NEW YORK CITY — Maayan Dee spoke at The Jerusalem Post Annual Conference Gala in New York City on June 1, 2026, sharing her experience as a survivor of the Nova music festival massacre and honoring her murdered friend Sivan Sharabani. During her speech, Dee held up two small salt and pepper packets to commemorate Sharabani, who was killed during the October 7 attack.
"Sivan didn’t just carry salt and pepper. She actually named them simcha v’osher, ‘joy and happiness,’” Dee said. Sharabani’s body was identified from burned remains in southern Israel a week after the massacre. "I didn’t accept the fact that she was dead. I couldn’t."
Dee, a former lone soldier who immigrated from the UK and served in the IDF’s canine combat unit, attended the Nova music festival with friends she met while traveling through South America after completing her military service. She met Sharabani while backpacking in Argentina after her IDF service.
In her remarks, Dee described her search for mental health support in the aftermath of the attack. "I needed a place that would treat me without judgment and understand the Nova community." She credited SafeHeart, Israel’s largest mental health provider for survivors of the Nova music festival and other music events targeted during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, with helping her heal.
SafeHeart provided Dee with 24 free therapy sessions, which were later extended to 36. The organization provides trauma treatment, counseling, support groups, crisis intervention, and long-term mental health care free of charge to survivors and their families. Founded by mental health professionals from the music festival community, SafeHeart supports over 3,000 survivors and their families and is funded by private donors and government sources.
"For me, and many other survivors, navigating this stormy ocean of PTSD, SafeHeart has truly been our lifeboat," she said. Dee concluded her speech with a message of resilience: "We can do more than survive. We can live."