Warning: Some accounts of the attack in Israel may be disturbing for some readers. Discretion is advised.

(COLORADO SPRINGS) — Many Israelis who now call Southern Colorado home are worrying about friends and family in their home country. Even those with no real family ties are showing their support.

“To be kind and to be loving, shoulder to shoulder… that’s what we pray for,” said Rabbi Boaz Vitek of the Chabad of Colorado Springs Jewish Community.

On Thursday morning, Rabbi Vitek went before the Centennial Hall Board of County Commissioners in Colorado Springs to pray for El Paso County and his country as the war between Israel and Hamas rages on. He is one of many calling for Southern Colorado to stand together.

“It’s important for this kind of unity and have that togetherness,” said Kobi Chumash, executive director, Temple Shalom.

Though the war is an ocean away, Colorado Springs is feeling the impact.

“I just want to be able to do what I can do to help out and work as a community,” said Tom Boldt, owner of Bulldog Armory.

The fighting has been going on since Saturday when Hamas conducted a surprise attack on Israel.

“The way that they attacked them was barbaric. It was unbelievable. They shot people in their face. They pulled them out of their home,” Chumash remembered.

Vitek recalled, “They beheaded their little babies in front of their parents, and then they burned everybody alive.”

A sophomore and international polictical economy major at Colorado College said he was in his dorm doing homework when he heard the news. He said he immediately called his family to make sure they were all right.

“When I first got a hold of them, they were in bunkers, multiple generations from elderly to newborns, fearing for their lives,” said Michael Benin. “Trying to figure out if they’ll be able to escape or going to even make it through the night. They were hearing the bombings right above them.”

With the intial shock mostly over, people are now taking sides.

“What we’re looking for is not responses — ‘we’re pro-Israel’ or ‘we’re pro-Palestine’, ‘we want only one sort of people to exist and succeed’,” Benin said.

Some in the Jewish community understand where people pro-Palestine are coming from.

“I have a lot of criticism over my own country and over my own government,” Chumash said. “But at the time of war, right now… all of that criticism has to be put away.”

Clay Arnold, a senior at Colorado College, did not want to lay blame on the people of Palestine, but instead look at the group who committed the attack.

“Understanding what Hamas stands for… It’s unfortunate that the majority of students haven’t rallied behind what I consider to be the very clear and apparent answer, which is that Hamas is a terrorist organization,” Arnold said.

Hee Yeal Lee, a sophomore at Colorado College, said the rhetoric many are pushing is not helping either, when the focus should be on the people.

“I don’t see that the people of Palestine [are] the aggressors of the situation,” he said. “I definitely don’t understand how we can condone actions by Hamas, a terrorist organization, to see this movement of anti-colonialism as a justification of their actions, their violence. And, the fact that we are trying to see it that way is just appalling.”

Temple Shalom is holding fundraising through their website where they will help beautify bunkers to make them less intimidating for small children, and help adults feel more like home.

And, in the meantime, some in the Pikes Peak region are backing the Jewish community, providing free security for their places of worship.

“We basically just want everybody to have a sense of safety so they can do what they need to do,” Boldt said.