The trauma never ended: Boyfriend of murdered Nova victim dies by suicide at her grave

Bar Asraf, 30, died by suicide at the gravesite of his girlfriend, Liron Barda, after years of struggling with the trauma of her murder during Hamas’s October 7 massacre at the Nova music festival.

Family members said Asraf never recovered from Barda’s death. He remained devoted to her memory, stayed close to her family, visited her grave regularly, and had tried to drive to the festival on October 7 to save her before being turned back by security forces. His sister said the family found him lying beside Barda’s grave, where he had gone to be with “the woman he wanted to be with most.”

Barda, the festival’s bar manager, refused to flee during the Hamas attack, choosing instead to treat wounded victims until she was murdered. The couple, described by relatives as “soulmates since childhood,” had remained inseparable even after her death. “People need to know what Nova did to people,” Asraf’s sister said, highlighting the lasting psychological scars carried by survivors and families nearly three years after the massacre.