The article was previously published in Ha-Umma.
On September 17, the explosion of pagers wounded several thousand Hezbollah operatives. The next day, the explosion of handheld radios injured many more. The action is attributed to Israel, which did not take responsibility for it. A few days later, the elimination of Hezbollah’s number two, Ibrahim Aqil, took place, along with the top echelons of Hezbollah’s elite unit, Radwan, which planned the invasion into Israel. Subsequently, the elimination of Hassan Nasrallah, the organization’s secretary-general, occurred. All these actions demonstrated Israel’s remarkable intelligence superiority. It takes the most intimate knowledge, creativity, and a variety of sources of information to carry out these operations and a slew of attacks on Hezbollah’s military sites in Lebanon.
These significant intelligence achievements in Lebanon stand in stark contrast to the failure of October 7. The answer to the question, “How can it be that Israeli security officials had accurate intelligence for all the operations accomplished in Lebanon but failed to warn of a Hamas invasion a year earlier?” does not lie in the time gap between them. Developing intelligence sources requires a lot of time, much more than a year. Moreover, as time progresses, it becomes evident that the inability to provide a strategic warning of Hamas’s intention to wage war against Israel is not due to intelligence. Or rather, intelligence information. There was plenty of it. This occurred both at the tactical level, as observed by the IDF female field observers, and at the strategic level, where the “Jericho Wall” plan was exposed. The claim of certain sources that they were unfamiliar with the plan is illogical. Ultimately, the research division is responsible for providing strategic warnings, and it is reasonable to assume that the information concerning the “Jericho Wall” plan reached the researchers. Regrettably, they were unable to establish a connection between the mere existence of the plan and the intention of carrying its execution, and moreover, the timing of execution. It is reasonable to assume that the IDF field observer’s reports—which are classified as tactical intelligence—did not reach the individuals responsible for analyzing Hamas’s intentions in the Research Division. Is that the only reason for the intelligence failure?
Failure to “connect the dots”
In his resignation letter, Brig. Gen. Yossi Sariel, commander of 8200, admitted that the system had failed to “connect the dots” and added that in a situation where “there are two Hamas commando divisions on the Gaza border, only a few minutes away from the Israeli communities… The SIGINT warning zone cannot be trusted.” What did he mean? To provide the forces with an intelligence alert, one must be able to respond to the Five Ws. Who? What? When? Where? Why? How? The intelligence apparatus apparently had most of the answers. However, the question of “when” remained unanswered. Brig. Gen. Sariel adds, “You can’t rely on a SIGINT warning zone and count on us being able to get the golden info.” Some saw this as an excuse for the concept that the intelligence personnel had fallen into. However, it is an integral part of the process. The recurring mistake we make is not a lack of understanding of our enemies, but rather a failure to recognize our own limitations as intelligence personnel and evaluators. The Sin of Hubris brings to the misconception.
Due to the scarcity of resources, Israel’s security doctrine has relied for years on deterrence and warning. The issue of warning is becoming increasingly problematic, not due to a lack of intelligence, but rather due to our inability to comprehend the intentions of our enemies. I argue that even if Sariel’s people had brought the “golden info.” it would not have led to a different result. When there are so many people who are sure that they are reading Hamas’s intentions correctly and know “what is going on through Nasrallah’s mind”—no” matter what intelligence arrives, it will be perceived as problematic, unreliable, and partial, and therefore it is not certain that it would have brought about the cancellation of leaves and the distribution of weapons to all the alert squads in the border area.
Israeli intelligence possesses the capability to provide precise alerts about specific activities, eliminating the need to discuss the adversary’s intentions. If intelligence sources identify that Iran’s missiles are on launch pads, we will be able to issue a warning. If this occurs during a war, issuing the warning will be easier, as discussing intentions becomes less relevant. However, in a routine period, the challenge is completely different. Consequently, the fundamental shift required in the Israeli intelligence framework is the recognition that we lack a preemptive warning capacity for war due to two primary factors: First, warning consists of an analysis of intentions and capabilities. We will always make a mistake when analyzing our opponent’s intentions. Our thinking differs significantly from his, making it difficult for us to pinpoint where he is at and when he will make the decision to use his abilities against us. Second, the price of a mistake in the absence of a warning is very high. Israel has very long borders in relation to its small territory and therefore aspires to settle the entire area, adhering to the Zionist notion of “Wherever the Jewish plow plows its last furrow, that is where the border will run”, a concept established many years before its establishment. We all saw the result on October 7, 2023. This is similar to a decision to shut down the “Iron Dome” as long as there is no intelligence warning concerning the enemy’s intentions to launch missiles into Israel.
