Exclusive | Jews embrace tattoos to cope with pain, heartbreak of Hamas terror attack: My way to remember

Tattoos are taboo to many Jews, but the atrocity of Oct.7 has changed a lot of minds about how pain leaves its mark.“I’m a nice Jewish boy from New Jersey,” said Todd Elkin, a former Wall Streeter who now works for his family’s commercial cleaning business.

“I never imagined doing this, but Oct.7 changed everything.

I now have two tattoos.” The good news is his Jewish mother is still talking to him.“I’m close with my mother, like every other Jewish boy,” said the 54-year-old from Marlboro, NJ.“I had to approve it with my mother.

She’s 80 and I’m still afraid of her.”The non-religious, married father of two was “devastated” after the slaughter of 1,200 Israelis by Hamas terrorists, and responded by making donations to Friends of the IDF and to help send armor to soldiers.“But I felt like there had to be more,” he said.With a daughter away at college in the Midwest, and relentless anti-Israel campaigns raging on campuses across the country, Elkin was fed up with the “from the river to the sea” crowd.

He inked a plan to take a “stance.” “I’m not 20.This was by no means impulsive,” he said, before settling on a bicep tattoo in Hebrew that reads “Am Yisrael Chai,” which means “The people of Israel live.”“This is my way of fighting back, of showing my support for Israel,” said Elkin, adding, “This is just for me.”He was careful in choosing a tattooist.“I wanted an Israeli and Jewish tattoo artist,” Elkin said of his decision to tap former Williamsburg resident May Hillel Levit.She moved to the Miami area this summer after increasing antisemitism in the wake of the Hamas massacre left her “scared” to send her young son to daycare, she said.

A steady stream of new customers, including seniors, have made their way to Levit since the assault on her homeland.“I get a lot of old people, people who didn’t even think about getting a tattoo in their life,” Levit said, noting the first client who ...