The Israeli military’s first military report on the October 7, 2023, attacks revealed that Israeli security officials misjudged the Hamas-led attack and grossly underestimated the group’s capabilities. According to the report, Hamas’ intentions were not correctly interpreted even hours before the attack.<\/p>\n
According to\u00a0The Wall Street Journal<\/em>, the report stated that there were many indications that the attack was imminent, but these were not taken seriously enough by the Israeli authorities. On the evening of October 6, 2023, Hamas militants activated Israeli SIM cards and moved to designated assembly points, but the Israeli authorities did not consider these actions as unusual. The authorities believed that Hamas was either conducting a military exercise, preparing to defend against an attack from Israel, or planning small-scale cross-border raids. However, these signs were ignored as clear signals that Hamas was preparing a large-scale attack.<\/p>\n The report, prepared as a result of the highest-level investigation by the Israeli army, sheds light on one of the biggest security weaknesses in the country’s history. The report stated that Israeli intelligence units misjudged Hamas, ignored documents containing the group’s attack plans, and missed numerous signals. It was emphasized that these intelligence failures triggered the attacks that continued for more than a year after the attack.<\/p>\n Just a few hours before the attack, senior Israeli military officials held discussions about suspicious Hamas activity. However, the urgency of the attack was not recognized. Herzi Halevi, Chief of the Israeli General Staff, ordered a more extensive briefing the following day. That same night, the Israeli general on the northern front was summoned to military headquarters in Tel Aviv in anticipation of an attack by Hezbollah. The Israeli army’s focus on the northern front caused it to lose sight of the threat in Gaza. Hamas took advantage of the Jewish holiday to launch the attack at a time when the border was less guarded than usual.<\/p>\n According to the report, Israeli military planners, when designing a possible attack scenario from Gaza, envisaged that Hamas would at most try to cross between 4 and 8 border points. However, Hamas militants crossed the border at almost 60 points. Their first target was the Israeli military base responsible for the perimeter of the Gaza Strip. Here, they killed senior commanders and destroyed Israel’s intelligence capacity in the area. This left Israel unable to follow developments on the ground in the first three hours of the offensive. 1,200 Israeli soldiers and civilians lost their lives, and 251 were taken hostage. The first reinforcements did not arrive until 5.5 hours later, and it took three days for Hamas to be completely repelled.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0The Times of Israel<\/em>, the investigation found that although the Israeli military intercepted plans detailing a possible attack in 2022, it considered it unlikely and that former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar did not think that an attack would be carried out because he was “pragmatic.”<\/p>\n The report found that Hamas approved this attack plan in 2019, received operational approval in 2021, and began setting a date for the attack in 2022. Despite this, the Israeli authorities stuck to the idea that Hamas did not want to start a war. Israeli intelligence failed to recognize this strategic shift, believing that Hamas was focused on building a state in Gaza and seizing the West Bank.<\/p>\n Hamas saw the political turmoil inside Israel and the protests over judicial reforms as an opportunity. At the height of the attack, Hamas’ military leader, Mohammed Deif, called on the entire population of Gaza to take up arms and attack Israel. By midday on October 7, more than 5,600 militants and civilians had crossed into Israeli territory.<\/p>\n The attack began at 6:29 a.m. when Hamas fired 1,400 rockets into Israel. At 6:45 a.m., an Israeli brigade commander radioed, “We are at war.” However, Israel did not fully understand the situation on the ground in the first hours due to the collapse of the chain of command. Some soldiers and commanders saw news of the attack on social media and traveled to the southern front by their own means. However, large-scale military reinforcements arrived hours later.<\/p>\n Reporting on the report,\u00a0The Jerusalem Post<\/em>\u00a0reported that on October 7, the Israeli Air Force implemented the Hannibal Protocol. The report mentioned that over 5,000 Hamas members had entered Israel from Gaza and that there was concern that many more Gazans could infiltrate into Israel.<\/p>\n According to the Israeli Air Force investigation, following the decision to implement the Hannibal Protocol, the pilots received “highly specific information about where and what to attack.”<\/p>\n Hamas Used Elements of “Deception”<\/p>\n According to\u00a0Yedioth Ahronoth’s<\/em>\u00a0report on the investigation, Israel’s biggest mistake was to believe that Hamas was incapable of waging a large-scale war. “Israel is superior to its enemies” and “the intelligence directorate knows everything,” while Hamas used elements of “deception” to support this perception.<\/p>\n Israel Army Radio reported that investigations showed that the Israeli army was surprised by the speed and planning of the October 7 attack.<\/p>\n Israeli Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, whose term of office ends on March 6, said at the meeting where the investigations were presented, “I am responsible. On October 7, I was the commander of the army, and I am also responsible for you.” He reiterated that the responsibility lies with him.<\/p>\n Halevi stated that they had failed and that he tried to face failure every day.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Israeli military’s first military report on the October 7, 2023, attacks revealed that Israeli security officials misjudged the Hamas-led attack and grossly underestimated the group’s capabilities. According to the report, Hamas’ intentions were not correctly interpreted even hours before the attack. According to\u00a0The Wall Street Journal, the report stated that there were many indications […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8136,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[7381,7384,1334,294,7379,2503,7383,812,3066,7378,7380,7382,2707,7377,7385,1837],"class_list":["post-8135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middleeast","tag-attack-plans","tag-deception","tag-gaza","tag-hamas","tag-hannibal-protocol","tag-herzi-halevi","tag-intelligence-directorate","tag-israel","tag-israeli-army","tag-israeli-intelligence-failure","tag-israeli-security","tag-military-report","tag-mohammed-deif","tag-october-7-attack","tag-security-weaknesses","tag-yahya-sinwar"],"yoast_head":"\n