‘LSD, MDMA’: Party drugs may have helped survivors of October 7 attack, study claims

MDMA, LSD and other illegal drugs may have helped survivors who were high during Hamas’ October 7 attack, a new study suggests.

MDMA and other party drugs may have helped festivalgoers who survived Hamas’ horrific October 7 attack, a new study suggests.

Hundreds of festival goers were allegedly under the influence of illegal recreational drugs when Hamas gunmen, dressed in body armour and carrying AK-47 assault rifles, stormed the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel on October 7, 2023.

The attack left 360 people dead, saw dozens kidnapped and triggered a devastating war in Gaza.

Over a year on, preliminary research suggests MDMA – a stimulant and psychedelic drug also known as ecstasy or molly – may have provided survivors some psychological protection against trauma both during and after the attack, BBC reports.

Over 3,000 people attended the Nova Music Festival in Israel on October 7, 2023. Picture: CNN

An Armed Palestinian militant walking around the music festival, near Kibbutz Reim in the Negev desert in southern Israel. Picture: AFP

The study, which was conducted by Israel’s Haifa University and is currently being peer-reviewed, analysed the psychological responses of over 650 festival survivors – two-thirds of whom had taken MDMA, LSD, marijuana or psilocybin (magic mushrooms) before the attack.

“We had people hiding under the bodies of their friends for hours while on LSD or MDMA,” Roy Salomon, one of the professors leading the research, told the BBC.

Professor Salomon said the study found “MDMA, and especially MDMA that was not mixed with anything else, was the most protective” for survivors.

Researchers believe prosocial hormones triggered by the drug such as oxytocin, helped minimise fear during the attack.

Abandoned and torched vehicles at the site of the October 7 attack. Picture: Jack Guez/AFP

People visit a memorial for the victims killed at or kidnapped from the Supernova music festival. Picture: Menahem Kahana/AFP

Survivors who took MDMA also appeared to cope better mentally in the first five months after the tragedy, Professor Salomon said.

“They were sleeping better, had less mental distress – they were doing better than people who didn’t take any substance,” he told the publication.

One survivor, Michal Ohana, said being high on MDMA during the music festival “saved” her life, as she would have likely frozen otherwise, resulting in her being killed or kidnapped.

“I was so high, like I’m not in the real world,” she told the BBC. “Because regular humans can’t see all these things – it’s not normal.”

Michal Ohana, said being high during the music festival “saved” her life. Picture: John Feder/The Australian.

The study, which is limited to only those who survived the attack, is believed to be the first time researchers have analysed a mass trauma event where many people were under the influence of drugs.

It is expected to be published in the coming months, adding to research around
MDMA and mental health.

As of July 1, 2023, authorised psychiatrists in Australia can access MDMA for treating PTSD and psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression (TRD), though under strict controls.

According to the TGA, the psychiatrist must be an authorised prescriber and requires permission from a human research ethics committee to prescribe certain medications. If authorised, psychiatrists are responsible for supervising their patients while administering these medications, which will occur in a hospital, clinic, or other healthcare setting.

Individuals cannot use MDMA and psilocybin medicines without the supervision of their psychiatrist, and patients cannot take these medications at home or access them outside the healthcare facility.

MDMA is the main ingredient in ecstasy pills. Picture: Supplied

Gaza ceasefire standoff continues

The university’s research comes as the ceasefire standoff between Israel and Hamas continues.

The first phase of the ceasefire agreement ended last weekend following six weeks of relative calm that included exchanges of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners.

While Israel wants to extend the first phase of the ceasefire agreement until mid-April, Hamas has insisted on a transition to the second phase, which should lead to a permanent end to the war.

Of the 251 hostages taken by Palestinian militants during the 2023 attack, 58 remain in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military has said are dead

On Friday, Hamas released a video showing an Israeli hostage Matan Angrest alive, footage that his family said had left them “shaken” as they accused his captors of torturing him in captivity.

In the footage, Angrest, who turned 22 in November, calls on the Israeli authorities to implement the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal.

“We are shaken by the video we just saw, in which we see our Matan looking drained and desperate after 518 days in Hamas’s tunnels,” the family said in a statement issued by Israeli campaign group, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.

Hostage soldier Matan Angrest. Picture: X

Angrest says in the video he has been held for 511 days, suggesting it was shot last week.

The family said the video showed Angrest had been “tortured” in captivity and provided further evidence that time was running out for the remaining hostages.

“Beyond the severe psychological state evident in the footage, his right hand is non-functional, his eyes and mouth are asymmetrical, and his nose is broken – according to testimonies from those who have returned,” the family said.

“All due to interrogations and torture in captivity. What more proof is needed to understand that time has run out?”

Angrest was abducted from the Nahal Oz base after trying in vain to contact his family during Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war.

In September, during a demonstration for the hostages, his mother, Anat, released an audio recording of him found in Gaza by the Israeli army, in which he asks Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to swap Palestinian prisoners for the hostages.

On Friday, the family urged US President Donald Trump to proceed with the ceasefire deal and not stop until “the last hostage comes home”.

– With AFP

Originally published as ‘LSD, MDMA’: Party drugs may have helped survivors of October 7 attack, study claims