On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas’ attack on the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel became the deadliest music festival massacre in history.
But its founders refuse to allow the story of the Nova Music Festival to be fully stained by blood. Now, they ensure that the story of the event, its victims and its survivors is told through their touring memorial, the Nova Exhibition.
Located at 307 Dorchester Ave., the Nova Exhibition recreates the grounds on which 378 partygoers were killed by the terrorist group Hamas, initiating the Israel-Hamas war. Featuring authentic items preserved from the attack’s aftermath, recordings of victims and testimony from survivors, the exhibition gives attendees a look at the massacre while benefiting the foundation that assists survivors in their recovery. After opening in New York in April 2024 and making stops in Los Angeles, Miami and Toronto, the Nova Exhibition arrived in Boston Sept. 26 and is open until Oct. 21.
“The goals [of the exhibition] have always been the same,” said Ofir Amir, co-founder of the Nova Music Festival and co-organizer of the Nova Exhibition. “We are here to raise awareness and to have more people join us in the healing journey. And the other goal is to educate people and to fight antisemitism. After two years, there hasn’t been any progress; there’s only more hate. Everywhere we go, we understand that we are fighting for survival all around the world.”
Hamas’ multi-pronged attack Oct. 7, which included the massacre at Nova, led to Israel declaring war on Hamas the next day. Two years of war have caused the near-total destruction of Gaza and 67,000 Palestinian deaths, according to local health authorities. Some festival attendees were held hostage for two years until their release Oct. 13, 2025 as part of a ceasefire deal brokered by President Donald Trump.
When the Nova Exhibition first arrived in New York, it opened against the backdrop of rising antisemitism in the United States. Toward the end of its New York run, hundreds of people protested outside the exhibition, with some waving Hamas flags and calling the exhibition “propaganda,” according to reporting by WABC-TV, a station in New York. For Amir and the team, it was important to bring the exhibition to a city known for its higher education to inform students on what happened that day.
“[Boston] is considered a hub for the major universities and colleges and education, and I think it’s very important to come and educate in a city where it’s considered one of the best educators,” Amir said. “Unfortunately, you see what’s going on in the news at decent universities, and we are here to make a change.”
Entering the Nova Exhibition parallels the experience of arriving at a joyous rave. As tickets are scanned and bags are checked, disco music plays as if a party is occurring in the next room over. In this room, attendees watch a video in which survivors reflect on the celebration and bonding that occurred at the Nova festival before the attack began. At the timestamp of 6:29 a.m., the music suddenly stops as rockets fly through the sky and gunshots sound, and the video turns to black.
Attendees are then directed to the main gallery — a recreation of the festival grounds in the attack’s aftermath. Parking signs, the set list, the DJ booth and the bar are all placed exactly as they were at the festival. But instead of partygoers, the sand-covered floor is filled with rubble and abandoned items, all of which attendees are encouraged to touch and hold. Video screens throughout the exhibition show clips of partygoers fleeing and people being taken hostage into Gaza. Audio recordings play goodbye messages from victims to their loved ones as gunmen approach them.
“All this stuff being there made it personal and more alive,” said Lea Chen, a first-year occupational therapy graduate student at Boston University. “The shoes had such a mirror to the Holocaust. It’s hard to compare tragic events, but it was a strong parallel to see the abandoned shoes. In a way, it makes it more human.”
After walking through a gallery of all the people killed at the festival, attendees are directed to the second floor, the “Healing Room.” Unlike the dim first floor that tells a story of darkness, the lightly-lit second floor details the work of Tribe of Nova Foundation, which assists survivors, freed hostages and the deceased’s loved ones. In the Healing Room, attendees can learn about individual victims and survivors and purchase merchandise paying tribute to the festival, with all proceeds going to the foundation. Additionally, a rotation of festival survivors gives daily testimonies about their experiences and healing journeys.
“This is the part that has changed the most from New York to Los Angeles to Miami, because this is the story we’re still writing,” Amir said. “There are over 3,500 survivors and 2,500 bereaved family members. These stories show how we focus on post-traumatic growth, how we grow out of this trauma.”
Amir, who survived the attack and was left with a bullet wound in his leg, stresses the continued work that needs to be done to assist trauma-ridden survivors.
“In Israel, there are … young survivors who still deal with severe trauma,” Amir said. “They don’t go back to school. They don’t leave their homes. And this is why we are here telling this story and raising money, so we can help them, the same way we help those who are strong enough to come and tell their stories here.”
The exhibition is acclaimed for its graphically-accurate retelling of the attack. Robert Falack, a first-year business administration student at Northeastern, visited the site of the Nova festival in December 2023, just two months following the attack, while on a volunteer mission to Israel. Having seen the festival grounds himself, Falack was astonished by the exhibition’s authenticity.
“The exhibition truly did an excellent job at portraying what happened,” Falack said. “You got to see the tents, the dance stage, the sound speakers as they were left. I appreciated the fact that they were able to transport things that were in Israel to the exhibition, but I really got a sense of, ‘Wow, they did a very good job portraying this.’”
Spencer Kaufman, a first-year business administration student at Northeastern, hopes all people will get a chance to visit the exhibition, noting its importance to bear witness to the events that occurred.
“I don’t think there’s anyone that should not go,” Kaufman said. “Everyone should go, regardless of their nationality, ethnicity, religion, political affiliation. People need to see the horrors that are happening. People need to understand why the conflict is happening in the first place.”
After a year and a half of touring North America, a European tour began Oct. 7, the second anniversary of the attacks, in Berlin. But the North American tour will continue following its stop in Boston, with Amir dedicated to resuming the Nova Exhibition’s mission of educating and remembering.
“I lost too many friends on Oct. 7 because of all these politics, and I didn’t come here to talk about it,” Amir said. “I came here for the memorial of my friends and to raise awareness about what happened on Oct. 7. This is my mission now, to educate people, to help others and to talk about what happened at a music festival.”
Leave feedback about this