Survivor shares terrifying first hand account of Supernova music festival massacre one year on

One year ago, David Bromberg was running for his life as terrorists unleashed on festival-goers in Israel. Now, he’s ready to share how he escaped, recounting the day that will haunt him forever.

Israeli David Bromberg has travelled to Melbourne for the one-year anniversary of the Supernova festival massacre. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

When he first heard the missiles, David Bromberg hardly flinched.

Music blared as festival-goers watched the sun rise over the Negev desert.

The sight and sound of rockets being intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome was part of life — a normality for locals.

But as the DJ shut off the music minutes later and an evacuation order sounded over the microphone, hell on earth would unfold across southern Israel.

And thousands of attendees would begin running for their lives.

In an exclusive interview with the Sunday Herald Sun, Mr Bromberg — who has travelled to Melbourne to mark the anniversary of Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attack — gives his first-hand account of the Supernova music festival massacre.

Aabandoned and torched vehicles at the site of the October 7 attack on the Supernova music festival. Picture: Jack Guez

As panic set in, the 26-year-old, finding his mates, set off in a car hoping for a quick escape along the rural 232.

But cars had quickly banked up, and hundreds of Hamas terrorists, along with some armed Gazan civilians, were fast approaching — gunfire sounding in the distance.

The group, coming to a fork in the road, began to hear shouting.

“As we’re about to take a right, a car comes filled with bullets, and he screams, don’t take it right, the terrorists are coming,” he said.

“We take a left, it’s completely jammed.”

Amid the chaos and confusion, and the sound of missiles raining down, Mr Bromberg spots three policemen get shot down by heavy gunfire as they run to the scene.

Ditching the car, the friends began running.

“Then they (Hamas) came from both ways,” he said.

“I look behind me, and I see a white truck … a few terrorists on it, dressed in black, heavy machine guns are shooting at everyone.

“I’m running … you hear the whistling of the bullets, windows shattering next to you.”

It was then that festival goers began “getting shot from both angles”.

“Everyone started running through the fields,” he said.

“Bullets flying over your head, people next to you getting shot.”

Despite the death and destruction around him, Mr Bromberg says he knew he would survive.

“I don’t know how to explain, but I just had a very strong feeling that I’m going to live that day,” he said.

Israeli David Bromberg recalls terrorists dressed in black firing at the crowd as he and his friends ran for their lives. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

Eventually the group hid in a bush where they checked their phones.

Messages were streaming in from friends and family.

“We hear the screaming ‘Allahu Akbar’ and we hear the shooting,” he said.

Eventually — after hours spent with no food or water in the blistering heat — Mr Bromberg’s friend’s dad would arrive to rescue them.

Squished into the car, the group drove past dozens of bodies before eventually pulling up at a petrol station.

“There were injured, dead, people,” he said.

“A stretcher comes in with someone that got hit by an RPG, (his) chest is open, hearts coming out … and he was still breathing.

“My friend, who is a paramedic, tried to save him. He died in her hands.”

“Another girl joined us into the car … (and) she kept mumbling, ‘they cut off her head, they cut off her head’.”

The aftermath of the attack on festival-goers. Picture: South First Responders / AFP

Eventually reaching safety, Ms Bromberg found himself among dozens of other survivors.

“You can just see all the other survivors in their eyes, like what they went through,” he said.

“You can see dark in their eyes and fear.”

The 26-year-old may have survived the worst terrorist attack on Israel since the country’s conception, but October 7 will haunt him forever.

“That day, I lost over 40 friends,” he said.

“There was a line-up in the festival of DJs. After the festival, there was a line-up of funerals.”

Among them was German national Shani Louk, whose mutilated body was paraded through Gaza through a cheering crowd and spat at by bystanders.

A video of the disturbing attack was one of the first videos broadcast on social media of the massacre.

Israeli soldiers walk among portraits of people taken captive or killed by Hamas militants during the Supernova music festival. Picture: Jack Guez / AFP

Other friends miraculously survived.

“My friend, she was hiding in one of the bomb shelters … and there’s a bunch of people in front of her, and terrorists threw eight grenades in the bomb shelter, eight grenades, and they were shooting everyone,” he said.

Burying herself under the bodies, she covered herself with the braids of girl next to her who had been killed.

“She was hiding under her for 10 hours, covered in her blood,” he said.

“When she was walking out, it wasn’t bodies, it was pieces.”

A total of 364 people were murdered at the Supernova festival. Many of the bodies were mutilated and burnt.

And some, including Mr Bromberg’s friend Eliya Cohen, remain trapped in Gaza, in the grips of Hamas.