How did Israel’s Intelligence failed to stop Hamas?

“This is a major failure”, said Yaakov Amidror, former National Security Adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu 

On 7 October 2023, a few hours before the brutal attack at dawn, Israel’s intelligence unit picked up an increasing surge in communication from Gaza’s militant networks. As it is an unusual activity, they gave a warning signal to Israeli soldiers at the borders, but Hamas acted swiftly beyond imagination. In a concerted way, Hamas destroyed Israel’s communication networks and surveillance towers using trailblazing drones.

Apparently, the drones decimated the machine guns and blew up the border fences in several places. The brute brazen infiltration in more than 20 Israeli towns and army camps is the worst breach and first time in the history of Israel. For a few hours, the mightiest military in the Middle East was rendered spineless and clueless. Indeed, Israeli forces have never anticipated such a surgical attack, well-coordinated, complex strike of thousands of rockets and devasting drone attacks. 

“We have no idea how this could have happened” – 

That is the predominant reply from most of the Israeli officials after the lethal attack from Hamas. 

Israel’s intelligence agencies like “Shin Bet and Mossad” have demonstrated significant capabilities in hunting down terrorists and their supporters not only in Palestine but in Lebanon, Iran and Dubai. Over a half-century, Israeli intelligence agencies garnered an aura of invincibility due to their incredible achievements. 

Strikingly, intelligence agencies believed that they had enough information regarding intelligence, from human networks to electronic signals. But under the nose of Israel’s security agencies, Hamas smuggled thousands of rockets, missiles and electronic sensors into Gaza without detection. Plausibly, Israel’s Intelligence agencies failed to figure it out and stop Hamas’s well-planned brutal attacks.

How did they fail?

First, Israel’s intelligence agencies plummeted to assess the increasing capabilities and funding of Hamas. Second, there is a vague understanding of the strategic intentions of Hamas and terror networking. Third, the operations linked cognitive biases and analytical challenges between the policymakers and intelligence agencies. Fourth, intelligence officers failed to identify the critical communication and decipher the encrypted networks used by Hamas. Fifth, there is an over-dependence on border surveillance equipment and technology.

The former Intelligence Chief of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) Amos Yadlin said that this attack echoes the memory of the Yom-Kippur War, marked by ‘colossal intelligence failure’ and outrageously the enemy unveiling the conflict.

However, one of the substantial challenges for intelligence agencies is to persuade policymakers about the threat. The ambiguity of evidence and ambivalence of judgment collectively create disbelief in policymakers, which is also one of the reasons for intelligence failure. Another facet is that PM Benjamin Netanyahu and his senior advisers might be focused on Iran, Lebanese militants on Israel’s northern border and the proliferating crisis in the Westbank rather than Gaza and insidious Hamas.

Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli general, argues that presently, Israeli security agencies rely much on technological prowess to gather espionage data. But militants found a plethora of methods to evade the technological intelligence gathering, providing a pandemonium of real Palestine’s intentions. This created an incomplete picture of the Hamas’ real motive. In recent years, Israel has allowed work permits to around 18,000 Palestinian labourers with 10 times higher salaries than coastal enclave residents. Later, the intelligence agencies miserably failed to note down their activities and investment patterns. We must note that Israel’s surveillance technology industry is one of the world’s most advanced and innovative. Despite all these, Hamas’ preparations and attacks were unable to be tracked.

Strategy of Hamas

For a couple of years, Hamas stayed away from waging war. The Hamas abstained from joining, especially when the fringe group ‘Palestine Islamic Jihad’ attacked Israel. Notably, they went for a quick truce when Qatar brokered border riots. Interestingly, Hamas was deceiving Israeli security and intelligence agencies by giving the impression that they were not in an upsurge mindset.

In an interview a few days before the attack, Israel National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi said, “Hamas is very, very restrained and understands the implications of further defiance.” On the contrary, Hamas took the leverage of using aerial drones to attack cell towers on borders. Subsequently, without being intercepted, over 1,500 Hamas militants entered Israel. This is the first time Hamas has mass infiltrated Israel using paragliders decimating the smart fence.

Moreover, Hamas comprehended the clustering of soldiers in a single location and held them hostages. And they understood the gap in the coordinated responses and counterattacks. With a long-term strategy, Hamas meticulously planned operations like tunnel networks, targeted Israeli soldiers, rapid ambushes, holding hostages, speed boats and paragliders to enter the Israeli territory. 

Security Dilemma!

More specifically, Israel’s security and intelligence team is overconfident about the impregnability of the surveillance system, especially AI cameras, sophisticated sensors, drones and advanced machine guns. But they failed to understand that technology is not infallible and the enemy’s potentiality.

Nonetheless, such a catastrophic attack potentially damages the morality and reputation of the intelligence and security agency. Perhaps the immense anxiety to Israel is how to cease Hamas from advancing towards the West Bank and curtail the heavily armed Hezbollah in its northern borders.

Henceforth, Israel must investigate and examine what went wrong with intelligence and security agencies in the future. And they must apprehend and analyse why they failed to understand the capabilities of Hamas and their adverse strategic perception. They should evaluate their mammoth reliance on technology and how they could negate the gap between intelligence officials and policymakers. Now is the time to fixate on the present and not the past.