Israeli experience working with families of fallen soldiers for Ukraine: notification group officer Zoya Sever met with Ukrainian specialists in Khmelnytskyi

In Khmelnytskyi (Ukraine), a meeting took place where the Israeli experience of working with families of fallen soldiers was not just theory, but a conversation with people who live with this pain every day.

Zoe Sever on July 8, 2026 wrote about specialists who inform families of terrible news, accompany funerals, go for identifications, and find the strength to continue — already the fifth year of the war.

When protocol is not paper, but a person at the door

“What can an Israeli notification officer say to their Ukrainian colleagues?” — this question begins Zoe Sever’s post, published after a meeting with Tetiana Huranska and the Khmelnytskyi district KZ “Veteran PRO”.

The question sounds almost technical, but the answer in the post is not about bureaucracy at all.

Sharing experience — possible.

Talking about protocols — possible.

Explaining how communication with the family of a fallen soldier is structured in Israel — also possible.

But there is something that cannot be done: change the Ukrainian reality.

And this reality is several messages about deaths every day. Between them — organizing funerals and memorial services, trips with relatives for identification, forensic examinations, constant interaction with the police and military units where the deceased served.

A separate pain — those missing in action, when the family is between hope, fear, and the impossibility of closure.

There are relatives abroad.

There are incomplete families.

There are cases when one family loses several people in a short time.

And so, as Zoe Sever writes, already the fifth year.

This text does not contain loud political formulas. It is stronger precisely because it shows the invisible work of war — not on the front line, but next to it. This is the work of people who come every day to where ordinary language breaks.

Khmelnytskyi context: who was at this meeting

The meeting is important not only because an Israeli specialist participated in it. It is also important where it took place — among people who are already integrated into the Ukrainian system of support for veterans, families of the deceased, missing, and prisoners.

According to the Khmelnytskyi district military administration, Tetiana Huranska is the director of the Khmelnytskyi district communal institution “Veteran PRO”. On July 5, 2026, she participated in a meeting on the activities of specialists accompanying war veterans and demobilized persons together with representatives of the RVA, regional veteran policy, and territorial communities.

This is not a random background for a conversation with an Israeli notification officer. The Khmelnytskyi district “Veteran PRO” works not only with veterans but also with families going through the consequences of war — the death of loved ones, captivity, disappearance without a trace, and long uncertainty.

In October 2025, the Khmelnytskyi RVA wrote that 171 specialists were already working in Khmelnytskyi on accompanying veterans — the highest figure among the regions of Ukraine. At the same meeting, they discussed the organization of work of such specialists in communities, working conditions, equipment, and performance of duties.

For this topic, the number is important not in itself. It shows the scale of the system that Ukraine is forced to build during the war: accompanying veterans, helping families, working with the missing, supporting relatives of prisoners and the deceased.

In March 2026, the Khmelnytskyi RVA reported on the “Veteran Hearings” project. Representatives of the RVA, TCC and SP, communities, veterans, their family members, families of the deceased, missing, and prisoners, as well as specialists accompanying war veterans and demobilized persons participated in such meetings.

So the meeting of Zoe Sever with Ukrainian colleagues was not an abstract lecture “from Israel for Ukraine”. It was a conversation with people who themselves perform one of the most difficult functions of the state during the war every day.

Israeli experience: not only to inform but also to stay close

In Israel, working with families of fallen soldiers has long become a separate system. It is not just the moment of notification. It is preparation, precision, human presence, and further support for the family.

The Israeli notification system is built around the principle of personal contact. The family should not learn about the death of a loved one from rumors, social media posts, or a random call. Prepared people should come to them, who know what to say, what not to say, and how to be there in the first minutes after the news.

For Ukraine, this experience is important not because it can be mechanically transferred. The scale of the Ukrainian war, the geography of families, the number of missing, constant strikes by Russian terrorists on cities and villages, the burden on military and civilian structures — all this creates a different reality.

But the basic principle remains common: the family of the deceased should not be left alone with the news that is impossible to accept.

The notification of death is not an administrative act. It is the moment when the state enters a person’s home with the most terrible truth.

And how this is done affects not only the initial shock but also the family’s further trust in the army, society, and those who promise to be there after the loss.

Those who report the death also need support

One of the strongest episodes of Zoe Sever’s post is her question to Ukrainian specialists: what do they do for themselves, how do they recover?

The answer was short: “We sleep. When there is time.”

This phrase says more than any statistics.

In Ukraine, there are people who day after day bear the pain of others, but they themselves have almost no space for recovery. They accompany families for identifications, organize funerals, communicate with military units, help relatives, search for answers about the missing, and go to new families again.

This is not heroization for the sake of a beautiful text. This is a question of professional burnout, witness trauma, and human resources.

The system of accompanying families of the deceased cannot rely solely on the personal resilience of individual people. If specialists are constantly close to grief, they themselves need regular support, supervision, training, and the opportunity to at least sometimes exhale.

That is why the Israeli experience here is important not only as a set of protocols. It shows: caring for the family of the deceased begins before the first words are spoken and continues after the funeral.

But caring for those who bring this news should also be part of the system.

“Veteran PRO” as part of the support infrastructure

The Khmelnytskyi district KZ “Veteran PRO” is not just a platform for meetings. According to the Khmelnytskyi OVA, in July 2025, the institution received two minibuses to provide services to veterans, as well as to families of fallen defenders and prisoners of war. These buses are equipped with inclusivity in mind.

