reporting
Article reserved for subscribers
Israel-Palestine, endless conflict? File With a massive hostage-taking this weekend, particularly at a rave party on the Gaza border, Hamas has shifted the conflict within Israeli society itself.
The pictures went around the world; a group of young people dancing wildly to electronic music. Ravers, dreamers too – the party was called “a festival for peace” – surprised by an offensive of microlights, motorcycles and gunmen, “our biggest nightmare,” says Diamond. She only wants to give her stage name – “out of modesty, not out of fear of saying it,” the tattooed young woman wants to make it clear. DJ, she is part of this Israeli subculture popular in all social circles, a kind of Israeli version of Burning Man, parties in nature until the early hours of the morning, often making fun of boundaries and codes. “Something was broken,” she adds. “I close my eyes and think of my friends who were there; “I don’t know how I can party again,” she says, rolling a cigarette. She’s shaking a little. “And imagine if that happened to you if you took LSD?”
From today’s perspective, in Israel after October 7th, the concept of organizing a peace festival on the border with Gaza seems absurd and unconscious. However, this is not at all surprising for an Israeli society that had become accustomed to waking up in the morning “without thinking about the conflict,” as the former prime minister had eloquently said.