Time Plays With Us: Winter Hour, Israeli Drama and World Comedy

The transition to winter time in Israel is not just a change of hands, but an annual performance in which biology, economics, politics and international satire are intertwined. Behind the scenes are hormones, millions of shekels, historical battles and atomic clocks, accurate to the microsecond but powerless against the human inclination to the absurd.

On the night of October 24-25, 2026, Israel, as at the command of an invisible conductor, will again plunge into the ritual: the hands of the clock will retreat an hour ago, and the country, holding its breath, will meet winter time. Some will breathe a sigh of relief, anticipating the “gifted” hour of sleep, some will look longingly at the early twilight, and some may remember that behind this simple movement of shooters lurks a whole universe — from biochemistry to political satire, from economic calculations to international paradoxes.

However, if everything was limited to the change of time, life would be much easier. But the human body is not a Swiss watch, and certainly not an Israeli watch. As the nights get longer, melatonin begins to reign in the body - the same "hormone of darkness" that is produced by the pineal gland in response to the onset of darkness. With each winter evening, it rises like the dollar in the run-up to the election, and we become sleepy, sluggish, and sometimes downright apathetic. Not far behind is serotonin - the "hormone of happiness", which, alas, goes into hibernation with the sun. The less light, the lower its level, and now on the horizon looms seasonal affective disorder, popularly known as “winter blue”. Studies impartially record: after the transition to winter time, the number of depressive episodes increases by 11%, and among adult men, substance use increases by 12%. Ironically, in the first week after the transfer of shooters in England, there is even a short-term decrease in the number of diagnoses of depression by 4% - apparently, the body rejoices in the "gifted" hour of sleep before finally surrendering to winter melancholy.

But it is not only the soul that suffers from the vagaries of time. On the roads in the first four weeks after the transition to winter time recorded an increase in the number of accidents by 6% – perhaps because the biological clock has not yet had time to adjust, or maybe because in the dark, even the most experienced drivers become a little less attentive. However, economists can breathe a sigh of relief: unlike the spring shift to daylight saving time, when labor productivity drops and the number of fatal accidents soars by 6%, the autumn shift hardly affects the economy. Moreover, if Israel decided on year-round summer time, the country’s economy could win up to 400 million shekels a year, and energy companies could save 90 to 155 million shekels a year. But so far, school and workplace schedules are adjusting to the winter sun, so that most Israelis start their day after dawn rather than in pitch dark.

However, if you think that Israel's arrow-translation story is just a matter of biology and economics, you're clearly underestimating the local political theater. Recall how it all began: back in 1940, during the British Mandate, the country first got acquainted with summer time. Since independence in 1948, Israel has inherited not only laws but also chaos over time. For many years, transition dates were determined by the interior minister, making each autumn and spring an arena for political battles between religious and secular parties. Religious factions demanded an early end to daylight saving time for convenience during the high holidays, and secular factions insisted on long summer evenings. In 1992, the Time Act was passed, which was supposed to restore order, but in fact only consolidated the annual disputes: dates were still approved manually, and compromises sometimes looked like jokes. In 2005, in an attempt to please everyone, the transition to daylight saving time was tied to the Jewish calendar: it began on the second day of Passover, and ended between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. As a result, Israel became famous for one of the shortest summer eras in the developed world, sometimes barely five months. It was only in 2013, after another wave of public discontent, that the Knesset finally approved fixed dates: now the shooters move forward to the last Friday dawn of March, and back to the last October Sunday, almost in sync with Europe.

