At 6:29 am on 7 October 2023, Mia Schem was filming a video with her friend Elia Toledano when the sound of rockets started, reports BritPanorama.
They had been waiting for the sun to rise over the Negev desert in southern Israel at the Nova music festival, just three miles from the Israel-Gaza border. By the end of the day, 21-year-old Schem would recount being shot in the arm by a Hamas militant and taken hostage into the Gaza Strip; 378 festival-goers would be among 1,200 people killed as Israel launched a relentless two-year barrage of strikes in response, leading to 70,000 Palestinian fatalities in Gaza and extensive destruction of the enclave.
In the early days of the war, Hamas released a video of Schem in captivity—the first footage of any of the 251 hostages. The French-Israeli citizen remained in Gaza for 55 days before her release during a brief truce between Israel and Hamas.
Speaking in London after returning home to Shoham, a town on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, Schem shared that her attendance at the festival was spontaneous. “I remember that I asked Elia, ‘Do you want to go to the Nova Festival?’ and he told me ‘Yes, why not?’” she stated. They had driven in Toledano’s car, unaware of the event’s proximity to Gaza—a crucial detail obscured by the festival’s organizers, who revealed locations shortly before the festivities began.
Once the rockets commenced, Schem and Toledano swiftly sought refuge in his car. Remarkably, they may have been among the first to escape the festival site. Schem noted that individuals who turned right survived, while those that turned left toward Tel Aviv and Jerusalem encountered Hamas militants. “Me and Elia were the first people to see the terrorists,” she recalled, describing how gunmen fired upon vehicles, killing passengers as they fled.
Schem accelerated past the roadblock, but their vehicle was riddled with bullets. The car flipped twice, forcing both to crawl out through the windows, as the doors were jammed. Seeking safety next to the wreck, Toledano called emergency services, only to receive dire instructions to hide—“Nobody came to save us,” Schem remarked. During this perilous moment, she was shot in the arm at point-blank range by a Hamas terrorist and both were subsequently abducted.
Toledano’s body was later recovered by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) from Gaza in late 2023, with an investigation indicating a “high probability” that his death resulted from an Israeli airstrike.
In recounting her time in captivity, Schem described her treatment as akin to being an “animal in a cage.” She asserted that her safety from rape stemmed from being kept in her captor’s home, where his family resided. Schem endured abuse from her captor’s wife, who expressed resentment towards her presence. “She didn’t give me water or food,” she stated.
Five days prior to her release, Schem was taken to tunnels beneath Gaza, where she encountered other hostages, including five women. This segment of her captivity was particularly harrowing, characterized by the hopelessness that permeated the group.
Schem shared her narrative during the Nova Exhibition in London, which recreates the music festival using actual wreckage brought from Israel. “It’s a miracle that I’m here,” she declared, “and if God saved me, I never give up.” This exhibition is currently traveling globally, with plans for future stops including Paris, Budapest, and Prague.
During its previous stop in New York, the exhibition attracted protests from those criticizing Israel’s actions since the attacks of October 7, with some accusing the display of serving as political propaganda.
