Brain researchers at Haifa University in Israel have studied 650 survivors from the October 7 attack in 2023. They were all at the Nova music festival near the border with Gaza when the Islamist extremist group Hamas attacked.
Two-thirds of them were affected by drugs such as MDMA, LSD, marijuana, or hallucinogenic mushrooms during the attack. According to the researchers, those who were affected by the central stimulant MDMA – often called ecstasy – may have received a certain psychological protection during the event, according to preliminary results from the study.
Especially MDMA, which had not been mixed with anything else, was most protective, says Professor Roy Salomon, one of the researchers behind the study, to BBC.
Reduced fear
According to Salomon, those who took MDMA seem to have coped better mentally during the first period after the attack.
They slept better, had less mental stress, and felt better than those who did not take any substance. They also had an easier time seeking support from friends and family, he says.
According to the researchers, the reason may be that the feel-good hormones released by the drug, including oxytocin, helped to reduce fear and increase feelings of friendship among those who fled the attack.
"Not in the real world"
One of those who believes that the drug itself helped during the attack is Michal Ohana. She believes that she would have frozen or fallen to the ground – and perhaps been killed or captured – without the drug.
I feel that it saved my life, because I was so high, as if I wasn't in the real world. Ordinary people can't see all these things – it's not normal, she says.
It is believed to be the first time researchers have been able to study a mass traumatic event where a large number of people were affected by mind-altering drugs, writes BBC.
Hamas killed 370 people in the festival area where 3,500 people were present.
