On Thursday, the IDF released a 19-page report with its findings from an investigation into Oct. 7, concluding that the Israeli army “failed in its mission to protect Israeli civilians.” The document is based on four General Staff investigations and 41 battle debriefings. It relies on tens of thousands of testimonies and recordings. The complete investigations will be published on the IDF website in the coming months.
The IDF wrote that Hamas considered numerous dates for the attacks, including Sept. 16, Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year), and Sept. 25, Yom Kippur (the day of atonement). Ultimately, Oct. 7, 2023, coinciding with the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah, was chosen.
Hamas began preparing for the attack the day before, gathering weapons and putting terrorists on alert. They began preparing the forces around 11:00 p.m. on Oct. 6, concluding the briefings by 4:00 AM on Oct. 7. The first wave of terrorists crossed the border at 6:29 AM on the morning of October 7. The infiltration was carried out under the cover of a barrage of 4,696 rockets and mortars.
The IDF declared a state of emergency at 6:43 AM, and at 7:10, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) did as well.
Between 7:00 and 9:00 AM, 3,400 terrorists were inside Israeli territory. At 8:00, Hamas commander Mohammed Deif called on civilians in Gaza to join the massacre.
The attacks continued unabated until 1:00 PM, when the IDF managed to stop several primary attacks. Several hundred terrorists were still inside Israel at 3:00 PM, and the IDF claimed to have gained control of some of the communities and surrounding areas by 9:00 PM.
The Israeli Air Force was found to have met and even exceeded the defined standards for readiness except for two instances due to heavy rocket fire. But the Air Force was unprepared for a large-scale attack. In addition, there was “significant difficulty” distinguishing IDF troops, civilians, and terrorists from one another.
In total, over 5,000-5,600 Hamas terrorists and Gazan civilians crossed the southern border into Israel in three waves, murdering over 1,200 and taking 251 back into Gaza as hostages. The attacks left 829 Israeli civilians, 76 foreign nationals, and 415 security personnel dead. Additionally, 251 hostages were taken into the Gaza Strip.
“The fundamental failure was a result of failure to understand Hamas’s intentions and readiness for a wide-scale surprise attack,” IDF senior officials wrote in the report. “The belief was that Hamas could be influenced through pressures that would reduce its motivation for war, primarily by improving living conditions in the Gaza Strip,” the report said.
The IDF identified at least five early warning signs that were overlooked. There were indications of both usual and unusual Hamas activity in the evening hours before the attack. Israeli sim cards were activated inside Gaza. These SIM cards would allow Hamas terrorists to communicate after they crossed the border into Israel. While this was detected, no alert was raised. The investigation identified four other signs, but they remain classified.
The IDF report outlined the collapse of the IDF’s Gaza Division and its failure to mount a response. The division was defeated for several hours and unable to protect civilians or soldiers.
The report claimed that this failure resulted from years of misinterpreting intelligence concerning Hamas, the military’s overreliance on having an early warning to prepare its defenses, the degree to which the invading terrorists massively outnumbered troops, and the failure to understand what Hamas was doing during the attack.
Much blame went to the Intelligence Directorate. Its officials believed they had intelligence superiority over Hamas and did not believe they could be surprised by the enemy,
The investigation concluded that before the Oct. 7 attack, the IDF command believed that Hamas did not represent a threat. Much of the IDF’s focus was on Iran and Hezbollah before the Oct. 7 attacks, and Hamas was defined as a secondary threat at the time.
The IDF thought that Hamas was not focused on direct conflict or a large-scale war and was focusing on rocket attacks. IDF intelligence claimed that the system of Hamas tunnels was seriously degraded and did not represent a threat. The IDF believed that its high-tech border fence would prevent any infiltration, leading Israel to conclude that a large-scale invasion was unlikely. As a result, the IDF drastically reduced the number of troops and weapons on the southern border.
The investigation highlighted a widening gap between the IDF’s perceptions of Hamas and what the terror group was doing in reality.
The IDF came to these conclusions despite the Military Intelligence Directorate having received information and plans outlining Hamas’s intent to launch a wide-scale attack against Israel for several years. This information was discounted as being unrealistic. They considered Yahya Sinwar, who headed the Oct. 7 attack, to be a pragmatist focused on rocket attacks.
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 percent readiness, and it agreed in May 2023 to launch the assault on October 7.
The investigation also determined that five signs of unusual Hamas activity were detected the night before the attack but were disregarded. This was based on the previous years of false assessments about Hamas. Based on this mistaken assessment, intelligence officials on all levels failed to warn the government of the military.
