October 7th: “The IDF failed in its mission to protect Israeli civilians”

On Thursday, the IDF published a 19-page report with its findings from an examination of October 7, in which he came to the conclusion that the Israeli army “failed in its mission to protect Israeli civilians”. The document is based on four general stations and 41 battle reviews. It is based on tens of thousands of certificates and recordings. The complete examinations will be published on the IDF website in the coming months.

The IDF wrote that Hamas has considered numerous data for the attacks, including on September 16, Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year) and on September 25th Yom Kippur (the day of reconciliation). Ultimately, October 7, 2023, which coincided with Simchat Tora's Jewish holiday.

The Hamas began to prepare for the attack the day before, to collect weapons and to draw attention to terrorists. They started preparing the forces at around 11:00 p.m. on October 6th and completing them on October 7 at 4:00 a.m. The first wave of terrorists crossed the border on the morning of October 7 at 6:29 a.m. The infiltration was carried out under the cover of a thrust of 4,696 rockets and murderers.

The IDF declared a state of emergency at 6:43 a.m., and the Israeli Air Force (IAF) also did at 7:10 a.m.

Between 7:00 a.m. and 9:00 a.m. there were 3,400 terrorists in the Israeli area. At 8:00 a.m., the Hamas Commander Mohammed Deif asked civilians in Gaza to join the massacre.

The attacks took unabated until 1 p.m. when the IDF managed to stop several primary attacks. At 3:00 p.m. there were still several hundred terrorists in Israel, and the IDF claimed to have received control over some of the communities and the surrounding area at 9:00 p.m.

It was found that the Israeli Air Force fulfilled the defined standby standards with the exception of two cases due to severe rocket fire. But the Air Force was not prepared for a large -scale attack. In addition, there were “considerable difficulties” to distinguish IDF troops, civilians and terrorists.

A total of over 5,000 to 5,600 Hamas terrorists and Gazan civilians crossed the southern border to Israel in three waves, murdered over 1,200 and took back 251 as hostages in Gaza. The attacks left 829 Israeli civilians, 76 foreign nationals and 415 security personnel dead. In addition, 251 hostages were brought into the Gaza Strip.

“The fundamental failure was a result of the failure to understand the intentions and willingness of Hamas for a spacious surprise attack,” wrote IDF-high-ranking civil servants in the report. “The conviction was that Hamas could be influenced by pressure that would reduce its motivation to war, especially by improving living conditions in the Gaza Strip,” the report said.

The IDF identified at least five early warning signs that were overlooked. In the evenings before the attack, there were signs of usual and unusual Hamas activities. Israeli SIM cards were activated in the GAZA. These SIM cards would enable Hamas terrorists to communicate after crossing the border to Israel. While this was found, no alarm was raised. Four other signs were identified in the study, but they remain classified.

The IDF report describes the collapse of the Gaza division of the IDF and the failure to assemble an answer. The department was defeated for several hours and was unable to protect civilians or soldiers.

The report claimed that this failure from years of incorrectly interpreting secret services was due to the Hamas, whereby the over -control of the military was a early warning to prepare his defense to what extent the penetrating terrorists massively understood what Hamas did during the attack.

The intelligence directorate was a lot of fault. His officials believed that they had the superiority of Hamas in the secret services and did not believe that they could be surprised by the enemy.

The investigation came to the conclusion that the IDF command before the attack on October 7 was of the opinion that Hamas does not pose a threat. A large part of the IDF concentrated on Iran and the Hisbollah before the attacks on October 7, and Hamas was defined as a secondary threat at that time.

The IDF believed that Hamas did not focus on direct conflicts or a great war and focused on rocket attacks. IDF Intelligence claimed that the Hamas tunnel system was seriously deteriorated and was not a threat. The IDF believed that its high-tech border fence would prevent any infiltration, which brought Israel to the conclusion that a great invasion was unlikely. As a result, the IDF drastically reduced the number of troops and weapons on the southern border.

In the investigation, an expansion between the perceptions of Hamas by the IDF and what the terrorist group did in reality.

The IDF came to these conclusions, although the management of military secret services has received information and plans to describe Hamas' intention to start a comprehensive attack against Israel for several years. This information was reduced as unrealistic. They looked at Yahya Sinwar, who led the attack on October 7, as a pragmatist who focused on rocket attacks.

The IDF has now found that Hamas decided in April 2022 to start such an attack. By September 2022, the terrorist group had a willingness of 85 percent and agreed to start the attack on October 7 in May 2023.

The examination also showed that five signs of unusual Hamas activity were found in the night before attack, but were not taken into account. This was based on Hamas on the previous years of false assessments. Based on this false assessment, intelligence officers did not warn the government of the military at all levels.