Noy Leyb Left his NYC Startup to Fight for Israel

IDF soldier Noy Leyb began documenting himself fighting in Gaza after October 7th. He never imagined the ripple effect that his personal footage from Gaza would create. After posting his videos on Instagram, they quickly went viral and garnered a massive social media following. Today, Noy has shifted gears entirely—leaving behind his startup company in New York to focus full-time on Jewish advocacy.

Noy grew up in Calgary, Canada, with parents who were deeply Zionistic. His father was the president of their synagogue and his mother taught in Hebrew school. After high school, when all his friends were applying to university, he decided to take a different path. At age 18, he moved to Israel and enlisted in the IDF as a lone soldier, serving as a paratrooper.

“I was the first kid from Calgary to become a lone soldier. After I enlisted, 11 other kids joined. They claimed I created a path for them to follow. I am really proud of that,” he says.

After a few years of serving in the army, Noy was released from active duty as a First Sergeant. He moved to Australia and sold Dead Sea skincare products at the mall. “It was there that I learned some of the best sales skills of my life.”

He went on to work for travel companies like Intercontinental Hotels and in high tech before heading to Michigan to pursue an MBA, but instead of going the corporate route he and a friend decided to build their own tech company.

“It was a platform for bachelorette trips. The person could say exactly what they want and share their interests and we would organize the perfect trip using AI. We raised funds through accelerators, but after October 7th, everything changed.”

Noy went back to serve in the IDF. He started documenting his war experiences through personal footage and posting it on social media.

“This is something soldiers don’t do. It’s unique and dangerous at the same time.”

Opening to a tunnel in Gaza

When Noy first started, he barely had any followers on Instagram but then his account started to explode.

“I brought my digital camera and GoPro into Gaza. I would film everything and report back to people waiting for my updates on Gaza. I did this for four months.”

Noy’s unit was the first reserve duty unit to enter Gaza. They would receive intelligence on which houses belonged to Hamas and which were dangerous. They would then enter each house and either look for terrorists, weapons or try to gain more information.

 

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“Once inside a home, we had to clear every room. We checked every corner, looked under beds, in sofas, and even in fridges. We cleared houses thoroughly, either eliminating terrorists inside or gathering critical intelligence they left behind. Once we cleared a house, we would either move onto the next house, or sleep there, to avoid terrorist detection.”

Their unit also searched each house for terror tunnels. “We’d rip up floors searching for them. Sometimes we’d find nothing, but for the most part we would find tunnels. We’d call in a specialized engineering unit to handle it. Unfortunately, many tunnels were booby-trapped and we learned that the hard way. There’s an entire unit specifically trained to deal with these threats.

At times his unit would enter houses that obviously belonged to professional terrorists. Other homes belonged to families. “It was eerie to see a normal family home with pictures of Hamas. We went into one house and when we turned left, we found a little girl’s room. It was painted pink and purple and had dolls, books, a mini desk—everything about it was so normal. Then I moved the armoire and discovered a picture of Hamas terrorists all holding guns and wearing the paraphernalia. Oddly, there were little hearts drawn around each one. As a kid, I followed hockey players, while this little girl had been taught to idolize murderers.”

Hearts for terrorists

Their third Friday in Gaza, Noy and his fellow soldiers were playing cards on their break. Suddenly, over the radio, they heard there was an emergency with many casualties.

His unit had trained for this moment and immediately sprang into action. The incident had happened just fifty meters away.

“Normally, when something like this happens, it’s loud—bombs are going off, people are screaming in pain. It’s total chaos. But when we got to the site of the event, it was eerily silent. We thought to ourselves, either we were in the wrong place or something was terribly wrong.”

The reason for the silence became quickly apparent: everyone was either dead or unconscious.

The attack had been orchestrated remotely. The IDF soldiers had been spotted by cameras and Hamas detonated a bomb remotely that killed four soldiers instantly.

Six others were still alive, though badly wounded.

“We finished around 11:30 p.m. and returned to the house we were sleeping in. It was pitch dark and no one really wanted to do anything. But it was Shabbat, so we prayed. No one had an appetite but I took some grape juice and made Kiddush in honor of the soldiers that fell. ‘The death of our comrades should strengthen us,’ I said.”

A week later, around 4:00 p.m., again on a Friday, Noy was on the second floor of a building, guarding with another soldier, when Hamas fired a drone at the building.

“It felt like a scene out of a video game. Everything shook. Various soldiers had different reactions because you can’t really train for this.”

Some fired back. Others screamed, “Get them!” or “Let’s get out of here.”

Then Hamas fired an RPG that landed just a meter and a half away from Noy.

“I felt the force of it and made sure everyone got cover. Afterwards, I took a picture of myself holding the end of the RPG. If Hamas had fired just one degree to the left, I wouldn’t be here today. It’s a crazy feeling, having an RPG fly past you and not hit you.

“When I was in Gaza, my friend found a book. It was a science and health book. The first page of the book was dedicated to all the martyrs of Jihad. It was super disturbing. My friend ripped the page out, folded it, and put it in his pocket.

“I said, ‘Wait, we need to take a video of this.’ So we unfolded it and filmed it.”

After posting the picture of the book, Noy got destroyed on social media. “People thought I had printed the page myself and brought it back to Israel. Gigi Hadid’s sister, Alana, called me a liar and a ‘genocide soldier’. People wrote ‘Baby killer’. They said, ‘You deserve to die.’”

Today, Noy is on a list of 85 soldiers in Canada who have been coined Genocide Soldiers.

Noy says that he doesn’t care about these lists or looks at the comments anymore. It only fazes him when the comments are about his family.

Still, there’s a silver lining. “For every hateful comment, I get messages from people around the world telling me I’ve changed their perspective on Israel and the Jews.”

People from Africa have written, “I still don’t fully agree with everything Israel is doing, but you totally changed my perspective.”

Guard duty in Gaza

People say to Noy, “Listen man I’ve followed a lot of Influencers. Everyone posts the same thing. Yours is unique because It’s from inside Gaza.” It’s comments like these that give him more courage and energy.

Advocate for Israel

Noy became a vocal advocate for Israel, often speaking at universities across the U.S. He partners with DIPLOACT and has spoken in over 50 different communities since October 7th.

“I’d put up a sign: ‘I’m a Zionist, ask me anything,'” he says, recalling one event in Dearborn, Michigan, an area with a large Palestinian population. “I got yelled at, I got threatened—but I don’t care. I do this because it’s the right thing.

“I don’t get paid to do it. If I don’t tell people a first-hand account of what happened, who will?”

Noy has started working on workshops to help students speak up against antisemitism.

He now leads Strong Voices for Israel, an organization with two core missions. The first is sending powerful speakers directly to non-Jewish communities that most organizations overlook — doing the hard, face-to-face work. These include IDF soldiers, October 7 survivors, victims of antisemitism, and second-generation Holocaust survivors. Their presence sparks real conversations and shifts perspectives.

The second is empowering the Jewish community through interactive workshops that give allies the knowledge, confidence, and tools to stand proudly and effectively for Israel.

Noy is determined to change the narrative around Israel, one post and one interaction at a time.

Follow Noy on Instagram @noyleyb https://www.instagram.com/noyleyb/

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