Hero of Nova who saved 2,000 lives: Extraordinary account of Israeli who directed terrified crowds away from Hamas slaughter - before he was dragged into Gaza

By FRANCINE WOLFISZ, NEWS REPORTER Published: 12:18, 2 August 2026 | Updated: 12:23, 2 August 2026 A former Hamas hostage risked his own life to help thousands fleeing the Nova festival – before being kidnapped and confined inside a Gaza terror tunnel for more than two years. Bar Kupershtein, 24, was working as a security guard and medic at the Nova festival in southern Israel when the barbarous attacks of October 7, 2023 erupted. Some 413 people were killed and 44 taken hostage to Gaza from the annual outdoor trance festival, as Hamas terrorists unleashed their savage assault on nearby Kibbutzim, including Be'eri, Kfar Aza and Nir Oz. Bar could have tried to save himself but instead made the fateful decision to stay and help those most in need. Over the next few agonising hours, the then 21-year-old jumped into his ATV and persuaded a security officer to open an emergency access road – saving thousands of lives in the process. Without that route, drivers were haplessly forced to head towards roads leading to Kibbutz Be'eri, around six miles away, or Kibbutz Re'im, just a mile away from Nova.  But both locations were subjected to vicious Hamas attacks that left hundreds of men, women and children butchered to death, raped or kidnapped. Many who went left or right along Road 232 ended up confronting terrorists planted along the routes. Bar Kupershtein, pictured second from left, bravely stood with other armed security guards to hinder the Hamas terrorists on the road leading to the Nova festival site. Four of the men he was seen with were killed during the gun battle Thousands were sent fleeing across open fields after Hamas terrorists arrived at the Nova Festival site on October 7, 2023 Bar (pictured left) and fellow hostage Maxim Herkin were forced to participate in a Hamas propaganda video, which was filmed within the Gaza terror tunnels Bar was later seen in Hamas footage lying on his stomach with a rope around him after he was taken hostage to Gaza. He spent 738 days in captivity Bar is credited with saving thousands of others - before he was kidnapped and confined inside a Gaza terror tunnel for more than two years. Pictured: The former hostage at the Nova Exhibition in London 'I told the police we were in the middle of a death trap,' recalled Bar, who went on to reroute terrified festivalgoers across open fields to safety.  He and five other armed security personnel then bravely positioned themselves behind a vehicle during a standoff as they shot at the Hamas terrorists. Four of the men he stood with that day were murdered. In all, he is credited with saving the lives of 2,000 people and scores more after ferrying several injured in his ATV to paramedics close to Nova.   He would have kept going on with his mission had it not been for the sinking realisation the Hamas terrorists were closing in.  'I understood in that moment I can't save anyone else, I needed to save myself,' he said soberly. Speaking about his harrowing experience, Bar explained how he left his vehicle and found himself running towards scrubland with 'gunfire everywhere'.  He then began crawling on the ground, the bullets rushing around his head before hearing a prolonged gunfight between terrorists and Israel Defense Forces soldiers who had arrived at the scene. 'After 40 minutes, there was suddenly silence and it was finally over. I'm thinking the IDF had defeated the terrorists - but then I heard "Allahu Akbar".  'Something inside me broke. I didn't understand how the terrorists had won.  'They started to murder everyone. I heard the screaming and then silence. Then they came to me, I prayed and waited for them to kill me. But instead they decided to take me hostage.' Haunting footage later emerged on Telegram, seen by his family, showing Bar tied up on the ground, bound at his wrists and ankles with a cord wrapped around his neck, alongside fellow hostage Elkana Bohbot. They and several others were hauled onto a truck and taken by Hamas terrorists into Gaza, where Bar recalled he was moved around several times before reaching an apartment.  After several months he was moved again to a tunnel, where he spent the remainder of his captivity cramped into a darkened room 50m underground. He said of his conditions: 'It was forbidden to talk or to move. I had handcuffs, feet cuffs and a blindfold. Every day they say to us "we're going to kill you".  'They gave us a little bit of food, water, but not clean water - it was salty. A few times there were fish in the water. 'The terrorists started to punch us day after day. After two weeks they came with a large stick and called me and another hostage, Yosef-Haim Ohana, to a room where they beat us and broke my leg.  'I prayed all the time and asked don't let this break me. I knew one day I would be released and I needed to stay strong. This was a very hard time for me.' Dashcam footage showed Israeli civilians being kidnapped to Gaza by Hamas terrorists Eden recalled how he had spent 'two hours of Russian roulette' trying to determine which way to flee as he witnessed 'death all around' him Former Hamas hostage Bar Kupershtein is hugged by Nova survivor Eden Rozner, who realised that the man who had saved his life was standing in front of him An aerial shot reveals the sheer number of cars ambushed by Hamas terrorists planted along the main road. It was thanks to Bar's efforts that many were spared the same fate Survivor Anita Conforty said her ordeal at Nova on October 7, 2023 is 'something that will stay with me for the end of my days' At one point his captors forced him to make a propaganda video, where he was compelled to tell the camera 'Hamas are ok'.  'I was an actor in the tunnels of Hamas,' recalled Bar. 'But I told them I would do any video they wanted, because then my family would see I was alive.' A glimmer of hope in the darkness of the Hamas tunnels came when Bar was handed a transistor radio. His kidnappers told him he needed it to learn the Koran – but he resourcefully retuned it to an Israeli station.  Then something truly remarkable occurred. 'For the first time we hear about the war, what happened outside, the protests, the soldiers dying, what had happened at Nova. Two weeks later was my birthday - and one of the presenters wished me a happy birthday.  