Lior Asulin, 43: Ex-soccer player killed celebrating his birthday
Murdered by Hamas terrorists at the Supernova music festival, October 7
Lior Asulin, a former Israeli soccer star, was murdered while attending the Supernova music festival near Re’im on October 7.
He attended the rave in celebration of his 43rd birthday, which fell a day earlier. Among the friends celebrating with him were Hanan Yablonka, who was presumed captive in Gaza for more than 7 months, until his body was recovered in late May by the IDF, which said he had been killed on October 7 and his body taken hostage.
Lior was buried on October 12 in Ra’anana. He is survived by his three children, Rom, 18, Sun, 17 and Amor, 16, his mother, Mimi, and his siblings Moshe, Dado and Ortal. His father, Avi, died in 2021.
Asulin played as a striker for numerous top Israeli teams, including 10 years with Maccabi Herzliya, during a professional career that spanned from 1997-2017, in which he tallied 176 goals. After retiring he pursued a career as a coach, although his legal troubles cut that path short.
“The Hapoel Tel Aviv club bows its head and sends condolences and strength to Lior’s family at this difficult time,” one of his former clubs said in a statement.
Asulin spent eight months in prison in 2022 as part of a plea deal for dealing drugs. He told Ynet following his release that being in prison was difficult, but he found solace in his faith as well as his plans and dreams for the future.
“What kept me sane was the knowledge that when I left there, I was going to do everything I could to never go back,” he said in an interview in 2022 following his release. “Get up, work, rehabilitate my life and my relationships with my family and my children.”
His brother, Moshe, told a sports podcast that “in the soccer world he was Lior and at home he was my little brother. Always smiling, always playful, always laughing, always helping… it’s a huge loss for the world of sport, for the world of soccer, for our personal lives. He loved life, he loved to do everything. That was Lior.”
Moshe said that after Lior’s release from prison, “it was a very difficult period. He left soccer and tried to find his place. There’s no lower place than prison,” he said, but in a way, the arrest set him on a new path: “He was released, worked two jobs, tried to make a living on his own and take care of his kids. He understood there was a life after soccer, after success, and he succeeded in doing that. I saw him dealing with it.”
Lior’s sister, Ortal, told Walla that “if anyone else had gone through what he went through, they would lower their head, be depressed, and not get out of bed — but Lior was the opposite. To him sleeping was a curse, he had 40 hours in the day, not 24. He would go from party to friends and then to his parents and then go make music — he lived life, took advantage of life, tried everything and tasted everything. That’s something you can’t say about a lot of people.”
His mother, Mimi, told Channel 13 news that in his recent years he was “satisfied, sweet, he had finally found his place.”
Mimi said her son “was a good soul… what else can I say about him? I lost my soul,” she said. “You know who Lior was. A soccer player, a good boy, a good friend, loyal.”
