Former IDF chief Halevi says Oct. 7 was 'preventable,' but was not 'betrayal from within'

Halevi’s “preventable failure” refers to the security breakdown that allowed Hamas to launch its October 7 attack without Israel stopping it. He does not describe the attack as an unavoidable surprise. Instead, he points to mistaken assessments and failures across the security system.

Before October 7, the IDF, Shin Bet, and political leadership believed Hamas did not want war. Hamas had worked to create that impression. Because officials accepted it, Hamas was ranked below Iran and Hezbollah in the IDF’s priorities, despite its ability to attack from Gaza.

The result was that Israel was caught by surprise on the morning of the attack. Halevi says the country must examine these failures through a State Commission of Inquiry. He views that process as necessary for national healing and for preventing similar security lapses in the future.

A State Commission of Inquiry is an official, independent body created to investigate重大 failures of public institutions. In Israel, such commissions can examine decisions, summon witnesses, collect evidence, and publish findings. Their purpose is to establish what happened and why, rather than rely on competing political claims.

For October 7, the commission would examine intelligence warnings, military priorities, readiness, decision-making, and the response to Hamas’s attack. It could also assess how the IDF, Shin Bet, and political leadership reached the conclusion that Hamas did not want war. That belief is central to Halevi’s explanation of the failure.

Halevi says the investigation should ask difficult questions and confront failures directly. The article does not specify the commission’s membership or legal timetable. Its intended role, however, is clear: support national healing and help prevent similar security lapses in the future.

The article gives no figures for the number of people killed, the number taken hostage, or the geographic area breached by Hamas-led forces. Therefore, those details cannot be established from the supplied source. Halevi discusses the attack’s preventability, the security failures, and the later hostage-release dilemma, but not its scale in numbers.

Widely reported accounts of October 7 describe approximately 1,200 people killed and 251 people taken hostage. Hamas-led forces also crossed the Gaza border at numerous points, commonly reported as roughly 29 locations. The exact count can vary depending on whether communities, military sites, and entry points are counted separately.

These figures provide context for why Halevi calls the failure serious, but they come from established reporting outside this article. The article itself only states that Israel was caught by surprise and that hostages remained a central concern during the war’s early stages.

Before October 7, the IDF’s threat priorities placed Iran first, Hezbollah second, and Hamas third. This ranking reflected the military’s understanding of the regional danger at the time. Hamas was not ignored, but it received less priority than Iran and Hezbollah.

Halevi says the IDF, Shin Bet, and political echelon shared the view that Hamas did not want war. Hamas had invested significant effort in encouraging that belief. Its apparent preference for avoiding a major conflict shaped how Israeli officials interpreted its actions and intentions.

The ranking mattered because it affected attention and preparation. Israel was then caught by surprise when Hamas attacked on October 7. Halevi presents this mistaken assessment as part of the preventable failure and argues that a formal inquiry should examine how the priorities were set.

The central consequence was a failure to recognize Hamas’s willingness and ability to launch a major attack. Israeli officials across the IDF, Shin Bet, and political echelon believed Hamas did not want war. That judgment reduced the perceived urgency of the threat from Gaza.

Halevi says Hamas deliberately invested effort in creating this assessment. Its deception helped Israeli institutions interpret warning signs through the wrong framework. Hamas was ranked third behind Iran and Hezbollah, while its preparations for attack were not understood as evidence of an imminent war.

Israel was therefore caught by surprise on October 7. Halevi calls the result a preventable failure and says the country must face it directly. He also acknowledges later mistakes in the early Gaza war, when the IDF was trying to determine how best to fight Hamas and bring hostages home.

Halevi rejects the idea that the October 7 failure resulted from an internal betrayal by one official or security professional. His reasoning is practical. Enabling Hamas to carry out such an attack would require coordination across many actions, systems, and people, rather than a lone collaborator making one secret decision.

He therefore says an alleged betrayal would require an extensive network. A network would presumably leave multiple traces, involve several participants, and require sustained cooperation. Halevi adds that people who spent decades serving Israel would not choose to help Hamas carry out a terrorist attack.

According to Halevi, no evidence of that network has been found. He says that even after three years, not a single such person has been identified. Instead, he describes the event as a preventable failure rooted in mistaken assessments, not proven treason within the political or defense establishment.

Intelligence and security organizations assess an adversary’s intentions by combining many signals. They study military preparations, public statements, communications, leadership decisions, logistics, and past behavior. Analysts then compare those signals with the adversary’s capabilities and likely goals. The result is an estimate, not direct knowledge of what another government or group plans.

Deliberate deception can corrupt that process. An adversary may hide preparations, send reassuring messages, or behave in ways that support a preferred interpretation. If analysts see each sign separately, they may explain away warnings instead of connecting them. In this case, Halevi says Hamas worked to convince Israel that it did not want war.

That assessment shaped priorities before October 7. Iran and Hezbollah ranked above Hamas, while Israel was caught by surprise when the attack came. The article supports reviewing how that judgment formed, which signals were missed, and how future assessments can challenge convincing deception.