Dan Benhamou, 27: French immigrant with ambitions to be a CEO

Daniel (Dan) Benhamou, 27, from Ra’anana, was murdered by Hamas terrorists at the Supernova music festival on October 7.

Dan attended the rave with three other friends: Tomer Segev, Antonio Macías Montaño and Yvonne Rubio Vargas, and all four were slain that day.

He was buried in Ra’anana on October 11. He is survived by his parents, Muriel and Shmuel, and his three siblings.

Born in Marseille to French parents, Dan and his family moved to Israel when he was a young boy and settled in Ra’anana.

He worked as a regional manager with the Carolina Lemke glasses retailer, while studying management and economics at the Open University. Loved ones said he was dedicated to his job and had a big drive to succeed, alongside a love of a wide and eclectic range of music. He was also a big dog lover, and was devastated when his dog Lucky died a few months before he was killed.

Dan’s friend and colleague, Peleg Avraham, wrote on Facebook to “my manager, my mentor, my brother, my friend — one of the closest people to me.”

“You believed in me, invested in me and took me by the hand from the first moment to the last moment I worked with you,” added Peleg, noting their four years of friendship. “You were an incredible boss and I couldn’t have asked for any better. While working together we got to know each other… You were a smart guy with a good heart who never tried to keep any distance, just wanted to get to know everyone and try to make sure things were good for everyone.”

Peleg wrote, “I will never forget you, your positive energy, even when things were difficult, your lofty ambitions, the goals you set for yourself that you will sadly never get to achieve, even though you worked so hard for them, even though I have no doubt that you would have reached them.”

His close friend, Yadael Hazan, told a local news site that Dan was “a comic guy with the timing of tactlessness and perfect pratfalls, that it almost looked like he was doing it on purpose.”

Dan was the one “who introduced me to rap music and made me love it,” Yadael said. Despite his humor, “he was a serious guy who was devoted to his job. I remember him telling me that he was studying business management at the Open University to prepare to one day be a CEO.”

Dan, he said “was creative, sharp. He wanted to build a family more than anything. And he believed in me from the beginning that I would succeed. Music was his place of refuge and his connection to other people, what gave him life.”

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