At first glance, transport, consultations, meetings, digital systems, notifications, funerals, and trips for identification are different things.

In fact, these are parts of one infrastructure of dignity.

The local Khmelnytskyi media “Linza” wrote that “Veteran PRO” implements recovery programs together with international partners. In particular, together with the Mountain Seed Foundation, camps are organized for families released from captivity, combining physical activity, work with trust, and support after traumatic experience.

This is an important context for the meeting with Zoe Sever. Because the conversation about notifying the family of a death does not exist separately from the entire subsequent chain of assistance.

First — the terrible news.

Then — identification, documents, funerals, conversations with the military, legal issues, psychological support, accompanying children, parents, spouses.

And all this happens not in a peaceful laboratory, but during an ongoing war.

Why this is important for the Israeli audience

For Israel, this story sounds very close.

The Israeli society knows what a knock on the door, a military vehicle at the house, officers who came not with an ordinary message means. After October 7, this memory became even more painful.

But the Ukrainian reality described by Zoe Sever adds another scale.

Several messages a day.

The fifth year of full-scale war.

Missing in action.

Relatives abroad.

Families that have lost more than one person.

Specialists who respond: “We sleep when there is time.”

NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency writes about this as an Israeli-Ukrainian topic not for the sake of a diplomatic gesture. Here is a real point of contact between two societies that know the cost of military loss and understand that the family of the deceased needs not formal sympathy, but precise, careful, and long-term support.

In Khmelnytskyi, this conversation took place between people who speak different languages, work in different systems, and live in different wars.

But the situation they found themselves in is understandable without translation.

There is news that cannot be softened.

There is a family that needs to be told.

There is a person who must enter the house and remain human.

And there is a state that must not disappear after the first message.

The quiet work of war

Zoe Sever’s post is important because it brings to light those who usually remain behind the scenes.

We often talk about the front, weapons, diplomacy, air defense, sanctions, negotiations. All this is necessary. But next to it, there is another line of war — the line of families, funerals, identifications, waiting for the missing, and people who accompany this path.

War destroys not only homes and cities. It destroys the order of family life. And the task of such people is to help the family go through the moment after which the previous life is no longer there.

An Israeli notification officer cannot change the Ukrainian reality. Zoe Sever writes honestly about this.

But she can do what in such circumstances is sometimes more important than loud promises: sit next to, talk, listen, and learn from each other.

And perhaps this is the true value of this meeting in Khmelnytskyi.

Zoe Sever

Zoe Sever is an Israeli artist of Ukrainian origin, born in Lviv. She was born in Lviv in 1974, repatriated to Israel with her family in 1990, and in 2001 graduated from the architecture faculty of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem. Her works have been exhibited in Israel and abroad, and she is known for her bright, recognizable style, which combines Israeli landscapes, architecture, memory, and personal history of repatriation.

But in the Ukrainian context, Zoe Sever is important not only as an artist. After the start of the Russian full-scale invasion, she became involved in helping Ukraine. Sever founded the United People Planet fund and since the beginning of the war has been helping Ukrainian military, including with protective equipment — helmets and bulletproof vests. In interviews, she explained this by her personal connection to Ukraine: her former classmates serve in the Ukrainian army.

As early as April 2022, Zoe Sever was written about as a well-known Israeli artist, a native of Lviv, who after the Russian invasion participated in creating a volunteer group to provide Ukrainian fighters with protective gear. In that interview, she emphasized that she does not consider herself an “arms exporter”: it is about protective equipment and saving lives.

There is another important layer of her biography directly related to the topic of the meeting in Khmelnytskyi. Zoe Sever shared that during her service in the IDF, she was an officer who informed families of fallen soldiers of the terrible news. It is this experience — not artistic, but military and human — that she now passes on to Ukrainian specialists working with families of the deceased, missing, and prisoners.

The NATAN Worldwide Disaster Relief organization lists Zoe Sever as the coordinator of the Ukraine Community Resilience Center. The description of her work states that she is originally from Lviv, became an Israeli citizen in 1990, served in the Israel Defense Forces, and supported families of fallen and wounded soldiers. Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, she has often volunteered with NATAN, working “on the ground” in Ukraine, conducting crisis response training, and collaborating with local structures.

A separate direction of her work is the project “Window to the World”. Zoe Sever, together with Ukrainian artists and children, paints the walls of shelters in schools and children’s hospitals in Ukraine, turning concrete shelters into brighter and more human spaces. The project started in May 2024 and already covered Kyiv, Kharkiv, Cherkasy, Vasylkiv, and other cities.

That is why the meeting of Zoe Sever with Ukrainian specialists in Khmelnytskyi carries special weight. She came not only as a representative of Israel and not only as a person of art. Several lines converge in her biography: Lviv and Israel, service in the IDF, experience of notifying families of fallen soldiers, volunteer assistance to Ukraine, work with trauma, and an attempt through art to return children a sense of light even in a bomb shelter.

For Ukrainian colleagues, it was a conversation with a person who understands the value of protocol not from a textbook. And for the Israeli audience — another reminder that the connection between Israel and Ukraine today goes not only through diplomacy but also through people who know how to be there in the most difficult moments.