After Bombs, Israelis Return To Normal Startlingly Quickly

In the aftermath of a double bomb attack that tore through a Jerusalem market, claiming 15 lives, life in Israel appears to return to normal with startling swiftness. The debris is cleared from the market’s narrow lanes, and the throngs of shoppers return. The dead are buried. Life goes on.

But the very familiarity of such tragedies takes a heavy toll.

“On the surface, people get back to normal very fast,” psychologist Miki Rachmani Yerushalmy said Friday. “But inside, everybody feels the hurt and anger. More and more, you can’t stand it anymore.”

After a dozen suicide attacks in recent years - and long experience with terrorism in its five decades of existence - Israel copes with the aftermath of such tragedies with heart-wrenching routine.

Rescue workers are on the scene in minutes, quickly followed by Orthodox Jews collecting scraps of flesh and blood for burial. Within hours, the wreckage of the blast is hauled away, leaving only a few char marks and memorial candles lit by survivors.