Memorial Ceremony for Bereaved Families and the Nova Tribe Community Association

08 October 2026 11:00 AM
More than 3,500 people, including bereaved family members, survivors of the southern festivals, members of the Nova community and members of the public, gathered yesterday, October 7, at the Re’im memorial site for a memorial ceremony organized by bereaved families and the Nova Tribe Community Association in partnership with KKL-JNF, marking three years since the October 7 massacre. The ceremony was attended by President of Israel Isaac Herzog.
Ninet Tayeb, Shuli Rand, Amir Benayoun, Yuval Raphael, Benaya Barabi and the Nova Band performed at the ceremony, which was hosted by Tamir Steinman.
 
The ceremony took place at the site of the Nova festival, where hundreds of festivalgoers were murdered. It was dedicated to the memory of those murdered from the Nova community and the southern festivals, including Nova, Mushroom, Psyduck and Midburn.
 
At 6:29 p.m., the audience stood for a minute of silence, followed by a Yizkor prayer recited by Elkana Buhbut and Kaddish recited by Yehuda Halevi, the father of the late Aviad.
During the ceremony, remarks were delivered by President Isaac Herzog; Eyal Ostreinsky, Chairman of KKL-JNF; Reef Peretz, CEO of the Nova Tribe Community Association; Amir Hodorov; and Meir Zohar, father of the late Bar Zohar and representative of the bereaved families.
Readings were presented by Liat Eylon Ravie, mother of the late Ofek, and Orly Bard, widow of Senior Staff Sergeant Alon Bard, who was killed in the October 7 attack.
Photo: Yossi Ifragan, KKL-JNF Spokesperson’s Division
 
Photos of those who were murdered and videos were also shown, including a video dedicated to bereaved siblings.
 
Yuval Raphael, a survivor of the Nova festival, performed “Lir’ot Et Ha’Or” (“To See the Light”); Shuli Rand and Amir Benayoun performed “Ayeka” and “Simchot Ktanot” (“Small Joys”); Benaya Barabi and the Nova Band performed “Ze Beseder” (“It’s Okay”); and Ninet Tayeb performed “Shelo Tipol HaRuach” (“May the Spirit Not Fall”). The ceremony concluded with Ninet singing “Hatikva.”
 
Photo: Yossi Ifragan, KKL-JNF Spokesperson’s Division
 
Remarks from the Ceremony
 
President of Israel Isaac Herzog: “You, family members, beloved ones and dear friends who have lost those closest and dearest to you – no one can stand where you stand. The wound you carry in your hearts will never heal. Yet the strength of spirit, nobility and resilience you show and draw upon leave us in awe. Because alongside the burning, searing love and unbearable longing, you stand here with your heads held high, with a dignity that inspires respect and awe. And we stand together with you, in a place where cruelty and love, dancing and death, light and darkness, collided with unimaginable force. We will embrace, we will cry, we will grieve together, and we will pray that the promise of spirit and rain in its season will once again bring blessing to our soil at the end of Tishrei, and that you will find comfort and healing.”
 
Reef Peretz, CEO of the Nova Tribe Community Association: “Each and every one of them had a voice, a smile, a story and a whole world. And tonight, three years later, they are missing. Missing from their homes. Missing during the holidays. Missing from the small moments of life, and missing here, in the place where they danced for the last time. Their memory is part of our mission. We will continue to say their names, tell their stories and commemorate who they were.”
 
Eyal Ostreinsky, Chairman of KKL-JNF: “When we established the Nova memorial site, the only public memorial site of its kind in Israel, alongside the Iron Swords Forest, we chose not to look around or look back, and without checking what others were or were not doing. We understood that there was a story here that had to be told. We are not that story – you are. As Chairman of Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael–Jewish National Fund, I make this commitment: your story of remembrance belongs solely to you. No one in the world will dictate to you how to commemorate those you love or how to tell the story of your community.”
 
Photo: Yossi Ifragan, KKL-JNF Spokesperson’s Division
 
Meir Zohar, bereaved father and representative of the bereaved families: “During those hours of horror on October 7, these beautiful and courageous young people taught us all a lesson that we must never forget. In moments of fire, when they hid together, protected one another, rescued others and gave their lives, they saw what connected them. They saw a person. They saw a brother. They saw a sister. They acted out of pure mutual responsibility, out of a reverence for life, and with immeasurable courage. Through their bodies and souls, they proved that at the foundation of our existence, we are all one body. One soul.”
 
Liat Eylon Ravie, mother of the late Ofek Ravie: “Like all of you, I too search for his light every day anew. There are days when that light is very small, almost hidden. There are days of anger and great sorrow, questions that have no answers, and thoughts that return again and again to what happened, and to everything that will no longer be.”
 
Tamir Steinman, host of the ceremony: “We are gathered here this evening, three years after the October 7 massacre, the most devastating terrorist attack Israel has ever experienced. The voices, messages, final images and cries for help that I received from here that day, and that came through the news reports as I worked as the southern correspondent, continue to echo inside me even three years later. And they probably always will. For a long time, I was unable to go back to them, but in preparation for this evening I did. I went through some of the messages and names: ‘We are wounded and hiding. We are begging you, send someone to save us.’ Suddenly I understood: I did not manage to get back to some of them. And for that, I am sorry. They will always remain with us.”
 
Elkana Buhbut, in a Yizkor text: “May the people of Israel remember the pure souls of its sons and daughters, the victims of the October 7 festival massacre. We will remember the melody of their hearts, the beauty and innocence of those who sanctified life. We will remember our brothers and sisters, pure children, young and old, who were abducted and murdered in captivity by a cruel and merciless enemy.”
 
Photo: Yossi Ifragan, KKL-JNF Spokesperson’s Division
 
This was the third year in which the families of those murdered held the ceremony at the memorial site in partnership with Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF). This year, for the first time, the Nova Tribe Community Association joined them, bringing its memorial ceremony together with the families’ ceremony in a shared space of remembrance, reflection and solidarity.
 
The Nova Tribe Community Association grew out of the community following the events of October 7 and works on behalf of survivors of the southern festivals, families of those murdered and members of the community. The association provides support and rehabilitation in the areas of mental and community resilience, social support, returning to employment and routine, and financial assistance. It also promotes community spaces and remembrance and educational initiatives in Israel and around the world.