Once again, reality has delivered a heartbreaking reminder that evil doesn’t just strike in the moment—it lingers long after the headlines fade.
According to the New York Post, Roei Shalev, a survivor of the October 7, 2023, massacre at Israel’s Nova music festival, ended his life in a fiery suicide near Netanya just days after the second anniversary of the terrorist attack that upended his world.
Shalev, 28, had lived through events that most wouldn’t dare imagine—surviving a Hamas ambush that claimed his girlfriend’s life and later losing his mother to suicide in its aftermath.
A Survivor Of Murder, Then Grief
On that terrible day in 2023, Shalev and his 25-year-old girlfriend, Mapal Adam, had been among the thousands gathered at the Nova music festival near Re’im when Hamas terrorists launched a brutal surprise attack.
The pair hid beneath a truck, pretending to be dead, whispering their final "I love you" before closing their eyes and hoping for survival.
Moments later, according to Shalev’s own painful retelling in a 2024 YouTube interview, a Hamas militant approached and fired at them at point-blank range.
A Young Man Who Carried Tragedy
Shalev was struck twice while attempting to protect Adam, who died instantly from a gunshot to the chest. Covered in blood and dirt, he somehow survived.
“They disappeared, and I opened my eyes—Mapal is next to me in a pool of blood. She got a bullet in her heart,” Shalev recounted in the interview, offering chilling testimony to the brutality he witnessed.
Tragedy didn’t let go—not even days later. His mother, unable to bear the horror, also died by suicide, setting her vehicle ablaze in what appeared to be an act of overwhelming grief.
Two Years Later, Pain Was Unrelenting
As the second anniversary of the Nova massacre passed in early October, the weight of these events appears to have become more than Shalev could bear.
Authorities confirmed that his body was discovered on Friday in a burning car off a highway exit outside Netanya. Surveillance footage revealed he had purchased fuel just beforehand.
Before taking his own life, he posted a goodbye message on Instagram, revealing the depth of his suffering. “I’m truly sorry. I can’t bear this pain any longer,” he wrote. It was the message of a man whose soul had long stopped healing.
A Final Cry From A Wounded Spirit
In the same post, Shalev wrote: “Never in my life have I felt such pain and suffering—deep, burning, eating me from within. I just want this suffering to end. I’m alive—but inside, I’m already dead.”
This was not melodrama. This was the unfiltered agony of a man let down by every institution that should have stood up for him—the security state that failed to protect, the medical system that couldn’t heal, and a society distracted by political pageantry instead of mourning its own.
The Nova Tribe Community, made up of survivors and relatives of the 2023 attack, issued a statement mourning the loss. “Roei was the backbone of the community, and his death is inconceivable news for us,” the group shared.
