JTA — A week into the ceasefire in the Iran war, and as an hours-old truce with Hezbollah takes hold, Israelis have settled into their old normal — sort of.

“Is anyone else completely struggling with the expectation that now that there is the ceasefire we are supposed to go back to work like nothing happened?” one mother wrote in a popular working parents Facebook group.

She described weeks of sleep punctuated by sirens and working from home while caring for children — then being told to return to the office immediately.

Children, too, were sent back to school just hours after the ceasefire began, after weeks of canceled classes and scattershot online learning. Cafes and beaches filled once again with ostensibly carefree Israelis, sometimes in sight of damage from Iranian missiles.

Behind the veneer of Israel’s famed resilience, darker feelings are simmering.

“We all have the jitters. PTSD. We need time to process the insanity. Never knowing if we can shower or go to the bathroom isn’t normal,” one parent responded in the Facebook group. Another asked, “Are we just supposed to pretend the past six weeks never happened?”

Then an even more pessimistic note crept in. “Can we all just get a paid spa day while our kids are in school before we go back to our bomb shelters?” one parent wrote. Another added, reflecting a view widely held across the country, “I’m trying to do as much as I can now before the war starts up again.”

Such is the condition of Israelis during two ceasefires foisted upon them by the United States. They are relieved that they no longer have to plan their lives around proximity to bomb shelters and that restrictions on gatherings have been lifted. Many are embracing a return to normalcy.

But their feelings also include little sense of victory or stability, as well as a great deal of dread about what’s to come.

For good reason. Even as US President Donald Trump says he believes he will reach a deal with Iran to end the war permanently, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is emphasizing that he is ready to resume the fighting.

Signs of confidence about continued calm are fraying. Plans for Independence Day celebrations next week were reinstated and then swiftly scrapped again in multiple cities — not only in the north, where Hezbollah fire continued up until the last moments before a 10-day ceasefire went into effect at 12:00 a.m. Friday morning, but also in southern cities such as Ashkelon.

Three-quarters of Israelis expect fighting with Iran to resume within the next year, a poll by the Institute for National Security Studies........

© The Times of Israel