A probe into the hours leading up to the massacre found that the first signs of an impending invasion were detected some 9 1/2 hours before Hamas attacked
The Israel Defense Forces presented on Thursday night the findings of its internal probes into the failures leading up to and during the Hamas-led cross-border terrorist attacks and the resulting massacre of 1,200 people in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“The State of Israel chose a policy of ‘conflict management’ vis-à-vis Hamas, whose purpose is to preserve and improve the existing reality, and from which the military methods of operation were derived,” the IDF charged in the probes, which were geared to draw operational lessons and not take aim at decisions by the political echelons.
“It is wrong to ‘manage’ a conflict with an enemy whose goal is your destruction,” the top-level military investigations stated on Thursday, concluding that Hamas terrorists “took advantage of Israel’s policy of ‘conflict management’ to advance an orderly plan for a broad attack.”
The report focused on four main topics: The development of the IDF’s “perceptions” of the Gaza Strip between 2018 and Oct. 7, 2023; the intelligence and decision-making processes on the eve of the attack; battles during the first days of the war; and “additional focal points.”
Israel Katz, the Israeli minister of defense, stated on Thursday night that he ordered all findings to be forwarded to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “and to prepare to present any probe deemed necessary in detail.”
Katz’s announcement came following complaints from the Prime Minister’s Office that the findings were not shared with the premier prior to their publication, according to reports in Hebrew media.
Investigation into the hours leading up to the massacre revealed that the first signs of an impending invasion were detected around 9 p.m., some nine-and-a-half hours before Hamas and Palestinian Arabs attacked.
Warning signs included preparations for rocket fire, operatives entering tunnels and the activation of dozens of Israeli SIM cards inside the Strip.
The offices of Netanyahu and then-Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant were informed of the developments during the night; however, political officials were not woken up by their military secretaries.
After the attack was launched at 6:29 a.m. the next day—on Shabbat and the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah—some 5,500 terrorists infiltrated Israeli territory through 114 breaches in the security fence, and using seven vessels and six paragliders, according to the IDF’s findings. The Hamas-led terrorists were said to have breached the border under the cover of 3,889 rockets and 57 drones.
The military now understands that Hamas had gradually prepared plans to “break the defense of the Gaza Division” since 2016. Yet when the Military Intelligence Directorate obtained Hamas’s attack plans, dubbed “Jericho Wall,” in 2022, they were dismissed as unrealistic.
Following the 11-day “Operation Guardian of the Walls” against Hamas in May 2021, the Israeli conception was that the terror organization suffered significant losses and was effectively deterred from major action, the report stated.
A year later, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh wrote to Hamas military leader Yahya Sinwar in the Gaza Strip: “During a meeting with [senior leader Hassan] Nasrallah [of Hezbollah], we reviewed the strategic path.” The missive concluded: “This is a realistic scenario that can be realized—the destruction of Israel.”
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi was not told of the “Jericho Wall” plan and only heard about it two weeks into the war, the report noted.
“The responsibility is mine. I was the commander of the army on Oct. 7, and I also bear the full responsibility for all of you,” said the chief of staff, who has taken the blame for the military’s failures and plans to resign in March, in remarks published by the IDF on Thursday evening.
“I think that an organization and a person who does not know how to stand and look failure in the eye will have a very, very difficult time fixing it,” Halevi continued. “I have been careful since Oct. 7, 2023, Simchat Torah, every day, several times, to look failure in the eye.
Halevi explained that “we have soldiers who fought heroically—we heard their voices on the radio during the inquiries—we have female observers who did not stop reporting professionally and calmly until the last moment, we have commanders who made dramatic decisions—after fighting, after being wounded—to enter into another battle to try and save the situation, we have a senior IDF command, part of which is sitting here, that took up arms and went to fight.”
He concluded: “This is the IDF.”
During the Oct. 7 onslaught, Hamas-led terrorists and unaffiliated Gaza “civilians” not only murdered 1,200 but wounded thousands more and abducted 251 back to Gaza, 58 of who remain in captivity after 510 days.