The just published report of the top-level investigation by Israel Defence Forces (IDF) into the Israeli military’s failure to gauge the impending lethal attack by Hamas on 7 October, 2023 reveals the military intelligence was so complacent about its false assessment of Hamas that it did not act even when unusual movements had been seen in Gaza the night before catastrophe struck Israel. Some 5,000 Hamas-led terrorists from the Gaza Strip burst into southern Israel carrying out a murderous rampage of unprecedented intensity and scale. The IDF probes have come out with evidence that the force struggled to mount a response with bases closest to the border overrun and the chain of command broken amid the chaos. The attack claimed the lives of some 1,200 people in Israel, with another 251 people kidnapped and much of the area devastated. Most victims were civilians.
The material released by the IDF shows Hamas’ invasion was possible because of the colossal failure for years of the Israeli forces to properly keep track of Hamas’ preparations and analyse whatever credible information its intelligence wing collected. The Israeli military establishment deluded itself into the belief that Hamas did not have the nerve nor the intent to launch a ground offensive against Israel. At the most it could fire rockets which Israel’s sophisticated system of interception could easily neutralize. This was the assessment of the IDF that was far removed from reality.
Also Read
What is even worse and scandalous for Israel is that the Israeli army was “defeated” for several hours at the hands of Hamas during the invasion. The chaos and confusion catastrophically slowed the fight back on the day.
The probes at the General Staff level are focused on four main topics. The IDF believed, prior to the 7 October onslaught, that the Hamas in Gaza did not pose a significant threat to Israel, it was uninterested in a large-scale war and any cross-border threat would be thwarted by Israel’s high-tech border fence. The investigation highlighted a widening gap between the IDF’s perceptions of Hamas and what the terror group was doing in reality. As part of its investigation, the IDF has now determined that Hamas had decided in April 2022 to launch such an attack. By September 2022, the terror group was at 85 per cent readiness and it decided in May 2023 to launch the assault on 7 October. This investigation also found that the IDF’s conduct, decision-making, and intelligence assessments on the night between 6 and 7 October were based on the result of years of false assessments about Hamas. As a result, intelligence officials at all levels failed to provide a warning for what would come.
Interestingly, even though the IDF probe has provided stark details of the holes in the famed intelligence service of Israel, there is not a word on the political establishment, especially Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Far-Right allies. While the latter were busy with their political goal of virtual ethnic cleansing to displace millions of Palestinians from their homes in Gaza and destroy their houses and infrastructure, they failed to oversee the work of their defence forces and intelligence apparatus. According to one school of opinion, Netanyahu was opposed to any cease-fire because he feared this would give an opportunity to his adversaries to raise the issue of his government’s intelligence failure and demand his resignation. It was to save his chair and his political future that he wanted the war with Hamas to drag on.
This raises the question of why the probe report has been made public now. The answer is the ruling establishment of Israel now feels safe as global and regional attention has shifted from the Hamas attack to US President Donald Trump’s plan to rebuild Gaza, forcing the Palestinians to leave their homes effectively, never to return. This seems to be the most opportune time to disclose the failure of the Israeli military and the government to anticipate Hamas’ invasion without attracting much public criticism.
Also Read: Trump suspends all military aid to Ukraine days after Oval Office showdown with Zelensky
Israel’s deadly intelligence and system’s failure should be a dire warning for India. Encircled by enemies on all sides since the failure of relations in the neighbourhood has collapsed, India is constantly prone to any kind of attack. Dependence on imported hardware for intelligence gathering and warfare, added with a lethargic and unwilling manpower, India has many hurdles to overcome that it has consistently been neglecting for decades. This should be a wake up call for the Indian political leadership.
