The first Israeli-Palestinian boyband was ready to take on the world – then came 7 October
It should have been a feel-good story: six young men, plucked from obscurity to become music stars. That’s how Neta Rozenblat, a member of boyband as1one, puts it.
Pop hopefuls do not usually find themselves having to navigate fear, grief and complex political issues before the world even knows their names – but theirs is not a typical story.
As1one are billed as the first-ever Israeli Jewish and Palestinian Arab boyband, put together following a two-year search by US hitmakers behind acts such as Maroon 5 and Kings Of Leon.
While the band has found considerable support, including from big names – they recorded their first single with Nile Rodgers at London’s Abbey Road – as Israel’s military campaign in Gaza continues, they have also faced criticism and some outrage. “Wrong Direction”, reads one headline, while other critics say the concept is in poor taste.
As1one and Nile Rodgers. Pic: Andrew Berkowitz
The six members, four Israelis and two Palestinians, are early 20-somethings Nadav Philips, Niv Lin, Aseel Farah, Ohad Attia and Sadik Abu Dogosh, alongside Rozenblat.
They are hoping to become the Middle Eastern version of BTS. They say all they ever wanted to do was sing – now, they also want to spread a message of unity.
After auditions and the selection process, the young men were flown out to LA to start work on 6 October 2023. “On to the next adventure,” they posted on Instagram ahead of the flight, not knowing what was to come.
The following day, they woke up to the news of the militant group Hamas’s attack on Israel; some 1,200 people were killed and more than 200 were taken hostage. Since Israel’s retaliation, at least 44,500 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry. Israel claims it has killed more than 17,000 militants.
“We were just having fun, fulfilling our dreams,” says singer and pianist Lin, 23, who grew up in the southern Israeli town of Sapir, near the site of the Supernova music festival, at which more than 360 people were killed. During his early days in LA, he learned a friend had died. “Suddenly the war has begun. We really didn’t know what to do.”
They contemplated returning home, he says. “Then we realised we have a big opportunity. We can show the world it’s possible to be Israeli and Palestinian together… it doesn’t matter who you are.”
‘We are just six musicians, at the end of the day’
Speaking on Zoom from LA, the band members are sitting in a tight formation, camera ready, and take turns to answer questions, with 22-year-old Rozenblat, who plays piano, guitar and violin, taking the lead. They are all boyband gloss, smiles and enthusiasm, but respond readily to questions about their critics.
Rozenblat, who served as a medic in the Israeli army, points out the band was formed before the current war broke out and was “never intended to be a political statement”. But it’s hard not to be when their marketing highlights their “Israeli-Palestinian boyband” uniqueness.
“We all give our opinions, we all take each and every one of our opinions and our emotions very seriously,” says 22-year-old Palestinian Farah, the group’s rapper and dancer, addressing the imbalance of having four Israeli and two Palestinian members, and not an equal split.
“Me and Sadik have Palestinian identity, the other four have Israeli identity… in the end, we are here for our music.”
“This combination just made more sense,” Philips interjects. They were the six who worked best together.
“In the new context that we find ourselves in [following the outbreak of the war], it’s easier to look into it and to really try to find some sort of hidden meaning,” says Rozenblat. “People will see us as four Israelis and two Palestinians, but we’re just six musicians, at the end of the day.”
In a world divided, as1one are united through friendship, brotherhood and music. Our hearts break for all the lives lost, the injured, and the grieving. We are singers and musicians. We are Israelis and Palestinians. We come from the same place. Each of us is very different – yet we are all one. This idea guides our band and we hope and pray, one day, this idea will guide the world.
The search for ‘diverse’ talent
The music executives behind as1one, Ken Levitan and James Diener, say the aim was to create a “global, state-of-the-art pop group from the Middle East region” and showcase the “incredible and undeniable talent from this area of the world on a global stage”.
They focused on Israel and its mix of cultures and heritages, says Diener over email, following the interview with the group. “Then, we set out to find a diverse group of singers, rappers, instrumentalists and dancers throughout the country.”
Farah is from a Palestinian neighbourhood in the city of Haifa. Abu Dogosh is from Rahat, an Arab Bedouin city in Israel’s Southern District.
Auditions for as1one were not held in the West Bank or Gaza due to restrictions limiting movement and travel, which were “widely known… even before the current conflict”, says Levitan.