But if you think that only Israel can make political drama out of time, look at the world stage. The European Union, for example, in 2001 heroically unified the dates of transition: the last Sunday of March is forward, the last Sunday of October is back. In 2018, after a huge poll in which 4.6 million Europeans (84 percent!) voted in favor of abolishing seasonal remittances, the European Commission pompously proposed an end to this ritual. The European Parliament even voted to repeal it by 2021... and now it is 2026, and Europe is still dutifully turning its hands twice a year, becoming a monument to bureaucratic inertia. In the United States, where time is money and money is everything, the clock is switched to the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November. Dozens of states have already passed perpetual daylight saving time laws, but the federal Congress is stuck in a debate about the Sunshine Protection Act, and Arizona and Hawaii are out of the game altogether, refusing transfers. Russia, having tried to live in eternal summer in 2011-2014, eventually switched to permanent winter time, citing the health of citizens and mass confusion. Since 2016, Turkey has been living on UTC+3 all year round, Belarus has followed Russia, and Iceland has never played these games at all, staying on GMT regardless of the season. China abolished daylight saving time in 1991, Japan in 1951, and Brazil and Mexico joined the anti-season club more recently. In the Southern Hemisphere, by the way, the opposite is true: Australia, New Zealand and Chile move forward in September-October, and back in March-April. Ironically, more than 140 countries around the world do not recognize seasonal remittances at all, and the two most populous countries, China and India, have never considered playing them.

And yet, despite all this political and cultural cacophony, there is something truly fundamental about Israeli times – not the Knesset’s decisions, but the work of the National Physical Laboratory (INPL) under the Ministry of Economy and Industry. It is here, in the silence of the laboratory halls, that the three atomic clocks of cesium-133 tirelessly count the seconds, defining the national time standard - UTC (INPL). Since 1992, INPL has been the only legitimate custodian of Israeli time, and its specialists, like Dr. Oleg Popov, check their watches daily with their world counterparts: 86,400 times a day, every second, using GPS and international protocols. The heart of this system is the quantum transition of cesium-133: when cesium atoms are irradiated with microwaves at a frequency of exactly 9,192,631,770 hertz, they change the energy state, and feedback allows you to fix this moment with an accuracy of one second for twenty million years. The results are sent to the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) in Paris, where data from around the world is put together into the UTC global standard. UTC itself, by the way, does not change either in winter or in summer - only local displacements change: in winter Israel lives on UTC + 2, in summer - on UTC + 3. The difference between UTC (INPL) and global UTC is the microseconds published in the monthly BIPM circular. This is where time is really beyond politics.

So, when you turn the arrows back on the night of October 25 and perhaps allow yourself an extra hour of sleep, remember: behind this simple gesture lies a whole world - from hormones and accidents to parliamentary battles and quantum transitions. Time, like history, likes to joke about us, but it is in these jokes that national identity is born. Israel, as always, walks its own path – between science and politics, between light and darkness, between past and future.

Reference tables

1. Comparison of winter/summer time in different countries (2026)

Country/Region Time Transition Status Key dates/notes

Israel Transition retained Forward: Last Friday of March; Back: Last Sunday of October

EU (majority) Transition retained Forward: last Sunday in March; back: last Sunday in October

United States Transition retained Forward: second Sunday in March; back: first Sunday in November

Russia Permanent winter without transitions since 2014

Turkey, Belarus Permanent summer No transitions since 2016 (Turkey), 2011 (Belarus)

Iceland has never had a GMT all year round

China - since 1991, Japan - since 1951

Brazil, Mexico No crossings Brazil - from 2019, Mexico - from 2022 (most states)

Australia, New Zealand Transition retained (southern hemisphere) Forward: September-October; back: March-April

2. Key indicators of the impact of the transition to winter time

Change after the transition to winter time

Depressive episodes +11%

Diagnosis of depression (England, 1 week) -4%

Psychiatric conditions -6%

Road accidents (4 weeks) +6%

Substance use +12% (male)

Heart attacks No growth, possible decline

3. Technical infrastructure of time in Israel

Element Description

National Authority INPL, Ministry of Economy

Legislative Basis Act of 1992

Cesium-133 Atomic Clock (9,192,631,770 Hz)

Accuracy up to 1 second in 20 million years

International synchronization of 86,400 comparisons per day via GPS

Official designation UTC(INPL)

Displacement relative to UTC Winter: UTC+2, summer: UTC+3

UTC Global Standard, calculated by BIPM

Microsecond error, published in Circular T