In Israel, the simple words ‘I am going dancing’ can sound almost like a declaration of defiance. After years of security crises, political division and the trauma of 7 October, even a few hours of enjoyment may feel like something that needs to be explained. The news never stops, public arguments rarely subside, and anxiety has become the background noise of ordinary life. Amid all this, many Israelis are searching for something no government programme can manufacture: a little room to breathe.
That need is not an attempt to deny suffering or turn away from responsibility. Quite the opposite. People who work, serve, volunteer, raise families and worry about the safety of those they love cannot live indefinitely with every nerve on alert. Sometimes they need a place where nobody asks them to take a political position, follow another news bulletin, or apologise for having a good time.
Midburn, which took place this past week at the foot of Mount Zin in the Negev desert, offered precisely such a place. According to reports from the event, some 9,000 people gathered in a temporary city of art, music, installations, camps, and communal activity. From a distance, it might have looked like a particularly colourful outdoor party. Up close, it was something more ambitious: a community building an alternative way of living, however briefly, in the middle of the desert.
Its inspiration comes from Burning Man, held annually in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert in the United States. Yet Midburn is not merely an Israeli imitation of an American music festival. It belongs to a wider culture shaped by ten principles, including inclusion, gifting, participation, communal effort, civic responsibility, personal expression, and leaving no trace. In an age when almost every experience is packaged, priced, and marketed, there is something refreshing about an event where the more interesting question is not what you bought, but what you contributed.
Those who have never attended such a gathering might struggle to understand the attraction. It is certainly not a luxury holiday. There is dust, uncomfortable weather, equipment to transport, camps to build and dismantle, and an immense amount of work behind the scenes. Water, sanitation, electricity, traffic, safety, medical support, and site management require serious planning. Thousands of people cannot simply be deposited in the wilderness and told to enjoy themselves. The freedom visible on the dance floor depends on the discipline, preparation, and ingenuity that make it possible.
That is one of Midburn’s most impressive achievements. Its scale and logistical complexity would challenge many professional event organisers, while much of its character is created by participants and volunteers. The camps, artworks, and activities are not decorative extras purchased from a catalogue. They are the result of people giving their time, skills, and imagination to something they will share with strangers. It is a demanding model, and hardly a flawless one, but it produces an unusual sense of ownership.
Then night falls. The desert changes colour, art installations begin to glow, and music spills out across the open landscape. DJs and sound camps offer everything from driving electronic sets to more intimate musical encounters. There are places to dance until sunrise, but also quiet corners, workshops, conversations and moments when doing absolutely nothing seems like a perfectly respectable ambition. One person may find release in a relentless beat; another may find it sitting beneath the stars. Neither needs to justify the choice.
The attraction reaches well beyond a narrow age group or social circle. Young adults and older participants, artists, engineers, entrepreneurs, students, parents, and people from countless other walks of life find themselves occupying the same temporary streets. The wider community has also attracted visitors and connections from abroad. For a country in which citizens are so often sorted into political, religious and social categories, there is something deeply appealing about a conversation that begins with ‘Do you need a hand?’ rather than ‘Which side are you on?’
Of course, romanticism should not replace scrutiny. Such events require money, time, and stamina, and not everyone can afford the ticket, the equipment, or a week away from work and family. The ideals of openness and equality are tested by the practical barriers to participation. Noise, environmental responsibility, accessibility, and the safety of participants are legitimate concerns. These questions deserve serious answers. They do not, however, diminish the remarkable effort involved in creating a place where people can cooperate on such a scale without expecting a financial return for every contribution.
There is, however, no responsible way to write about Israelis dancing in the desert without confronting 7 October 2023. That morning, people had gathered at the Nova music festival near Re’im for the most ordinary of reasons: to listen to music, spend time with friends, and celebrate being alive. Hamas terrorists turned that gathering into a scene of mass murder, injuries, and abductions. The festivalgoers had not set out to become symbols in a national tragedy. They had gone to dance.
Nova and Midburn are different events, with different structures, cultures, and purposes. They should not be confused. Yet there are connections between the people and communities drawn to music, freedom and collective celebration. The devastation of 7 October, and the war that followed, reached into these circles as it did into so many others across Israel. For survivors, bereaved families, and their friends, a dance floor can now evoke loss as readily as joy. Any discussion of returning to music must begin by acknowledging that pain.
But remembrance does not require the living to surrender the pleasures of life. To honour those who were murdered is to remember them, stand with the wounded and bereaved, and insist that security failures are confronted rather than excused. It is not to grant terrorism the additional victory of deciding that an entire society must never again gather, laugh, fall in love, or dance.
Israelis sometimes seem to demand an apology for every public expression of happiness. How can people go on holiday, eat at a restaurant, attend a concert or celebrate with friends while so much suffering remains? The question is understandable, but its premise is unsustainable. No society can survive on vigilance, sacrifice, and grief alone. Resilience is built in shelters, military units, and emergency rooms, but also in friendships, music, humour, creativity, and the small rituals through which people recognise one another as human beings rather than merely fellow citizens under threat.
There is an important distinction between taking a break from the pressure and abandoning one’s responsibilities. Organisers of mass gatherings must meet the highest standards of security, safety, and care. After 7 October, any complacency would be unforgivable. Participants, too, carry obligations towards one another and the communities around them. Yet once those responsibilities are taken seriously, joy should not be treated as a moral weakness. It is a source of strength and sometimes the thing that allows a person to return to difficult responsibilities with renewed patience and energy.
Nor does everyone need a desert camp or an electronic music set to find relief. For some, it is a small concert; for others, a walk in nature, a meal with friends, or an uninterrupted afternoon with their children. That is why the lesson extends beyond Midburn. Public authorities and local communities should regard safe, accessible cultural and recreational spaces as part of a healthy society, including outside the major cities and for families with limited means. Quality of life cannot be postponed until the arrival of perfect peace. In Israel, waiting for an entirely untroubled moment would mean waiting far too long.
There is also something unmistakably Israeli about the spectacle of a city rising out of an empty stretch of desert, functioning for a few intense days and then being painstakingly taken apart. People debate every detail, improvise solutions, volunteer, argue, work exhausting hours and somehow manage to celebrate together. It is a familiar national portrait: noisy, imperfect, occasionally chaotic, but also resourceful, generous and stubbornly alive.
Midburn does not resolve Israel’s political divisions, end a war or repair a broken heart. It never promised to. Its contribution is more modest, and perhaps for that reason more persuasive. For a few days, people can make something beautiful together, offer their talents without demanding a reward, make room for strangers and remember that existence is about more than surviving the next crisis.
We will continue to mourn those who are gone, support those who were harmed, defend the country and demand that those responsible do everything possible to prevent another catastrophe. None of that requires us to abandon music, friendship, art or the right to be happy. Anyone who sought to turn the silence of that terrible October morning into a permanent silence should understand one thing: we will not stop dancing.