Ultimately, there were no “workable scenarios” to scout talent in those areas, he says. “But our goal was to find as diverse a line-up as possible, and musicians who were part of the roughly two million Palestinian Arabs living in the state of Israel were included in our search.”
He says they sought advice from local experts, including Palestinian Arab musical experts, and ensured their efforts were “as respectful and inclusive as possible”, with the support of the families of those auditioning.
Can as1one be truly representative? And how do Palestinians in those occupied territories feel about a shiny, happy boyband spreading a message of unity, when the obstacles to peace are more complex?
The band attended the MTV Video Music Awards in New York earlier this year. Pic: Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
‘We’re not politicians – we don’t have the solution’
In the interview, Rozenblat responds, saying they all only ever wanted to sing. Both Farah and Abu Dogosh have family and friends in the West Bank, they tell me.
“We’re not politicians,” says Rozenblat. “We don’t know what the solution is for the conflict. We are here to make music.” However, he acknowledges why their background has led to questions.
“We are Israelis and we are Palestinians. We experienced this firsthand… a lot of the time, people will talk about the conflict as two sides and forget there’s people [involved]. These are our families, these are our people, they are our friends. People that we personally know, they’re involved in this conflict, and we want to just remind people that we’re all human.”
They are all supported by their friends and family, says Attia, 22, a singer who plays guitar, bass and drums. “When we got here we all had thoughts to come back. We were so worried about our families and wanted to be with them because this is the hardest time of ours and their lives. But they told us they want us to stay here.”
A new four-part documentary follows the band’s creation and the work put in before their launch. More than 1,000 young men auditioned across Israel before the final 20 were whittled down in 2022, during a boot camp in Neve Shalom, a unique village in Israel where Jewish and Arab citizens live together peacefully.
After the six were picked, the cameras followed their journey to LA. Having been “raised so differently”, the six young men were all “trying to convince each other what’s right and what’s wrong” after the Hamas attacks, says Philips. “The right thing to do is to listen.”
Read more from Sky News:
Dick Van Dyke says he’s ‘not afraid’ of death
Sabrina Carpenter to headline BST
“You have to die a little to learn,” adds Farah. “We have different backgrounds, different opinions… in the end, we all want peace. We all want a way to move forward.”
It has been a change of lifestyle, for some more than others. “It’s very different than home,” says Abu Dogosh, the group’s quietest member, who is shown in the documentary talking of his “simple” upbringing. “We are trying to make this our new home.”
‘If it has a good heart, then it can be good’
They want to be the world’s next biggest boyband, says Philips. They have just released their second single, Stranger, ahead of their self-titled debut album, following the first single, All Eyes On Us, the song recorded with Rodgers.
Farah says he has been inspired by the cultural change brought by BTS, who “broke out K-pop into the entire world”.
Together, as1one hope to make cultural changes, too, he says. “We want the people who make groups to feel courageous to do something a little bit controversial, a little bit risky – because if it has a good heart, then it can be good.”
Following the interview, Levitan reiterates Rozenblat’s words, saying “the world is a different place” now compared with when they started their search. “We are all looking at things through a different lens”.
But music is the soundtrack to people’s lives, he adds, and people will always find connection through it.
“All of that is what’s motivating us in the as1one journey – to create the best music, unite people and offer positivity. We are proud of as1one and their music.”
As1One: The Israeli-Palestinian Pop Music Journey is out on Paramount+ from 3 December
Before he died alone in his jacuzzi, Matthew Perry had received three injections of ketamine in the space of just six hours. “Shoot me up with a big one,” he told his personal assistant, ahead of the final, fatal dose.
According to court documents, in the period leading up to 28 October 2023, Kenneth Iwamasa was illegally administering Perry with between six and eight shots of the drug, an anaesthetic that can have hallucinogenic effects, each day.
A live-in assistant, he admitted to finding the actor unconscious at his Pacific Palisades home on at least two occasions in the weeks prior.
The hit that ultimately killed the Friends star was supplied by Jasveen Sangha, also known as the “Ketamine Queen” – a dealer who apparently only dealt “with high-end and celebs”. She has agreed to plead guilty to five charges and will appear in court later today.
Her charges, along with others filed against Iwamasa and others over the supply of ketamine to Perry, exposed part of Hollywood’s underground drug network – and put the spotlight on the world of celebrity, money and power.
