Inside trauma: How AI is helping Israelis see the invisible wounds of war

On the night of Oct. 7, while a nation sat paralyzed in front of flickering television screens, Tal Pasternak Magnezi did something that seemed, to the outside observer, bordering on madness. She walked.

As sirens echoed and the weight of an unprecedented massacre settled over the country, she and her husband wandered the silent, heavy streets. When a police car pulled them over to ask if they were losing their minds, her answer was clinical yet deeply personal: “If I don’t move my body now, the trauma will freeze inside me.”

Her expertise was not born in university lecture halls alone but in the wreckage of a Cessna plane crash 17 years ago. That day, she lost her two brothers – Itay, aged 25, and Aviram, 32. Overnight, she was transformed from a sister into a bereaved guardian of her own three young children, navigating a world for which there was no map. “I realized that if I survive this,” she recalls, “it has to mean something.”

What followed was years of personal reconstruction through therapy and nature. Out of that fire emerged her mission: to be a “conduit.” She absorbs the mechanics of healing and passes them forward to those standing on the frontlines of grief.

In the current crisis, the boundary between the professional healer and the woman navigating a national catastrophe has completely dissolved. For her, the walk on Oct. 7 was the first step in a long journey of ensuring that neither she nor the people she treats remain frozen in the dark.

In the sterile language of clinical psychology, trauma is divided into neat phases: acute stress, post-traumatic stress, and recovery. Pasternak Magnezi believes these definitions have utterly collapsed in the face of Israel’s current reality.

“We keep using the term ‘PTSD,’” she says, “but how can you talk about ‘post’ when it’s not over?”

This distinction has radical implications for treatment. Traditional “talk therapy” – sitting in a chair and discussing feelings – is often insufficient when the nervous system is still in a state of high arousal. “People don’t come with a story that happened,” she explains. “They come from something that is still happening.”

Beyond the obvious victims, she highlights what she calls the “transparent circles” of grief – those who fall through the cracks of state recognition. While military families receive structured support, there are thousands of bereaved grandparents, friends, and extended family members who remain invisible.

Pasternak Magnezi has observed a troubling pattern: In the years following a major loss, elderly family members often succumb to “broken hearts” that manifest as physical illness. Grief, when unacknowledged by the system, accumulates in the body until it becomes lethal.

To counter this, she utilizes the “circles of resilience” model developed by Mahut, focusing on three active pillars: identity (building a new narrative); community (providing witnesses to pain); and capability (teaching somatic tools to soothe the nervous system).

To address this unprecedented crisis, Pasternak Magnezi utilizes the “dual process model,” helping patients oscillate between the “circle of loss” (grief and memories) and the “circle of life” (routine and rehabilitation). This framework rejects the cliché that “time heals all wounds.”

Instead, it emphasizes that healing is a result of what we do with that time.

One notable case involved a client who coped through workaholism – running 10 kilometers every morning and working without pause to outrun her emotions. When the client finally tried to slow down, she found the silence unbearable. Pasternak Magnezi’s innovation wasn’t to force her to stop, but to build “emotional stamina” – the capacity to sit with pain in micro-doses.

One of Pasternak Magnezi’s most powerful tools is the “anchor of hope.” Inspired by the insights of author David Grossman, she teaches patients to “throw an anchor into the future.” By creating a tangible beacon – be it a family trip or a personal milestone – survivors find a visual destination to pull them through the darkest days.

Furthermore, Pasternak Magnezi has integrated artificial intelligence into her practice as a “visual translator.” She generates AI images to represent the abstract, often wordless symptoms of PTSD. These images allow the public to “see” the internal landscape of a survivor without violating any patient’s privacy.

However, she draws a hard line: “AI is not therapy.” In a context where access to care is limited, technology can illustrate and educate, but it can never replace the human presence required for a fractured psyche to feel safe again.

While the landscape of Israeli society is currently scarred by loss, Pasternak Magnezi is a firm believer in the concept of post-traumatic growth (PTG). This isn’t about “getting back to normal” – it is about the discovery of new strengths and meanings that emerge only from the depths of a crisis.

