An Israeli music fan is in Minnesota this weekend to talk about how he survived the harrowing October day that changed his life.
Pausing only occasionally to help translate a word from Hebrew into English, Rom El-Hai recounted the hours-long escape he and his friends made from the Supernova music festival after Hamas militants attacked on the morning of April 7. October launched a deadly attack from Gaza.
On Friday, about 30 students and community members filled the seats at the Martin and Esther Capp Event Center at Minnesota Hillel near the University of Minnesota campus in Minneapolis to hear El-Hai tell his story.
Students and community members listen as Rom El-Hai recounts his Oct. 7 escape from the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel during a speaking event at the Minnesota Hillel in Minneapolis on Friday.
Ben Hovland | MPR News
During the presentation, the 29-year-old Israeli national shared cell phone photos of him and his friends hiding in the bushes, as well as images of his damaged car after they finally returned to the festival site days later. El-Hai also shared a picture of his friend Hezi Hanom, who he said was killed in the attack.
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“I’ve been in the trance music scene for ten years,” El-Hai said. Festivals like the Supernova Festival in southern Israel are like his “second home.”
According to El-Hai, the trance music community in Israel is small and close-knit.
“So when I saw the pictures of the people being murdered, I didn’t know them personally, but I knew their faces,” he said.
Rom El-Hai shows off pictures of his damaged car left behind at the Supernova music festival during a speaking event on Friday.
Ben Hovland | MPR News
The presentation at the Minnesota Hillel was a stop on the second leg of El-Hai’s speaking tour of the Midwest, organized by the Israeli-led organization Faces of October Seventh. This weekend he will also speak at several synagogues in the Twin Cities and eventually stop in Chicago, Illinois, Atlanta, Georgia and Durham, North Carolina, according to trip coordinator Doron Gertzovski.
For Minnesota Hillel Executive Director Benjie Kaplan, it was important that Jewish students were able to witness firsthand the accounts of people like El-Hai who experienced the attack.
“The last six or seven weeks on campus have been difficult for all students affected by the events,” Kaplan said. He sees Minnesota Hillel’s role as a space on campus where students can reflect and find space for discussion, understanding and empathy.
Posters of people kidnapped during the Hamas attack in southern Israel on October 7 line the windows of Minnesota Hillel in Minneapolis.
Ben Hovland | MPR News
Dozens of University of Minnesota Twin Cities students staged a walkout Wednesday in support of Palestinians in Gaza Activists lobbied the State Board of Investment to withdraw the state’s holdings in Israeli companies.
On Friday, After a week-long ceasefire failed, Israeli warplanes resumed bombing locations in the Gaza Strip.
According to Israeli officials, the Oct. 7 attack killed at least 1,200 people and brought about 240 people into Gaza as hostages, 137 of whom were released in prisoner swaps later in the week. Israeli airstrikes and ground operations in response to the Hamas offensive have killed over 15,000 people in Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities.