Gaping flaws appeared before, during and even after the violent attack carried out by Hamas in Israel on October 7, 2023: the intelligence services were lacking, the responses in the first hours were not up to par, but Beyond that, an entire system is being questioned. However, no Israeli political or military leader, and first and foremost the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, seems in a hurry to launch a commission of inquiry, as long as the war continues.
In July, the army released the results of a limited investigation into the attack on Kibbutz Beeri, concluding a slow response and poor organization. Another investigation was launched in December 2023 by the state controller, a loyalist of Mr. Netanyahu. She was suspended by the attorney general, arguing that she risked harming the war effort. The procedure was launched following a request from the Israeli association Movement for Quality Government, which fights against corruption and excesses of power. The association wants a state commission of inquiry, independent of the government.
Several officials nevertheless drew conclusions from these events. In April, Major General Aharon Haliva, head of military intelligence, was the first officer to acknowledge his responsibility in the October 7 security fiasco and to announce his resignation. In June, Avi Rosenfeld, commander of the Gaza division, followed suit. Yossi Sariel, the head of Unit 8200, the elite cyber intelligence unit, followed in September. The head of Shin Bet – internal intelligence – in the southern region of Israel, who remained anonymous, has left his post. It must be said that, according to revelations from New York Times published on November 30, Israeli services had obtained the plans for the attack, a 40-page Hamas document codenamed “Wall of Jericho”, a year before its launch. And the signals multiplied, until the day before the attack.
The flaws
On October 6, at 11 p.m., an Israeli army lookout, member of a team monitoring Hamas movements in Gaza, warned that a certain Ali Al-Qadhi, leader of a section of the armed group in the north of the enclave, acts suspiciously: “It looks like he is preparing for an assault, with his men”she reports, according to an investigation by the Israeli daily Haaretzpublished in May 2024. The recipient of the alert, an officer from the Gaza division, does not pay attention to it, convinced that it is routine training. A few hours later, the Islamist movement launched the deadliest attack in Israeli history.
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