a few days before the Hamas attacks, Israeli soldiers had alerted the authorities

Six months after the start of the war and the terrorist attack perpetrated by Hamas, Israeli security failings are being exposed. Lookout soldiers claim, among other things, to have alerted of suspicious movements.

It was six months ago. On October 7, 2023, Israel woke up to the shock of the images and discovered the extent of the horrors committed by Hamas militiamen. Reputedly unsinkable, the security barrier which separated Gaza from the Jewish state was no match. More serious, the tacit contract between Israelis and their leaders who must, since the creation of the State in 1948, allow them to live in security, is now broken. While waiting for a commission of inquiry which should begin work after the war, tongues are loosening. However, the security services saw nothing or, rather, did not want to see anything, some denounce.

Tahlia* was an Israeli army lookout: “The goal is really to verify that there are no incidents”, specifies the young woman, at the microphone of franceinfo. Only a few days before the October 7 attack, colleagues based on the edge of Gaza noticed, on their screens, strange movements of Hamas militiamen. They warned, without result.

“I feel a lot of anger”

“The fact that these alerts were not heeded makes me very angry. It is not normal that this was not taken into account, that there were such flaws. I feel a lot of anger. That’s why they didn’t do the right thing.” denounces Talhia, in French.

“We give little importance to the words of the lookout soldiers. We are the very little soldier that no one takes into account. They don’t give us any importance, because we are young, we are 18 years old, we are all at the bottom of the army hierarchy”

Tahlia, an Israeli soldier

at franceinfo

The army, the intelligence services, the police… At all levels, the main leaders have taken responsibility for their faults. “All the evidence was therespecifies Michael Kobi, professor of military strategy at INSS, the Israeli National Security Institute. The problem is the way the information was analyzed. This is nothing short of an intelligence and operational disaster. This is a significant failure and is the first time since the creation of Israel in 1948 that Israeli communities have been occupied. People were killed in their homes. It is a failure for the army and for the State which have the duty to defend their citizens.”

And then the other major error, according to Michael Kobi, is the absolute belief in surveillance technology and the physical absence of soldiers that results from it. On October 7, there were, according to the researcher, only 200 around Gaza.

*The first name has been changed