KNOW THEIR NAMES
Danielle was simply 24 when she and her accomplice, Noam Shay, had been brutally killed by Hamas at Supernova Competition.
Because the daughter of Israeli tech billionaire, philanthropist and peace ambassador Eyal Waldman, 24-year-old Danielle inherited her father’s perception that Jews and Arabs may work collectively. He employed greater than 200 Palestinian engineers at Mellanox, the tech agency he co-founded in 1999 and led till 2020, believing that working collectively may result in peace.
“Danielle was the same as me. She believed we must strive for peace. She worked with me as often as she could,” Eyal, who raised $360,000 for an oncology ward at a Gaza hospital in 2020, remembers.
“She always thought that doing good things for other people was the best way to be. She knew many of my Palestinian friends and was friends with them, too, and she was always thinking of other people without thinking of herself. She helped so many people during her short life.”
Danielle was along with her boyfriend, 26-year-old Noam Shay, on the Supernova music competition which was going down near kibbutz Re’im close to the Gaza border when it was attacked by Hamas on October 7. Some 364 people were killed and 40 had been taken hostage by Hamas, in response to the primary Israeli police report into the assault.
Danielle and Noam had met six years earlier after they had been each serving within the Israeli army and had been inseparable ever since.
“They had just started talking about getting married,” Eyal explains. “But instead of a wedding, we held a funeral and buried them together.”
Lots of the a whole lot of Israeli, Palestinian residents of Israel and foreigners murdered by Hamas fighters on the Supernova music competition despatched their family members textual content and voice messages saying goodbye. However Eyal didn’t even have that.
“I didn’t get to say goodbye to her. She sent a text message to say she was OK at 6:30am. That was the last we heard of her. At least I have that,” he says. “I also have a video of when they were in the car before they were murdered and an audio recording from one of her friends who was wounded. But by that time, she was probably already dead.”
“Danielle was amazing. She couldn’t hurt a fly and she loved everyone. Anyone who came into contact with her loved her, too,” he says.
“My ex-wife [Danielle’s mother] called me the other day to tell me she had a dream about their wedding,” Eyal says, choking up with tears.
Regardless of his insufferable loss, Eyal says he doesn’t remorse working with Palestinians and stays optimistic that the day will come when the 2 individuals will coexist in peace. He additionally has cause to imagine the present warfare might change into a catalyst or set off for reconciliation: “After the [Yom Kippur] war of 1973, we started the peace process with Egypt and signed an agreement with them. There’s no reason that cannot happen again. We need to resolve this conflict. We’ve been killing each other for 75 years.”
When requested in regards to the reminiscence of his daughter he holds most pricey, he remembers a snowboarding vacation in France when Danielle started dancing spontaneously.
“She loved to dance. She was dancing all the time,” he says. “I just posted a video from that day when she was dancing in France and my three kids joined in. It was the song, Titanium, that says ‘I’m bulletproof’. It’s the best memory I have.”
