Israel’s military admits it delayed entering kibbutz when Hamas attacked

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The Israeli military has admitted, in its first investigation into its conduct on the day of the attacks, that its forces delayed entering a kibbutz for several hours as Hamas fighters rampaged there on October 7.

The Israel Defense Forces said it took hours for their troops to arrive, saying in several cases they “gathered at the entrance to the kibbutz and did not immediately enter the fighting,” while Palestinian militants killed more than 100 of the 1,000 residents and took another 30 hostage to Gaza.

After the first Hamas attack in the early hours of the morning and the capture of the kibbutz in southern Israel, local security forces were alone in fighting against about 340 Hamas fighters for a total of seven hours, it was said.

The report, written by several retired Israeli officers, focused exclusively on the military response to the Hamas attack on Be’eri, one of the communities in southern Israel that was worst hit during the Hamas cross-border attack that sparked the war in Gaza.

“The forces outside the kibbutz waited while inside the kibbutz the killings continued. This situation is extremely serious and must not be allowed to happen again,” Herzi Halevi, Israel’s Chief of Staff, concluded in the report.

Some of the forces had misjudged the “seriousness of the situation” due to a lack of intelligence and effective command and control capabilities among senior officers, Halevi added.

“We must give a clear instruction: in such a situation, all armed forces must intervene in the conflict area and do everything they can to stop the massacre of civilians,” he wrote.

The attack began shortly after 6:30 a.m. local time, but it was not until the afternoon that the Israeli army appointed a senior officer, Brigadier General Barak Hiram, to take command of the area. After that, about 700 Israeli security forces began to regain control of the kibbutz and evacuate the residents.

In total, 34 military personnel were killed in the fighting, while Israel estimates that around 100 Hamas fighters were killed. The report acknowledges that Israel was not able to completely clear the community of Hamas fighters until the following afternoon, October 8.

A total of eleven residents of Be’eri remain in captivity in Gaza.

The outcome of the investigation is likely to be controversial among Be’eri survivors: Hiram seemed to be cleared of any wrongdoing after ordering Israeli tanks to fire on a house where Hamas fighters were holding 14 Israelis hostage.

Only two of these hostages survived the incident. They later stated on Israeli television that they believed Israeli tank shells caused the Israelis’ deaths, but Israeli investigations refuted this claim.

“It appears that most of the hostages were murdered by the terrorists and that it is necessary to continue to conduct additional tests and investigate additional findings to the extent possible,” the report said.

It said local commanders, including Hiram, had made “professional and responsible decisions” after negotiation efforts failed and they feared for the lives of the hostages.

The Be’eri community issued a statement welcoming the “thorough” investigation by the Israeli military and stressing the importance of the military taking responsibility for “the complete failure to protect us and asking for forgiveness for our negligence during the many hours we were under attack by an evil that has no equal.”

The community called on the Israeli government to set up an official commission of inquiry to investigate all the failures before and during October 7.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has so far rejected such a step, although his Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said in a speech on Thursday that he supported the establishment of such a commission.

Instead, the Israeli military launched its own investigation, with the Be’eri report being the first to be published. The response to the atrocity in Be’eri is seen as a microcosm of the larger intelligence and operational failures of the Israeli security apparatus and its failure to prepare for a large-scale attack by thousands of Hamas fighters from Gaza.

According to military commander Halevi, “the investigation clearly shows the extent of the failure and the magnitude of the disaster that befell the residents of the south, who defended their families with their bodies for many hours while the IDF was not on the ground to protect them.”

Three senior Israeli officers, including the head of military intelligence, have resigned over failings related to the October 7 attacks, which resulted in the worst loss of life in Israel’s history.

Israel launched its assault on Gaza after the Hamas attack in October, in which the militants killed 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages, according to Israeli authorities. A total of 116 Israelis and foreigners remain in captivity.

According to authorities in the Hamas-controlled areas, the Israeli offensive has killed more than 38,000 people and created a humanitarian disaster in the coastal enclave.