Jasveen Sangha was known as the ‘Ketamine Queen’. Pic: Jojo Korsh/BFA.com/Shutterstock
‘Yes men’ with terrible consequences
Perry’s death was met with both utter shock and a sad sense of the inevitable. The world knew him best as Chandler Bing, the comic heartbeat of Friends. But behind the jokes and the sarcasm, he was deeply troubled.
“It almost felt like we’d been mourning Matthew for a long time because his battle with that disease was a really hard one for him to fight,” is how his former co-star Jennifer Aniston described his addiction in a recent interview. “As hard as it was for all of us and for the fans, there’s a part of me that thinks this is better… I’m glad he’s out of that pain.”
The actor was an addict, and vulnerable – but also a huge star, worth millions.
Kenneth Iwamasa was Matthew Perry’s live-in assistant. Pic: APEX / The Mega Agency
Iwamasa was administering the injections, ultimately playing God – but to him, the power most likely lay with his famous boss. His actions may seem inexcusable, but did he feel he had a choice?
“I think it was a situation that increasingly got more and more out of control,” says Bonnie Low-Kramen, a former celebrity assistant turned trainer, and author of Be The Ultimate Assistant.
Photos: Photos: Jojo Korsh/BFA.com/Shutterstock/ APEX/The Mega Agency/ AP/ DoJ/ AP
Those who do the job, especially in Los Angeles, can be put under an enormous amount of pressure, she says, “tasked with doing things many of us wouldn’t imagine carrying out for our employers. It is a job which comes with an inherent power imbalance”.
Which means it can be incredibly hard to say no.
“When people are rich and famous, they often have people around them who won’t say no,” she says. “And assistants are in the yes business anyway.
“We’re in the business of figuring out, ‘well, let’s solve the problem…’. When money is no object, there are new rules that apply in that situation and that can be really hard to handle.”
Iwamasa is not the first celebrity assistant asked to administer or pick up illegal drugs, she says, and Perry is not the first star to die after taking drugs.
Money Iwamasa paid for ketamine. Pic Central District of California Prosecutor’s Office
Ms Low-Kramen highlights the deaths of Janis Joplin, Prince and John Belushi as just a few other examples.
“Unfortunately, there are so many examples of this tragic end, where the abuse of drugs gets to a point where they’ve handled it for a really long time, and then the day comes when it can’t be handled anymore.”
For those struggling with addiction, being surrounded by “yes men” can have terrible consequences, says Garrett Braukman, an addiction treatment executive in Hollywood.
“Treatment is difficult for people when they have yes men. They have a lot of people that are going to tell them you can get whatever you want, you can get drugs, you can get alcohol, you could do whatever, and no one is willing to really look at that from the perspective of how dangerous that is.”
Read more:
Obituary: The one who made everyone laugh
Matthew Perry: A life in pictures
Material prosecutors said was taken from Sangha’s ‘stash house’. Pic: Central District of California Prosecutor’s Office
Mr Braukman says addiction can go hand in hand with fame and that a “high” percentage of his patients work in the entertainment industry.
“I don’t know how I would be able to stay clean and sober if I go to my grandma’s house and there’s 20 guys outside of my grandma’s house taking pictures of me walking in. You become an animal to a degree that people are watching.”
Dr Salvador Plasencia appeared in court in July. Pic: Reuters/Mike Blake
Rise in use of ketamine
The use of ketamine recreationally has been on the rise in recent years, in the UK as well as the US. In England, some 3,609 people started treatment for problems with the drug in the year 2023-2024 – more than eight times the number in 2014-2015, when 426 sought help, according to government statistics.
In January, drag queen The Vivienne was found dead in the bath at their home in Cheshire, aged 32. The star’s family later told how the performer had died “from the effects of ketamine use causing a cardiac arrest”.
Ketamine is usually taken recreationally as a crushed powder, but also sometimes injected or swallowed – making people feel detached and dreamlike. It can also cause severe bladder and kidney problems.
The Vivienne died after taking ketamine in January 2025. Pic: PA
Perry’s struggles with alcohol and other drugs, before ketamine, were long running and well documented, starting with drinking as a teenager before moving on to painkilling prescription drugs Vicodin and OxyContin, and tranquilliser Xanax.
“I have spent upward of $7m (£5.8m) trying to get sober,” he wrote in his memoir, released when he was clean, just a year before his death.
While accepting the almost unsurpassable legacy of the hit show that made him a star, he said he hoped his support for fellow addicts would be the achievement he was best remembered for.
