Car chases. Shrapnel wounds. Surrounded by terrorists facing almost certain death.
The story of Dor Kapah, one of the thousands of Israeli citizens who partied at the Nova music festival when Hamas gunmen flooded the Gaza border to launch their brutal massacre, is truly fit for the silver screen.
Circumstances forced the typically calm massage therapist to undergo a rapid transformation into a bona fide action hero as he piloted a getaway vehicle full of terrified civilians from a fleet of armed terrorists chasing them on motorcycles.
His friend escaped death by mere millimeters when shrapnel from a terrorist explosion tore part of his scalp, while Dor himself saved his crew from death when he managed to ram a Hamas militant off the road.
Still waiting for news of his friends kidnapped and dragged into Gaza by the Islamist attackers, Dor shares with MailOnline his breathless, adrenaline-filled escape from the festival in vivid detail.
Dor tells how he and his friends were hunted by terrorists at the Nova music festival
One of Dor’s passengers lost part of his scalp when shrapnel from terrorist gunfire left scars on the back of his head
Dor was ready to flee the festival site, but then he received a call from a friend telling him not to leave because ‘the streets are full of terrorists’
Scenes from Kibbutz Be’eri, where Dor had to hide from Hamas terrorists for six hours
A house destroyed during the attack by Hamas is seen in Kibbutz Be’eri on October 14, 2023 in Be’eri, Israel
“Everything was great until six in the morning… then we saw the trails of rockets shooting into the sky,” Dor said.
‘The music stopped, everyone panicked. People started running, lying on the ground… it was complete chaos. We heard gunshots in the distance… and then we saw them coming – 400 meters away. 300 meters.’
Dor and his friends began packing their belongings and preparing their jeep to flee the festival grounds. But then he got a call from a friend at a nearby kibbutz, putting the group in a catch-22.
“Don’t leave the festival,” the friend said. “The streets are full of terrorists.”
It was then that Dor truly realized the horror of his predicament: damned if you stay, damned if you go, with armed men lurking everywhere.
But with terrorists bearing AK-47s bearing down on him, Dor and his friends had no choice but to get into their jeep and take off.
As he weaved through the festival tents towards the exit, Dor only stopped to pick up more desperate festival goers who stopped him and begged him to save them.
“I see people running towards us from the exits and a group of thirty to forty terrorists… they were chased like ducks,” Dor exclaimed.
After leaving the festival site, the group rushed to nearby bushes where they happened upon an abandoned, damaged IDF armored car. They saw an IDF assault rifle on the ground, picked it up and took refuge in the bushes.
For a few minutes, the revelers thought they were safe. They got out of the jeep and started calling their families.
But the moment of peace was shattered by the roar of motorcycle engines and seconds later a group of Hamas gunmen came flying across the fields toward them, followed by terrorists in trucks.
Dor’s passengers frantically called the police as they fled the festival site
Dor narrowly avoided being shot at close range and managed to run over a terrorist on a motorcycle before he could fire his weapon
Debris is seen at a burned-out daycare center in Be’eri
An Israeli soldier inside the destroyed Jewish home in the Kibbutz Be’eri community along the border with the Gaza Strip
The group ducked back into the jeep, but two passengers chose to run further into the bushes. It is believed they were later captured and dragged across the border.
Dor left again, heading to Kibbutz Be’eri – where it was later revealed that more than 100 Israeli civilians had been shot, stabbed and burned in their homes.
It was at the intersection Be’eri entered that Hamas terrorists on motorcycles overtook Dor, prompting him to accelerate once again and veer off the road, swerving violently to avoid the stream of bullets.
Despite his erratic driving, Hamas still managed to search the jeep with several bullets. Shrapnel from one blast tore through the cabin and scorched the back of the head of a passenger, Gilad, tearing the skin from his scalp.
“I was shot in the head!” Gilad shouts. “Hold the wound, squeeze tight!” Dor responded as he zigzagged his vehicle away from the terrorists.
Suddenly, a motorcycle stopped right in front of Dor’s jeep.
‘The terrorist looks me in the eye and shouts: ‘It’s a Jew – kill the Jew!’
The Hamas fighter reached for his weapon, but Dor rammed the motorcycle with the front of the jeep, sending the rider flying through the air before landing in a nearby ditch.
When they entered Be’eri, she had nowhere to go. Dor stopped the truck next to a bush, pulled a bleeding Gilad with him and made his way to a dilapidated public toilet block.
There they cowered for six hours as Hamas gunmen came and went, shooting into the doors and windows before leaving to massacre more civilians inside the kibbutz.
“Even if our friends come back from across the border, they will never be the same,” Dor said before collapsing
Forensic investigators recover bone fragments from the ruins of a burned-out house in Be’eri
Members of rescue and ZAKA crews search for bodies and body parts after the attack by Hamas and Palestinian militants on the kibbutz on October 22, 2023
‘There’s nothing we can do. Pieces of the ceiling crumbled on us. We barricaded ourselves inside for six hours.
“You can hear the screams, the rockets, the Kalashnikov shots.” Dor continued, her voice shaking.
But just when all hope seemed lost, Dor said he could hear “the language of the IDF.” Military service is mandatory in Israel and most citizens undergo two or more years of military training.
Hearing the voices of IDF soldiers gave Dor and his wounded friend the strength to take cover before joining the military unit and evacuating the hellhole.
Sharing his thoughts with MailOnline after his heroic but harrowing ordeal, Dor could only speak of his friends and other Israeli citizens who were kidnapped by the terrorists and taken back to Gaza.
‘People will no longer be who they were. Even if our friends from across the border return, those who were kidnapped will never be the same.”
Dor agreed to share his story after speaking with Survived To Tell, an NGO initiative Israel iswhich aims to help survivors of the Hamas massacre, as well as friends and family of those abducted, tell their stories.