“From the darkest trauma, personal and national, it is possible to grow,” she insists. “Good things can happen, and they are happening, despite and because of everything we have endured.”

She draws inspiration from Viktor Frankl, the Holocaust survivor and psychiatrist who famously noted that while we cannot always choose our circumstances, we can always choose our attitude toward them.

This growth is already visible across the country, driven largely by the third sector. Where state systems have lagged, bereaved families, the wounded, and grassroots organizations have stepped in.

From the families of the Supernova music festival victims building healing farms to reservists establishing support networks for their peers, the civilian response has become the true backbone of national recovery.

Pasternak Magnezi advocates for a centralized national body to coordinate these efforts and a shift toward family-centered care. “We cannot treat the soldier or the widow in isolation,” she says. “Trauma affects the whole family system.”

For her, the goal of this work is not “closure”– which she views as a myth – but the movement toward a life that encompasses both the fracture and the growth.

By choosing to build initiatives that foster hope and renewal, Israel is proving that even in the wake of destruction, the human spirit possesses an architecture that can be rebuilt, stronger and more resilient than before.

Note: While these visuals illustrate the diverse landscape of trauma, it is important to emphasize that every individual’s experience is unique; naturally, not every person will exhibit all of the symptoms shown here.

The following images were created by Tal Pasternak Magnezi to illustrate the complex, often wordless symptoms of trauma.

They are intended as educational tools to foster empathy and recognition in a society navigating the unprecedented challenges of a prolonged, 2.5-year conflict – a reality that modern psychology is only now beginning to map.

The symptom: A person sitting completely alone, physically contracted and shrunken inward.

Clinical context: This illustrates the deep sense of isolation trauma survivors feel. Their internal world becomes dark and shrunken, standing in sharp contrast to the shared social reality they once knew.

Healing action: Providing a supportive environment of “witnesses” – and simply being with the survivor – to hold space for this profound loneliness without the impulse to “fix” it.

The symptom: A soldier experiencing a visceral flashback while in a civilian setting.

Clinical context: A flashback is a full body and mind sensory experience where the nervous system mistakes the present for the past. The body and mind act as if one is in immediate lethal danger.

Healing action: Utilizing somatic grounding to help the nervous system recognize that the body is currently safe, while providing cognitive support to help the individual return to the here and now in a stable, safe state.

The story: In a small village in Australia, there is a quiet custom. When a villager dies, every household in the village moves one small thing – a chair is turned, a gate is left open, a plant is moved.

The meaning: When the grieving family leaves their home, they notice these subtle changes. It is a profound message: We see. We know the world is no longer as it was. It is not an attempt to fix the grief but a quiet agreement to stand alongside it.

Healing action: Acknowledging that the world has changed – conveying the profound message, “We see you and we are with you” – which serves to effectively reduce the deep isolation of the bereaved.

The symptom: A soldier is burdened by a crushing sense of shame and survivor’s guilt.

Clinical context: This represents “moral injury” – the betrayal of one’s own moral code during combat. It manifests as a debilitating physical weight and the pervasive feeling of being judged by everyone one passes – and, most acutely, by oneself.

Healing action: Utilizing the dual process model to unload these complex feelings in a nonjudgmental environment, often accompanied by an act of repair to help restore the survivor’s sense of moral integrity.

The symptom: The struggle of bouncing between the battlefield and the civilian workplace.

Clinical context: This illustrates the dissonance of moving from high-stakes survival to a mundane office meeting. The nervous system is exhausted, leading to a total loss of interest in civilian tasks.

Healing action: Creating “trauma-informed workspaces” that allow for a gradual reentry rather than demanding immediate full capacity.

The symptom: A person sitting at a computer, outwardly working but mentally absent.

Clinical context: Deep dissociation and deficits in concentration. The body is present, but the mind is still in the war zone.

Healing action: Psychoeducation for employers to eliminate criticism and reduce the soldier’s internal shame.

The symptom: A discharged soldier in a safe environment reacting as if he were under fire.

Clinical context: The body’s survival mechanisms refuse to turn off. An illuminated room with open shutters is interpreted as a lethal threat.

Healing action: Teaching “capability” through breathing and meditation to slowly recalibrate the nervous system’s perception of safety. 