The savage slaughter by Hamas terrorists of 1,300-plus Israelis on Oct. 7 sent shock waves around the world, leaving profound grief and rage in its wake. Members of my synagogue community are mourning murdered family members, frantic over the fate of those taken hostage, and worrying about loved ones to the front line.

We are all tormented by thoughts of what the future will bring. Like so many in my community, I text and phone friends and family in Israel regularly to check in on them, make donations to organizations providing emergency aid, bring a meal to mourners in my community, and pray for the safe return of hostages and for an end to the violence, yet it’s an insufficient way to deal with the powerlessness we feel in the face of such profound suffering.

For many of us, grief does not stop at a border. The suffering of Palestinians in Gaza tears at my heart. My involvement with Healing Across the Divides, an organization that funds health programs for vulnerable Jewish and Palestinian people in Israel and Palestine, has given me empathy for the plight of Palestinians. I have been in contact with Healing Across the Divides’s staff in Palestine and Israel. They are traumatized by the “killing and rhetoric” on both sides, and struggle to feel hopeful.

Their message: “Stop the madness. Stop the killing of Palestinians and Israelis.” Although nothing justifies Hamas’ actions on Oct. 7, the 56-year Israeli occupation of Palestine has dehumanized and degraded Palestinians, and left Israel less, rather than more secure.

Before Oct. 7, partnerships such as Combatants for Peace, “a nonprofit organization of ex-combatant Israelis and Palestinians, who have laid down their weapons and rejected all means of violence, working together to end the occupation of Palestine, bring just peace to the land, and demonstrate that Israelis and Palestinians can work and live together”; and The Parents’ Circle, “a joint Israeli-Palestinian organization of families who have lost an immediate family member to the ongoing conflict and believe that the process of reconciliation between nations is a prerequisite to achieving a sustainable peace,” have been two of the many partnerships in the region determined to stop demonizing the “other.”

Today, Palestinians and Israelis, recognizing their shared humanity, continue to work together, envisioning an end to what seems to be a never-ending cycle of violence and death.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s divisive policies to expand Jewish settlements on the occupied West Bank, destroy the power of the Supreme Court, and prioritize the interests of his ultra-orthodox coalition partners have weakened Israel. He still refuses to take responsibility for leaving the border with Gaza vulnerable to attack.

Hamas’ raison d’etre, as exemplified in its charter, is to destroy Israel, even at the expense of Palestinian lives. Hamas has waged violence against Israel long enough to know that Gaza’s civilian population would suffer the consequences of Israeli retribution for the Oct. 7 attack. Neither the Netanyahu government nor Hamas has done anything to move the region on a path toward peace. The state of Israel was founded by survivors of the Holocaust. Their trauma has been passed from generation to generation. Palestinians live with the trauma of mass displacement during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, which continues today. Both Netanyahu and Hamas invoke past traumas to keep their people fearful of the other.

Here at home, it’s so much easier to differentiate the “good guys” from the “bad guys,” to take a black and white, rather than a nuanced perspective toward the war between Israel and Hamas. Some of the ignorant and hateful responses to the Gaza war on college campuses represent, in the words of UCLA Professor David Myers, “a failure of understanding and lack of empathy” on both sides.

The polarization of campuses across the country demonstrates the failure of institutions of higher education to equip students with critical thinking and ethical reasoning skills, and historical knowledge. Such lack of empathy manifests itself through antisemitism and Islamophobia that extends beyond the ivory towers of academia.

As I write this essay, a ground offensive to extricate Hamas from Gaza seems imminent; rockets are being fired across Israel’s northern border by Hezbollah terrorists, and violence on both sides is escalating on the West Bank, keeping alive the cycle of violence that will never bring peace. President Biden has pledged billions of dollars, much of it for weapons, for Israel’s defense, while cries for a cease-fire fall on deaf ears.

The current trauma inflicted on the residents of Israel and Gaza will manifest itself in continued violence for generations to come, unless both sides can join together determined to do whatever it takes to create a roadmap for peace, in which humans can live securely without fear.

In the words of Ayman Odeh, an Arab citizen of Israel, “It is time …(to) step up in the face of unspeakable tragedy and choose life.”

Sara Weinberger of Easthampton is a professor emerita of social work and writes a monthly column. She can be reached at columnists@gazettenet.com.