The conflict is happening more than 6,200 miles away. But the gravity of the war in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank is deeply felt by people here, just as it is by other members of the Jewish diaspora across the world.
People are still processing the violence of Oct. 7 . On that day, the Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel, killed over 1,000 people and took more than 200 hostages .
For weeks afterward, college student Miriam Bird found it hard to focus in class. She spent a gap year in Israel and has friends there.
“I found myself checking social media a lot because I was always afraid that one of the people that I’m going to see that was killed would be someone that I knew,” she said.
Like Bird, a lot of local Jewish residents have friends and family in Israel. Many of them also grieve collectively.
“People have asked, ‘Do you have family there?’ Well, aren’t we all family?” said Michelle Elisburg, who lives in Southern Indiana and did volunteer work in Israel last November. “I mean, really, the Jewish people are all one people.”