Nova festival survivor forced to flee Brazil after being accused of war crimes

An Israeli tourist has fled Brazil after a federal court authorised a criminal investigation into his actions as a soldier in the Gaza Strip, Israeli and Brazilian media reported on Sunday.

Judge Raquel Soares Charelli authorised the probe on December 30, news site Metrópoles reported.

The reports in Brazilian media did not name the Israeli who, according to Israeli media reports, has fled the country. He was wanted for actions allegedly taken during his military service in the Israel Defence Forces.

Yuli Edelstein, chair of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee, said in response to the Brazilian move that he would convene a classified discussion into the prosecution of Israelis abroad. “I am embarrassed for Brazil and its government, who surrendered to the pro-Palestinian legal terrorism,” the statement continued.

The former Israeli soldier, identified by Israel’s Channel 12 News only as Y, 21-years-old, travelled to Brazil as a tourist for the Chanukah holiday period together with three friends. He and his friends all left the country after receiving a warning from Israeli foreign ministry employees.

The man, who recently completed his mandatory service in the IDF Givati infantry brigade, survived the Nova music festival, where Hamas terrorists murdered more than 300 people on October 7, 2023, including his girlfriend, according to Channel 12.

The allegations against him concern his actions as a soldier in a residential area of Gaza in November 2024.

Another complaint has been filed against an Israeli visiting Chile, Ynet reported on Sunday, though officials have not yet identified the man as a suspect or announced a criminal investigation in Chile.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has publicly compared Israel’s actions to those of Nazi Germany, and accuses it of committing genocide in Gaza.

Da Silva, who in May recalled Brazil’s ambassador from Israel, is persona non-grata in the Jewish state, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said in February.

The complaint in Brazil was filed by an anti-Israel group called the Hind Rajab Foundation. According to the Jerusalem-based watchdog NGO Monitor, the organisation was founded by Dyab Abou Jahjah, a former Hezbollah fighter who once blamed the JC for being banned from entering the UK.

In 2007 he caused outrage when he claimed to have published a picture of Anne Frank in bed with Adolf Hitler alongside the caption “put this in your diary, Anne”.

In 2015, Abou Jahjah called Antwerp’s mayor “a Zionist c***sucker” on X. 

After the 9/11 attacks, Abou Jahjah spoke of his “feeling of victory.” He has called Antwerp, which has a large community of Orthodox Jews, the “international capital of the Zionist lobby,” according to the Dutch NRC newspaper.