'I knew in that moment no one had forgotten us. I stayed close to the radio and the presenter suddenly said: "I have a special person with me today". Against all odds it was Bar's mother, Julie Kupershtein, who was appearing on the show. 'I started to cry - this was the first time after one-and-a-half years that I had heard my mother's voice. It was the best birthday present and the hope I had asked God for.' On October 13, 2025, after 738 days in captivity, Bar was finally released alongside 19 other surviving hostages as part of a ceasefire agreement. Bar said of the day he was finally freed: 'I remember coming out of the tunnel. My eyes were covered but I could feel the sun on my face, I could hear the cars, the birds, the people. It was amazing.' Just hours later he was back in the arms of his mother and father, Tal.  During emotionally charged scenes, the now former hostage watched on in amazement as his father – who had suffered a stroke years earlier – lifted himself out of his wheelchair to embrace his son. 'This was without a doubt the best day of my life,' said Bar. The former hostage revealed the full extent of his heroism during an evocative speech at the Nova Exhibition in London earlier this month – where incredibly, one of the many people he saved that day was in the audience listening.  Nova survivor Eden Rozner, 28, told the Daily Mail he fell into a 'plunge of tears' after hearing Bar, because he realised the man standing in front of him was the reason he was alive. Amid a hail of bullets and missiles, Eden recalled how he had spent 'two hours of Russian roulette' trying to determine which way to flee as he witnessed 'death all around' him. Having made it to a vehicle, Eden and his close friends drove away at speed and onto an emergency track that had just been opened to fleeing revellers. But unknown to him, it was Bar who had guided them to safety. The physical therapist from Kfar Saba had not met his saviour in person until the pair met at the exhibition – where he embraced Bar on stage and thanked him for saving his life. Eden said: 'It was very emotional for me, because almost after three years I was able to thank him for the first time in person. It was a really amazing moment.' Reflecting on the events of October 7, he said: 'None of the things that happened that day should have happened. We were supposed to go to a festival and go back home and continue with our lives.  'The festival was filled with friends who got taken hostage and murdered, while others got away alive. 'Many people ask me how did I survive? And I often tell them, none of us survived - we became somebody else. I cry every day and feel sad, but also happy and blessed to still be here.' Fellow survivor Anita Conforty, 49, who also listened to Bar's testimony, said she will forever feel a connection to others who witnessed events at Nova. 'This is something that will stay with me for the end of my days,' she told the Daily Mail.  The piano teacher was celebrating the 40th birthday of close friend Sharona Shmunis-Harel at Nova when the missiles began appearing in the skies.  Some of her group began to panic, others were insistent the incident would soon be over, but for Anita 'something felt really off'. She said: 'Then these security guys came and screamed at us to evacuate and it started to feel really serious. 'We got in our minibus, but there was a traffic jam out of the site. We realised the terrorists were already there at Road 232 and saw people getting out their cars and running. They just left everything.  'Then we heard two guys screaming "terrorists" and we understood what was happening.' Due to having vascular scoliosis in his legs, Anita's husband Yaniv was unable to run – forcing the pair to hide instead in bushland.  The mother-of-three said: 'I remember I didn't want to die in fear. I was saying goodbye to my kids in my heart. I just looked up and saw birds flying. I identified myself with them being free, flying away and I thought whatever happens I'll be OK.' The sounds of gunfire and bullets came closer to the pair and they realised they would not be able to stay in their hiding spot for much longer. An armed police officer appeared and told them to run for the open field, where now thousands of others were fleeing for their lives.  'I heard and felt the bullets all over us. One whistled past my head. There were people running and screaming. We wanted to rest but we just didn't know where. 'Then we came across a cliff. I saw my friends - the ones we had just been dancing with - being massacred and falling to the ground. Terrorists were shooting at them from behind. It's a memory that stays in my mind every day.  'We were just there to dance - and then the next moment we were chased like animals.' Anita and her husband were eventually picked up by a van packed with 15 others that also escaped through the open access road to safety. Her friend Sharona, however, remained missing. Twelve days later Anita received the tragic news that the mother-of-two had been killed in the so-called 'Ambulance of Death'.  Seeking refuge, Sharona and 17 others had hidden inside an abandoned emergency vehicle before terrorists struck it with missiles and set it alight. The minibus driver Anita had hired to take the group to Nova was also murdered.  'Our Arab Muslim driver stayed with the car - he stayed to take us home and he was also killed. They murdered him just because he was there. Hamas weren't coming only to kill Jewish people, they just came to kill.' Having been born in Yugoslavia, Anita had fled the war in Kosovo as a young adult. Nova marked the second time she had been forced to run for her life. 'I feel like a soldier without ever having been in the army,' she reflected. 'My time at Nova still feels like yesterday.  'They say time is healing, but in truth my grief will stay the same for me all my life.' More than 40,000 people visited the Nova Exhibition in Shoreditch, London, including former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Mayor of London Sir Sadiq Khan, and senior government figures Wes Streeting, David Lammy and Angela Rayner.  Burned out cars, toilet cubicles riddled with bullet holes, abandoned camping gear and rows of discarded shoes were among the possessions placed on display at the poignant exhibition, before it closed last month following a 10-week run.