The Islamist movement took the world by surprise by launching a terrorist operation on Israel on October 7. Thousands of rockets were fired as fighters entered the territory, attacked military positions and kidnapped more than a hundred civilians.
Calm, then terror. Hamas launched a large-scale terrorist attack against Israel at dawn on Saturday, October 7. The Islamist movement, in power since 2007 in Gaza, fired thousands of rockets into Israeli territory while its fighters crossed the border, although it was deemed inviolable. They then seized Israeli military positions and killed and kidnapped civilians in the streets.
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“What happened is unprecedented in Israel”, recognized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. According to Israel, as of October 10, more than 700 people have been killed and 2,150 injured. In Gaza, 560 Palestinians were killed and 2,900 injured, according to Hamas. For many experts, the scale of the operation, named “Al-Aqsa Flood”, is the result of careful preparation that began several months ago.
Israeli defense saturated with rockets
At 6:30 a.m. Saturday, in the middle of Shabbat, the first rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel. According to Hamas, 5,000 rockets were sent, while the Israeli army counted 3,000. The aim of this maneuver was to saturate the “Iron Dome”, the Israeli anti-aircraft defense system, which makes it possible to shoot down in mid-flight missiles or rockets fired within a radius of 4 to 70 km.
“Due to the large number of rockets fired in a short time, the system worked, but was quickly saturated”summarizes Amélie Ferey, researcher at the French Institute of International Relations (Ifri). “Some rockets were intercepted, but others reached Israeli soil.”
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While the rockets fell on Israel and the first warning sirens sounded in Tel Aviv, 60 km from Gaza, the terrorists reached several points on the border between Gaza and Israel. In a few hours, they crossed several crossings: the border posts of Erez, Kerem-Shalom and Kissufim, BBC News counts. A Hamas Telegram account published propaganda images showing fighters crossing the fence on motorcycles.
Land and sea infiltration
According to a source close to Hamas to the Reuters agency, an elite force of 400 men carried out these ground infiltrations. She used explosives to open breaches, which bulldozers widened to allow the men to pass. At another point on the border, Hamas images show an explosion on a section of concrete wall. A man then makes a sign and militants equipped with bulletproof vests and weapons run towards the military base where Israeli soldiers are located, before shooting them dead.
To secure these ground attacks, fighters on hang gliders and paragliders flew over the border. Before the operation, a video posted by a Hamas Telegram channel showed a unit appearing to be practicing for the assault. Its members used one- or two-person paragliders and practiced landing on targets, the British news agency continues.
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According to Hamas, the group also used Zouari suicide drones. These weapons are named after the former Tunisian aeronautical engineer Mohamed Zouari. According to Release, he had traveled to Gaza several times to help Hamas develop its drones. Less powerful than those of the Israeli army, the Zouari drones have however already allowed Hamas to penetrate the airspace of the Jewish state. The terrorists also carried out their operation by sea. Israel said it repelled two attempts by fighters on boats.
“We have never seen such a deep penetration of Israeli territory by Hamas with such unsophisticated equipment. These are people with assault rifles in pick-ups, on motorcycles or amphibious boats”observes researcher Amélie Ferey. It is not a matter “in the register of state-of-the-art war equipment. What changes is the complexity of the operation, both on land, at sea and in the air”, adds David Rigoulet-Roze, Middle East specialist, associate researcher at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (Iris).
Homemade weapons made in Gaza
How could Hamas prepare such an operation? The Gaza Strip has been under a blockade since 2007 and its two million inhabitants have no possibility of leaving it. Entrances and exits are controlled by the Israeli army, and in principle prevent any circulation of weapons. Except that “the Gazans learned over time to make weapons, and with little equipment”, recalls Amélie Ferey. “They are tinkering with small drones, explosives… If you have the will to fight, you use everything you can,” she emphasizes. In 2018, Gazans, for example, used “incendiary kites” to attack Israel during the “Great March of Return”. Simple kites with burning clothes tied under them.
“On YouTube, you can easily access tutorials that show you how to make drones.”
Amélie Ferey, researcher at Ifriat franceinfo
In 2020, Ismaël Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’s political bureau, said in a broadcast on Al-Jazeera that the fighters were making weapons from leftover Israeli missiles from the 2014 war on Gaza, Al-Monitor cites the website news about the Middle East.
“There are numerous weapons manufacturing workshops hidden throughout the Gaza Strip. This is why the monitoring of raw materials used in this context has always been decisive.“, specifies David Rigoulet-Roze. Hamas, for example, recovers materials unearthed after bombings carried out by Israel on buildings. It thus recycles electrical wires, metal pipes or even crumbled concrete, according to a 2021 report from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank on American policy in the Middle East, close to Israel.
Material transported from abroad
These materials found on site in Gaza could have been used to build the “Hamas metro”, this network of tunnels dug under the Gaza Strip and near its borders. “It is probably through these tunnels that material is transported from abroad., adds Amélie Ferey. Since 2005, and Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, Hamas has secretly imported weapons from its allies, Iran and Syria, pointed out the Times of Israel in 2021, citing the Israeli army. Rockets, explosives and metal are shipped from Sudan by truck and then transported across Gaza’s southern border with Egypt.
According to Fabien Hinz, an independent analyst specializing in missiles in the Middle East, Hamas has notably acquired abroad Fajr-3 and Fajr-5 rockets from Iran and M302 rockets from Syria, reports the Washington Post. On Al-Jazeera, the group said it had received Russian Kornet anti-tank missiles by land and sea.
Reposting my 2021 overview of Hamas’ rocket arsenal. A bit dated, but still relevant. pic.twitter.com/4ruClV0whL
— Fabian Hinz (@fab_hinz) October 7, 2023
“We knew that Hamas had weapons, but it was their quantity that was underestimated”, continues Amélie Ferey. According to the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Michael Herzog, retired from the Israeli Defense Forces, the Islamist group could have 8,000 to 10,000 projectiles, quotes the Washington Post. “The tactical landscape in which Hamas now operates, [c’est] a professionalization of its forces, artillery worthy of a conventional army”, esteemed by Release David Khalfa, Middle East specialist at the Jean-Jaurès Foundation.
Iran’s uncertain role
In addition to the equipment, Hamas has been training for this type of operation for a long time. “Gaza has been at war since 2007. It is a group that uses force to achieve its means. It trains every day”, recalls Amélie Ferey. The fighters are enlisted very young. In 2021, a Vice documentary showed young boys learning to use guns, to fight, on the grounds of Gaza, in full view of everyone. “Hamas has been able to take advantage of Benyamin Netanyahu’s lowering of guard in recent months on Gaza to prepare for the operation.observes the researcher.
Above all, Hamas would not have been alone in these preparations. According to Wall Street Journal, citing Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah cadres, Iran helped plan the attack. The details of the operation were refined this summer during several meetings in Beirut (Lebanon). Already in April, Iran announced that it was mobilizing its partners, including Hamas, to prepare strikes on Israel, reported the Wall Street Journal.
But on October 10, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s highest authority, denied his country’s involvement while reaffirming Iranian support “to Palestine”. According to Ali Barakeh, a member of the exiled Hamas leadership, met in Beirut by the Associated Press agency, the attack was planned without informing its allies. Only one “handle” of commanders was aware of the“zero hour”, he said. He warned that nearly 2,000 Hamas members had taken part in the fighting, out of an army of 40,000 in Gaza alone.