NOVA Memorial Site

“Your light will continue to shine bright and your joyous laughter will forever be remembered”

NOVA Memorial Site

“Your light will continue to shine bright and your joyous laughter will forever be remembered”

Home » the-exhibits » The Small Bar – Mushroom Project

The Small Bar – Mushroom Project

The Small Bar exhibit recreates the bar built by the Mushroom Project team for the Nova Festival on October 7, 2023. The Mushroom area also included a dance floor and a stage. Smaller than the main Nova area, its bar and stage became known as the “Small Bar” and the “Small Stage”.

Artist Amir Chodorov, the founder and manager of the memorial site, is reconstructing the bar together with his partners, Jojo Rabia and Yochai Rivlin. The exhibit was created in collaboration with Yaakov Engländer, whose daughter Noa was murdered alongside her partner, Noam Efraim, among the refrigerators behind the bar. Amir shares the story behind the exhibit in his own words.

When I learned what had happened at the Small Bar, I thought about the people who had sought shelter there. I imagined them crowded between the refrigerators, sending final messages to their loved ones and hoping they would survive. They had come to dance, celebrate and be together. Instead, they were murdered by Hamas terrorists.

Working with their families, we are filling the exhibit with their photographs, their stories and the things they created. I want visitors to see more than the place where they were killed. I want them to meet the people they were, and to discover what each of them loved and what made each of them unique.

In memory of those murdered at the Small Bar:

Avraham Gilad Tayeb
Orel Abuhatzira
Ilan Moshe Yaakov
Alexander Lobanov
Jenny Nissimov Carmeli
Gili Adar
Chief Warrant Officer Debbie (Devorah) Avraham
Daniel Goltman
Daniela Petrenko
Mai (Mikey) Yitzhaki
Noam Liel Efraim
Noa Engländer
Ran Shefer

Michael and Osher Vaknin – Mushroom Project Producers

Mushroom Project has played a prominent role in Israel’s trance scene. It began more than 15 years ago with parties among friends in the forests around Jerusalem. Led by brothers Michael and Osher Vaknin, it grew into a home for the Dark Psy and Hi-Tech communities. These fast-paced, powerful styles of trance were at the center of the distinctive, close-knit community the brothers helped build.

For Michael and Osher, music and the people who came to hear it shaped every decision. They paid close attention to every part of an event, from the artists and venue to the sound system and stage design, with the experience on the dance floor always at the heart of it.

On October 7, the brothers were running the Small Stage with their childhood friend Elkana Bohbot, who was abducted to Gaza and returned to Israel 738 days later. The event was meant to be a high point for Mushroom Project. Instead, Michael and Osher were murdered together. Their deaths left a profound loss in the community they had built and nurtured, both in Israel and abroad.

The Morning of October 7 at the Small Bar

6:30 a.m.
The police commander at the festival orders the music to stop and the event to be dispersed. Police officers and security guards begin directing thousands of attendees from the camping area toward the exits.

8:30 a.m.
Dozens of festivalgoers seek shelter at the Small Bar. They move its nine refrigerators into position, hiding between them and inside them. Gunfire and explosions can be heard outside. Some believe that Israeli forces have arrived and are fighting the attackers. Hoping this is true, they call their families and try to reassure them.

Around 9:05 a.m.
Several hundred civilians remain at the festival grounds, most of them near the Small Bar and the police command post. Five police officers fight to protect them from the command post and the area around it.

Dozens of terrorists arrive from the direction of Route 232 in pickup trucks, armed with machine guns and anti-tank missiles, and storm the festival grounds. Chief Warrant Officer Debbie (Devorah) Avraham runs to the bar and warns those hiding inside: “Run as fast as you can. There is no one to save you.”

Two of the people sheltering there follow her warning and escape under fire. One runs toward the Gerar Stream, passing bodies on the festival grounds. The other flees into the ravines to the north and hides behind a tree. When he looks back, he sees a group of terrorists surrounding the Small Bar.

Soon afterward, the terrorists shoot indiscriminately at close range at those who remain inside.