An electronic music festival was among the numerous locations attacked by Palestinian militants since Saturday. While some participants managed to escape, others were killed or taken hostage.
The images are frightening: thousands of young men and women dancing in the first light of dawn and to the rhythm of the bass while black spots appear in the sky. Festival-goers gathered in the Negev Desert near the Gaza Strip have no idea that Hamas terrorists are launching a full-scale offensive against Israel. They also ignore that the visibly growing black dots are Palestinian fighters on paragliders approaching them.
Around 6:30 a.m., the first rockets fell on the grounds of the Nova Festival, an annual rave party in honor of the holiday of Sukkot, CNN reports. A few minutes later, gusts of wind were heard, triggering large mass movements that were widely shared on social media.
After the events, the fate of thousands of festival visitors remains uncertain. Testimony collected suggests that Hamas terrorists fired on the crowd, raising fears of a high number of casualties. Some currently unverifiable Israeli sources speak of 250 bodies at the site. Videos show how many people are forcibly taken away.
Also read: Hamas attack on Israel: The bitter failure of the Jewish state’s intelligence services
Rocket launcher fire
The testimonies of survivors are sometimes frightening. A young 20-year-old participant, Noya Reuven, told the Times of Israel that the terrorists opened fire indiscriminately on the crowd. On Israeli television, another young woman, Esther, explains that five gunmen shot at her car as she tried to escape. She was rescued by the driver of a jeep who was later shot. She escaped from Hamas by pretending to be dead until the IDF arrived.
Chen, another rave party attendee, tells i24News that heavy weapons were even used against festival-goers. “We were in the middle of a rave party and suddenly we were being shot at from all sides. We escaped and were able to take refuge under a tank. “The terrorists then attacked us with a rocket launcher,” he explained, still shocked.
Images of festival-goers being forcibly abducted by Hamas went around the world. A video showing a young woman, later identified as one Noa Argamani, particularly shocked public opinion. Despite her pleas, she is forcibly taken there on a motorcycle.
Also read: Gilles Kepel: “Israel’s September 11th, Iranian version”
A Frenchman present on site
A 26-year-old French-Israeli could be among the victims or missing. “Avidan T., originally from Bordeaux, was undoubtedly kidnapped by Hamas in the south of Israel while attending the music festival,” wrote on X (formerly Twitter) LR MP for the French constituency from abroad, Meyer Habib. He was “one of the organizers of the rave party,” the MP said on BFMTV. “He sent a message yesterday morning around 9am. A message of love, but in which we also felt a lot of grief. Since then, they have not received any news and have visited the hospitals without finding any trace of him, he added.
The fate of the young German of Israeli origin, Shani Louk, also caused a stir on social networks. In a shocking and widely circulated video, the young woman appears naked and with a dislocated leg in the back of a Hamas pickup truck. Terrorists sit on them, others spit on them. She seems lifeless, but we still don’t know if she’s alive. Her mother and cousin eventually recognized her thanks to the tattoos on her legs and her dreadlocks. CNN also confirmed the identity of the young woman.
There seemed to be a lot of foreigners present at this rave party. A 26-year-old Brit, Jake Marlowe, is also missing. He lived in Israel for two years and provided security for this event. “He is missing, we do not know for sure whether he was taken hostage, whether he is dead or in hospital,” a spokesman for the Israeli embassy in the UK told the British PA agency.