On the morning of January 7, the five men were meditating on a trail near Skull Rock in the Palisades Mountains.

They close their eyes and talk about their feelings and feelings.

One said: "I feel like my breathing is slowing down." Another said: "I feel like gravity is increasing."

Then all four of them suddenly said the same thing: "I smell fire."

Sources told The Times that the five men, including 24-year-old Beni Oren, who runs a glamping business, were the first to spot the Palisades fire in its infancy around 10:15 a.m. people. Video recorded by trail runners showed them rushing downhill, away from flames and smoke.

But what started as a traumatic, near-death experience turned into what he calls a long-term nightmare after Oren posted a video of the experience on social media.

With so little information available about the origins of the deadly fires still burning in Los Angeles, people on the internet are becoming suspicious of those so close to where they started.

"I've been having mixed emotions. It's absolutely infuriating that people are blaming us," Oren said in an interview with The Times. "It's scary, too. The fact that we know from our experience that we're not doing that, but then seeing the large number of people with different theories is overwhelming."

As of Tuesday morning, the Palisades Fire had burned more than 23,000 acres. The content is 17%. At least eight people died.

Oren said he and his friends decided to go trail running that morning and summited Skull Rock around 10 a.m. before leaving the trail to meditate on another nearby rock. When they smelled smoke, the men opened their eyes and saw blazing fire on the ridge. Oren said he couldn't see exactly where the fire started, just that it moved over the ridge. The flames appeared to be about 10 feet high. The fire was about 100 feet away.

“We went into emergency mode very quickly,” Oren recalled.

The group had to run up the hill, almost toward the fire, before they could get back to the main road that would take them away from the fire. They followed the main road and fled as quickly as possible from the fire, which was spreading rapidly.

"When we ran out of there and across Skull Rock, we felt like we'd dodged death," he said. “It was an exciting experience to be up close and personal like this.”

He said the group also encountered two older women at the foot of the mountain.

Oren said he was shocked one day last Tuesday as the smoke billowed and he realized the scope of the fire.

The next day, he posted the video on X and Tik Tok. They quickly went viral, and over the next few days, Oren and his friends were targeted by internet sleuths who found it suspicious that the men with backpacks were so close to the fire.

"Investigating these kids right near where the fire started," wrote one X user, which received nearly 5,000 likes. Actor Rob Schneider referenced the post and wrote, "Please help with identification," which included a still of the man in the video. Schneider did not immediately respond to a request for comment made through his manager.

A few days later, Oren said he deleted his X account because he was afraid of all the claims he and his friends might have had something to do with the fire.

"I know people are going to think this is suspicious," he said. “It felt a little dangerous at the time to keep the video.”

This is especially frustrating for Oren because he's from Malibu. A house where he grew up burned down, but he no longer lives there. His brother's best friend's house burned down.

"I did grow up in Malibu. Why would I light this fire?" he said. "If we did this, why would we release it? Once you know all the details, things really make a difference."

Oren said authorities have not yet contacted him. But sources told The Times investigators were already aware of the video.

All the questions posed to Oren and his friends made it difficult to begin to think about how close they came to one of the worst fires in Los Angeles history.

"We actually almost died, which is pretty traumatic. To go through that and then have people try to blame us so callously. It's terrible," he said.