‘We looked at Hamas videos to find our friends’

Raz Yadai Gantz went to three funerals on Friday. His pale face glistens in the dim light because he is crying. He apologises. The 30-year-old DJ has had a day few could imagine, yet he says sorry, because he is struggling to say the names of his dead friends. The friends he will always remember being dressed for a party, who are now wrapped in shrouds in the ground .

Moving between cemeteries at Moshav Sdei Hemed, Petah Tikva and Jerusalem, Raz went to pay his respects and sob for Matan Lior, Naor Levi and Michael Vaknin. He freezes when he says the third name and looks at the ground. “Michael had a twin brother, Osher. We knew he was dead, but thought Michael was still alive. Then we got the message that he too was not with us any more.”

The infrequency of levayas is one of the privileges of youth, and that is true even in Israel, where grief is in the soil. But 7 October brought such ineffable grief there is no noun to quantify it, and there will be more. Matan Lior, the sound engineer at the Supernova festival, was only 36 and his friends, all of similar age, gathered around his grieving family on Friday. Raz recited every word of the father’s eulogy almost verbatim, focusing on the fact that Matan was third generation in a family of soldiers. “Grandfather, father and son had been in the army and survived  without becoming מִשְׁפָּחָה שַׁכּוּלָה (mishpaha shekula) the family who lost a soldier. Then his father said, ‘But this is what we have now become.'”

Naor Levi, the DJ playing the music he loved, was murdered at Supernova Naor Levi. Known professionally as DJ AudioPhiller he was working the decks at Supernova. He and Raz had a shared love of Trance music and had international followings. “He was a great artist, intelligent – a light on earth,” says Raz, and his words were echoed by mourners at his funeral. Some wore the shirts of his football team, Hapoel Tel Aviv; others from the Trance community wept when his favourite song was played. “After his mother spoke she asked everyone to applaud one last time for her son who came to this world to bring happiness and joy with his music, and touched so many people”. The applause was mentioned by a friend on Naor’s facebook page who wrote: ‘It was insanely powerful. We must have been heard in heaven.”

Raz dreads his phone ringing. Every call and text brings more questions. “We have friends across the world who want to know what is happening. To know if we have found someone. I can’t say the words. I can’t.” Raz sobs are guttural and the emotions so raw. He is desperate to know about his friend, Shani Louk, 22, a German Israeli who was kidnapped and later seen unconscious in video footage.  “Only two weeks ago I was sitting with her in her apartment,”says Raz, who also wants to know about Noa Argamani. “We lost contact when she was taken. It was her birthday two days ago.”

The torment of not knowing has been so intense for Raz and his friends, that they searching Hamas videos to see if they could spot people they knew. “Can you believe it? We did that. And we saw friends. Lying dead.”

Matan Lior’s girlfriend also spoke at the funeral and shared the events leading up to his murder. The moment when the joyous party turned from exhilaration to terror.

“Matan was in control of sound. He had brought his huge speakers, the ones he would climb to set up. Everyone was happy. The Trance community is full of progressive, peace-loving people. But then the terrorists came. Matan and his girlfriend ran to the car. Everyone ran to their cars. But all the vehicles leaving at the same time created a block at the exit. No one could move. Matan could see what was happening. That the terrorists were waiting on the road by the exit. He got out the car and ran back to the mic by his speakers. He shouted for everyone to get out and run for their lives. Then the terrorists arrived over the field on hang gliders.”

Matan’s last words bring more tears. The sound man’s act of bravery is humbling and Raz knows that he could have been there. He should have been there as he goes to every festival, and this was the first time the Brazilian Universo Paralello psy-trance festival had been staged in Israel.

But Raz went camping in the north of Israel instead. The unconscious decision saved his life. A life he says that will never be the same again. “Not for anyone who was there and survived. That anyone survived is a miracle as no one came to help for hours. The terrorists even had time to dismantle Matan’s speakers and they stole them.”

Raz looks away, then up at the sky. “Do you hear the rockets?” He lifts his phone and turns the screen to the splayed flames against the Iron Dome. “Our movement is about psy electronic music, peace and love,” says Raz. “It’s the antithesis of hate and murder. There were people from 29 countries at the festival. From Brazil, Canada, Nepal… and it wasn’t a Jewish event. I know Hamas planned this, but why us? How did it become  a massacre of innocent people?  It wasn’t a political move. It wasn’t a strategic move. The only measure of Hamas’ success right now is the amount of Israeli Jewish blood that will be spilled! Hamas has no compassion for their own people. The IDF and the United States sent a clear message to the residents of the northern Gaza Strip to evacuate their homes in order to save their lives and escape the fighting zone.
Hamas is preventing that. They are making it difficult for the residents to exit. They want them to serve as a human shield against IDF attacks.”

Raz talks about the Trance movement, which has been popular in Israel since the 90’s, in the future tense because he sees it continuing, albeit in message alone. And it’s the messages on Facebook that are the darkest reminder of what was lost on 7 October and, most importantly, who.

The pages belonging to the victims and the kidnapped and the soldiers, including those about to risk their lives, are full of entries made less than a month ago when they were on the beach, with family or embracing someone they loved. On 29 Sept, Naor Levi posted the flyer for Supernova and beneath it wrote: “Happy Sukkot holiday our loved ones. We send you and everyone around you, good energy and blessings with joy and happiness. At this exact time next week everyone will already be smiling.”