“When I die, I don’t want Friends to be the first thing that’s mentioned – I want helping others to be the first thing that’s mentioned and I’m going to live the rest of my life proving that.”
He only lived for another year.
Perry (centre) with his Friends co-stars David Schwimmer, Lisa Kudrow, Courteney Cox, Jennifer Aniston and Matt LeBlanc at the Emmys in 2002. Pic: Reuters
Illegal use v therapy
Before he died, Perry had been undergoing legal ketamine infusion therapy to treat depression and anxiety. The drug can be used as a treatment in clinical settings in the US, and some specialist and private centres in the UK – although there are concerns from some medics here about its use even in those settings.
According to a postmortem report, the actor had reportedly been clean for 19 months before he started obtaining the drug illegally as well.
It was not the supervised doses that killed him, but the idea of an addict taking the drug to help their problems might still sound shocking.
Pic: Reuters
In California, ketamine drips are legally used as pain relief, to treat mood disorders and to help with addiction. Other celebrities and notable figures – including Chrissy Teigen, Elon Musk and Sharon Osbourne – have all shared details of ketamine therapy and how it helped them.
Dr Austin Harris, owner and medical director at NeuroRelief Ketamine Infusion Therapy, says historically the drug is “extremely safe” when used in the right conditions, and swears by its effectiveness.
At the clinic in California, he explained to Sky News how it can help people with mood disorders and chronic pain, as well as those in recovery from drug or alcohol abuse.
“Which a lot of people who don’t really understand this at a scientific level might think is an oxymoron,” he says. “But actually, it’s profoundly beneficial – done properly – in resetting both neurologic and psychological patterns for substance abuse.”
Ketamine treatment at NeuroRelief Ketamine Infusion Therapy in LA
Ketamine infusion “restarts in our brain what should already be there”, he says, in terms of “the neurologic road workers, to be able to then direct, to build new patterns and actual new nerve pathways”.
One patient having therapy at the clinic also spoke to us, saying he had abused alcohol and marijuana, and occasionally opiate painkillers, for many years.
“I’ve had enough experience and decades of being addicted to drugs and alcohol and traumas and trying different things,” he said. “When I came out of that infusion I was like, wait a minute. I didn’t have the shakes. I didn’t have the cravings.”
Read more:
Parties and busted doors: Living next to ‘Ketamine Queen’
The drug addiction leaving users in chronic pain
Dr Harris emphasises the need for administration by a professional in a clinical setting. “Matthew Perry was being illegally sold ketamine on the black market. The fact that a doctor happened to be one of several people that was illegally selling it to him should not be confused with the appropriate legal utilisation of ketamine.”
The actor was vulnerable, Dr Harris continues. “It’s absolutely abominable… You have someone with serious addiction problems, lifelong. And sadly, I think that he was really taken advantage of.”
The drugs stash
As well as Sangha and Iwamasa, the others charged over Perry’s death are Erik Fleming, an associate of Perry’s who was in contact with Sangha, Dr Mark Chavez, a physician, and Dr Salvador Plasencia, who also supplied ketamine illegally to Perry.
“I wonder how much this moron will pay,” Dr Plasencia said in a text exchange between him and Chavez.
Dr Mark Chavez, a physician from San Diego, pleaded guilty in court last year. Pic: AP/ Damian Dovargan
After Perry died, Sangha desperately sought to cover her involvement. “Delete all our messages,” she instructed Fleming in a message on Signal.
In March 2024, law enforcement searched Sangha’s home and found 1.7kg of pressed pills containing methamphetamine, 79 vials of liquid ketamine, MDMA (ecstasy) tablets, counterfeit Xanax pills, baggies containing powdered ketamine and cocaine, and other drug-trafficking items such as a gold money counting machine, a scale, a wireless signal and hidden camera detector, drug packaging materials, and $5,723 in cash, according to her plea agreement.
Sangha was happy to supply to Hollywood’s rich and famous – and not an anomaly.
Several books have been written by Tinseltown dealers, and only a few months ago, the Sean “Diddy” Combs trial heard from a former personal assistant to the hip-hop mogul who testified about meeting sellers for his boss.
Now, as she becomes the last defendant to admit her role in Perry’s death, the Ketamine Queen’s guilty plea brings to a close the criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the tragedy.
But in a world where money talks, where fame and addiction or mental health issues often go hand-in-hand, it is unlikely to be the last.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment11 months agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024