(New York Jewish Week) — To celebrate the end of his two years of service as a medic in the Israel Defense Forces’ paratrooper division, Tomer Meir joined 13 of his friends at the Nova Musica Festival on the weekend of October 6 in Re’im in southern Israel.
It was his first ever music festival. “It was the best moments of my life. I can’t explain the state we were in,” the 21-year-old told the New York Jewish Week. “It was pure love — people dancing, laughing, smiling. All the good stuff that we’re living for.”
Until 6:29 a.m. on Saturday morning. The red alerts, the rockets and the running.
“The music stopped. The rockets started. We started running for our lives,” Meir said. Meir is a survivor of the Nova Music Festival Massacre, where Hamas militants killed 364 festival-goers and took at least 40 hostages on the morning of Oct. 7.