Failure before the war

Shortly before the surprise attack by Hamas on Saturday morning, intelligence personnel noticed an increase in the pace of work of the armed networks of “Hamas saboteurs” who were following them. Two sources in the Israeli security services, who revealed this to the New York Times, said that intelligence noticed something exceptional was going on, and they issued warnings to the fighters on the border with Gaza. But this warning did not lead to any action, either because the soldiers did not receive the message, or because they did not read it.

Shortly thereafter, Hamas sent drones and shut down part of the cellular communications network and eavesdropping towers on the border, with the aim of preventing remote surveillance via cameras. The drones also disabled the “see - shoot” system activated by remote monitoring units, with the aim of harming “saboteurs” approaching the border. According to Hamas, the number of drones that participated in the initiatory strike was 35, including the “Al-Zouari” suicide drone.

This is the introductory strike that allowed Hamas saboteurs to blow up the wall and expand it, using bulldozers, with amazing ease. It is this signal that allowed hundreds of additional “saboteurs” to enter, through these openings, into “Israeli territory.” In the "massacre" carried out by Hamas "saboteurs", more than 1,200 Israelis were killed, and more than 3,000 others were injured.

Hamas surprised Israel in terms of the attack, and also in terms of the various methods it used to cross the solid wall and enter Israel. A senior official in the security services said that the Israeli intelligence services had certain indicators indicating that there was thinking about a major operation by Hamas, but these signals were far from forming a clear picture, and they were certainly not able to warn about the timing. And the place. On the other hand, the behavior of Hamas and its leadership convinced Israel in the opposite direction - that Hamas was experiencing a relatively moderate period.

The surprise attack carried out by Hamas - which was mostly successful for it - revealed a serious flaw in the Israeli security establishment. According to four senior sources in the Israeli security services, the initial analysis indicated that Hamas’ success in carrying out a “massacre” was the result of a failure in the intelligence and army in Israel:

1. Intelligence officers failed to monitor the central communications networks used by Palestinian “saboteurs.”

2. Israel relied too much on surveillance, persecution, and monitoring tools that Hamas disabled relatively easily, which left the forces on the border blind and created a fog that the “saboteurs” exploited in order to storm bases and towns.

3. From the first phase of the attack, Hamas stormed a base where senior officers were located, thus also preventing communication with the rest of the forces and requesting support.

4. In Israel, they believed it when they heard Hamas officials say in the internal communications networks, which they knew the Israelis were eavesdropping on, that they did not intend to go into battle.

Former National Security Council official Yoel Gojansky said: “We spent billions collecting intelligence on Hamas. In an instant, everything collapsed, like a domino.”

The first failure occurred months before the war began, when senior army officials presented incorrect assessments of the threat from Gaza. National Security Council head Tzachi Hanegbi said in a radio interview 6 days before the attack that, “Since the ‘Wall Guard’ operation in May two years ago, the Hamas leadership has taken a decision to exercise unprecedented restraint.” With great confidence, he admitted that, “For more than two years, Hamas has not fired a single missile from Gaza. It is restraining itself, and knows the repercussions of another provocation. Hamas has been very deterred for at least 15 years. It is not heading towards escalation.

Even last week, when intelligence officials were informed of urgent threats to Israel, they emphasized the danger from the north. The challenge from Hamas was not mentioned. Someone said that “Hamas is deterred,” exactly as Hanegbi said publicly.

Indeed, through the conversations of Hamas activists among themselves - which they knew very well - that Israel was eavesdropping on them, they created the impression that the movement wanted to avoid the outbreak of an additional war, two years after “Guardian of the Walls.” Now, the two Israeli sources said that intelligence is examining whether these conversations are real or fake.

Two sources told the New York Times that the surveillance system was based almost solely on cameras, remote sensors, and the “see-shoot” system that is activated remotely. Senior officials in the army believed that the combination of the remote monitoring system, the solid wall and the underground barrier to prevent tunnels that pass under the wall, would make penetrating the border into Israel almost impossible, and reduce the need for a large number of soldiers present at the bases.

After installing the systems, the army began reducing the size of the forces on the Gaza border and transferring them to other areas, especially to the West Bank. General in the Reserve Army, Yisrael Ziv, who said these words to the American newspaper, added: Reducing the forces was logical, after the construction of the wall and the atmosphere that arose after that, it seemed that it was impenetrable, and no one would be able to pass through it. This reduced the level of stress among officers and soldiers, and led to a state of negligence in operational commitment. This is at a time when the army’s focus shifted to other areas, and the Southern Command did not have any scenario that raised the possibility of a major security operation like what happened.”

However, there are drawbacks to remotely controlled systems - they can be destroyed remotely as well. Hamas exploited these weaknesses by sending dozens of drones to hit the communications towers that transmitted signals to and from the systems. Without cell signals, the system becomes invalid. The soldiers at the sites and control rooms did not receive any warning about the breach, and were unable to see Hamas members on video destroying the wall with bulldozers. Even the wall itself, it turns out, was easier to penetrate than expected.

More than 1,500 “terrorists” from Gaza penetrated the wall from more than 30 points on the border, some of them via gliders that passed over the fence, and in the initial strike they reached at least 4 bases without any objection. The pictures circulated by Israeli officers show a large number of fighters who were shot in the housing rooms inside the bases, some of them while they were sleeping. Then the "saboteurs" attacked other bases.

The second operational failure was the concentration of officers from the Gaza Brigade in one large place, not far from the border. When the Gaza Brigade was occupied and the soldiers were attacked, many of the senior officers who came out to defend their soldiers, fought “valiantly,” and were killed or injured. According to two Israeli sources, some of them were captured. All of this prevented a coordinated response and a shift to attack, and made it difficult to convey the seriousness of the situation to senior officers.

“As a result, no one felt the immediate need for a massive air strike and extensive air coverage, even when photos of the attack on several towns spread on social media,” the New York Times reported, according to Israeli sources. “It took the Air Force hours to get to the area, even though the bases are minutes away.”

By Ronen Bergman