President Isaac Herzog hosted on Tuesday an event honoring the creators of the documentary We Will Dance Again, which recently won the International Emmy Award for Best Documentary on a Current Affairs topic.
The event was attended by the film’s directors and producers, along with survivors of the Nova festival massacre and former Hamas hostages.
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President Isaac Herzog with Eliya Cohen (right), who was abducted from the Nova festival, and his partner Ziv Abud
(Photo: HOT, Sipur)
Among those present were Eliya Cohen, who was abducted from the Nova festival, and his partner Ziv Abud, who escaped. “We must not forget that we still have brothers who endured the same hell I did for 505 days,” Cohen told the president.
“It’s been almost six months since my return. In your presence, Mr. President, I ask you—do everything you can. Bring them home. My brother, who was with us in the shelter, deserves to be here too. There’s also Elkana, the festival’s producer, and of course, another 48 hostages who must all return.”
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Directed by Yariv Mozer and produced by HOT and SIPUR, We Will Dance Again revisits the horrific October 7 attack on a music festival near Kibbutz Re’im, telling the personal stories of survivors. The film won the 2025 International Emmy Award for Current Affairs Documentary in June.
The event included participation by director Yariv Mozer, HOT CEO Tal Granot, and a panel featuring Shira Shapira—the mother of the late Aner Shapira—as well as Nova survivors Tamir Leshetz, Yuval Siman Tov, and Noam Ben David Asher.
“Since October 7, documentary cinema has proven to be a powerful tool for preserving the story, reflecting justice and truth, amplifying the outcry, and showcasing determination and resilience,” Herzog said. “I thank everyone involved for their dedication, professionalism, and the moving representation at the Emmy Awards, where you dedicated the prize to the return of the hostages.
“I want to remind everyone of the Health Ministry’s shocking report, submitted to the Red Cross, along with horrifying images and videos of the hostages. These make it clear to us and to the entire world that the monstrous acts of October 7 have not ended; they continue to happen every day, every hour—right now—in Hamas tunnels.”
“These are daily, planned crimes against humanity, proving beyond any doubt that every hostage case is an urgent humanitarian matter. Hamas murderers are brutally torturing them, and we—Israel, the international community, and certainly the free world—must use every tool at our disposal to bring them home as quickly as possible, until the last one is freed.”
Herzog concluded: “We must keep all the hostages and their anxious families at the forefront of our minds, and act creatively, responsibly, and with full commitment to bring them back.”
Before anything else, We Will Dance Again is “a portrait of Israeli society,” said Granot. “It’s a film that reached tens of millions worldwide to show them the truth, but first and foremost, it touches every home in Israel. For me, it perfectly embodies our mission to be the home of Israeli creativity.”