Yedioth Ahronoth reported Wednesday, marking the anniversary of October 7, that psychological pressure remains widespread across Israeli society, with nearly one million Israelis having sought assistance through a mental-health hotline and about one-third of those users reaching levels associated with depression.
The report said some indicators improved during the second year of the war compared with the first, but subsequent research by the Myers-JDC-Brookdale Institute in cooperation with JDC Israel recorded renewed increases in depression and anxiety in July 2025 following the 12-day war and again in April 2026 following the 40-day war.
The findings point to a cumulative psychological burden associated with prolonged exposure to war, security tensions and uncertainty in the occupied territories.
The report cautioned that the assessments were conducted shortly after exceptional security events and therefore may reflect peaks in psychological distress rather than conditions during periods of relative calm.
Nevertheless, the figures indicate that the psychological consequences of repeated conflict have extended well beyond individual episodes of fighting.
In July 2025, 26.6% of respondents exceeded the clinical threshold for depression and 17.0% for anxiety.
In subsequent assessments, more than one-third of participants reported clinically significant symptoms of depression, at around 35% to 37%, while approximately one-quarter reported clinically significant anxiety symptoms, at around 24% to 25%.
In addition, around one-quarter of participants reported subclinical symptoms of depression, at approximately 27% to 28%, while about 26% reported subclinical anxiety symptoms.
Taken together, the data indicate that more than half of participants in each assessment experienced some level of psychological difficulty.
The report said the results demonstrate that mental health in Israeli society has been affected not by a single event but by the accumulation of periods of threat, combat and uncertainty.
“Whatever the results and analyses may be, there is no doubt about one thing: psychological suffering and stress have not disappeared even after three years of war, and in some respects, their true dimensions are only now beginning to emerge,” the report said.
The report also pointed to a worrying increase in children and adolescents seeking treatment in psychiatric emergency departments, according to data released by relevant institutions in recent days.
At the same time, it stressed that psychological distress does not necessarily lead to emergency psychiatric treatment, with difficulties also emerging among people who continue their normal routines but feel that they need assistance.
A doctor specializing in the field told Aharonot: “We live normal lives. Most of us continue to work, study, raise children and perform our duties, but the ability to do these things is not necessarily a sign of mental health. In conditions where uncertainty and ongoing threat govern reality, psychological pressures may gradually accumulate and manifest themselves as fatigue, loneliness, problems in relationships and damage to the sense of stability and security.”
The report said JDC Israel and the Myers-JDC-Brookdale Institute have in recent years monitored various indicators of Israeli public opinion through systematic and periodic surveys.
The surveys involve more than 3,500 participants representing different segments of Israeli society.
Because the research began during the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers have been able to compare conditions before and after October 7.
The report said a sustained increase in depression and anxiety has been observed since the war, both in officially classified disorders and at milder levels of psychological distress.
The latest assessment, conducted in April, showed a sharp increase in anxiety and depression rates, both at the highest “official” levels and at lower levels that nevertheless indicate psychological distress.
The researchers said the increase in anxiety and depression demonstrates that mental health is “not only affected by a single event, but also by the accumulation of periods of threat, suffering and uncertainty.”
The report further acknowledged that Israel’s mental-health and social-service systems lack the capacity to continue providing services while confronting the scale of psychological difficulties reported across society.
Beyond the mental-health findings, the report described broader concerns about the consequences of prolonged conflict for the Israeli regime.
It said Israeli media and political circles have described the regime’s internal and external situation as deteriorating across multiple areas following the October 2023 war and subsequent regional confrontations.