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IDF soldiers dance with Torah at Nova festival massacre site

The Simchat Torah holiday celebrates the conclusion and beginning of the annual cycle of public Torah readings.

Israeli soldiers and Jewish men carry Torah scrolls as they dance during Simchat Torah celebrations at a military base on the border with the Gaza Strip on Oct. 14, 2025. Photo by Tsafrir Abayov/Flash90.
Israeli soldiers and Jewish men carry Torah scrolls as they dance during Simchat Torah celebrations at a military base on the border with the Gaza Strip on Oct. 14, 2025. Photo by Tsafrir Abayov/Flash90.

Hundreds of people, including IDF soldiers, danced with a Torah scroll singing ‘The Nation of Israel lives’ on Tuesday, at the site of the Supernova music festival massacre near the Gaza Strip.

The event marking Simchat Torah came a day after the remaining 20 living hostages were released from Gaza, two years after the Oct. 7 attack.

The Simchat Torah holiday celebrates the conclusion and beginning of the annual cycle of public Torah readings.

The desert site, which has been turned into a vast memorial area, had been thronged with bereaved families on the second anniversary of the Gazan slaughter last week.

Nearly 400 people were slain at the dance party during the massacre, or about one-third of the some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, murdered during the Hamas-led invasion.

Separately, scores of people celebrated the Simchat Torah holiday at the site of the destroyed police station in the southern Israeli city of Sderot, where some 20 police officers died battling Hamas terrorists two years ago.

In a draft report delivered to the U.S. president, the commission also called for improved religious accommodations for U.S. service members.
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