisemitism, noting that a focus on the good is important for mental health. 

The hostage crisis

Perhaps the most memorable moment of the evening came when the soft-spoken Einav Danino, mother of murdered Israeli hostage Ori Danino, took the stage. In a speech translated into English, Danino told the audience that her son taught her the importance of being there for one another. Indeed, Ori had initially escaped the Nova music festival but was kidnapped when he went back to save three people he had met only the night before. 

Eleven months later, Ori was killed along with five other hostages in a tunnel in Gaza. “There was no light, very little air, and they fought for one another,” Danino said. “It was one of the things that made them survive, that they were there for one another.” Addressing the audience, she said, “We have food, light, water, air—but are we supporting one another? Are we united?”

She called on the people present to continue spreading Ori’s light. “Help people not just when they are in trouble,” she said. “And also try not to get to a hard place yourself, and [don’t] wait to get help.”

Danino’s testimony was especially poignant given the fact that the Israeli government recently cut funding to mental health organizations providing trauma therapy to October 7 victims’ families and October 7 survivors. 

Steen-Olsen said that the event in New York was just the beginning. “The conversation needs to continue,” she said. “People are dying to speak and share their personal stories. There is no greater agony than burying the story within you and healing begins only when you share. There is grit, pain, and pride in being Jewish, but we need to know that we are not alone.”