After hearing the dance track that was playing a year ago when the Hamas-led assault began, the hundreds who had gathered stood for a minute of silence, broken by a bereaved mother’s cries.
The dawn memorial ceremony in a clearing at the Re’im forest, the site of the Nova music festival where more than 380 people were killed in the Hamas-led assault against Israel a year ago, took place under heavy security and against a backdrop of continued war.
Songs and prayers were accompanied by the resounding booms and sharp cracks of Israeli strikes just across the border in Gaza.
The organizers, family members of those killed, had planned to sound a siren for a minute, but the security authorities asked them not to, as they feared the crowd would confuse it for a warning of incoming rocket fire.
Instead, at 6.29 a.m., after hearing the track that the crowd was dancing to a year ago when the assault began, the hundreds who had gathered stood for a minute of silence to mark the moment. It was broken by a bereaved mother’s piercing cries.
Among those mourning their loved ones were Michael and Lisa Marlowe, from England, whose son, Jake Aaron Marlowe, 26, had moved to Israel and was working as part of an unarmed security team at the festival when he was killed.
He’d been shot nine times, his father said. When asked what he does in life, Mr. Marlowe replied, “I grieve constantly now.”
Mr. and Ms. Marlowe tended to their son’s makeshift memorial in the clearing — his portrait attached to one of a thicket of metal poles, each devoted to an individual victim. They placed painted stones among the red ceramic poppies at the base of the pole.
They said Jake had called them last Oct. 7, at 6:30 a.m. Israel time, or 4:30 a.m. in London. He told them that rockets were flying over but that he would be OK, he loved them and would be in touch, Ms. Marlowe said, adding, “We never heard from him again.”
Isabel Kershner, a Times correspondent in Jerusalem, has been reporting on Israeli and Palestinian affairs since 1990. More about Isabel Kershner
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