“Exacting a price” Operations
Alongside the warning, deterrence is at the core of Israel’s security doctrine. Due to limited resources, there has been a perception over the years that we must prevent our enemies from using their developed abilities against us. Decision-makers accepted the idea of establishing deterrence by “extracting a price.” This has led us to “extracting a price” in Gaza over the past decade and relying on the deterrence created by the damage to Lebanon during the Second Lebanon War. We have repeatedly heard that Hezbollah and Hamas face deterrence on both fronts. We assumed they did not want to destroy Lebanon or Gaza, but we ignored the deep network of tunnels they built to protect their operatives from the devastation and destruction above ground. We repeatedly heard throughout the war that Hezbollah feared an all-out war and therefore did not carry out its attack plan. We are now hearing that Iran’s deterrence from a regional war has led it to choose limited attacks against Israel.
I want to completely deny the term deterrence for two reasons. The first goes back to my first argument: we have a very limited ability to understand our enemies, and therefore it is very difficult to estimate when they are deterred and when they are not. Secondly, and perhaps more crucially, we face adversaries driven by extreme religious motives. Iran—the architect of the current campaign against Israel on all fronts—is indeed a pragmatic state, but on the other hand, the “culture of death” and martyrdom are an inseparable part of the ideology of the Islamic Revolution. We cannot determine when ideology will triumph over pragmatism and vice versa. And what is Iranian pragmatism anyway? Despite the very difficult economic situation of Iran, it continues to fund its proxy militias and invest in the nuclear project. Despite the setbacks and disappointments Hezbollah has suffered, Iran continues to support it. We cannot ascertain when, if ever, the ayatollahs in Iran will alter their policies on these matters.
drawing lines in the sand
If deterrence and warning are no longer the cornerstones of Israel’s security concept, what else could be? We don’t have to completely dispose of the word deterrence. We should apply it to abilities rather than intentions. Instead of “extracting a price,” we should “negate capabilities.” Israel’s offensive in Lebanon, which began at the end of the summer of 2024, undoubtedly follows this logic. Following the Israeli attacks and initiative, Hezbollah finds itself with fewer resources, fewer rockets, a battered Radwan unit, struggling with command-and-control issues. Naturally, rebuilding capabilities is the primary concern in a ceasefire.
Another essential element of the security doctrine is the demarcation of red lines. Israel must clearly define to itself the boundaries of its enemies’ capabilities, which could serve as a “casus belli” or an attack on these infrastructures. Regrettably, regarding Lebanon the feeling is that the red lines have been eroded—there was talk of Hezbollah’s precision missiles, advanced air-defense systems, and its deployment facing the border settlements. Prior to the ‘Iron Swords’ war, none of the above were attacked. There were discussions regarding tunnels, and Israel responded by neutralizing those that crossed into Israeli territory but refrained from attacking those that reached the fence from the Lebanese side. In recent years, nothing was done to prevent the Radwan unit from establishing itself on the border with Israel, even though there was no intelligence gap in identifying this entrenchment, which was visible. An attack on Iran’s nuclear sites would be a test for adopting this principle.
Given that for various reasons it is not always possible to uphold the red lines that we have set for ourselves, the IDF must be prepared for the reference scenario, as another essential component of the security concept. At least on the northern front, the IDF was well acquainted with the build-up of the Radwan unit’s capabilities on the opposite side of the fence and Hezbollah’s offensive plans, which included the invasion of thousands of operatives into Israeli territory from a variety of points along the border. Despite this being the reference scenario, on the morning of October 7 (according to the Division Commander’s testimony), 91 battalions, comprising four battalions, were present on the border, with half of them on leave. At best, the alert squads’ weapons were in armories within the communities, and in the worst-case scenario, they were housed in armories within IDF bases. There are other ways to handle ground invasions besides “planes and tanks”. What transpired in the Gaza envelope communities on the morning of October 7 proved that community protection is meaningful. In places where the alert squads had timely access to weapons and critical defense-positions for community defense, they successfully and significantly saved their communities and reduced the damage.
In 1920, when Tel Hai fell, there was no State of Israel, and there was no IDF. The Jews in the Land of Israel defended themselves. After the State of Israel was founded, the IDF was responsible for protecting the residents, but on October 7, residents were massacred in the south and border communities were evacuated for a long time in the north. After the Iron Swords War The state and the citizens must draft a new agreement. The IDF will continue to be responsible for protecting Israeli citizens who reside within the borders or inside the country. At the same time, it is evident that border residents must actively participate in the defense of the settlements, and the IDF must provide the necessary infrastructure (including, combat doctrine, equipment, training, and homeland defense departments.). There is a need for defense-shielding, and it costs money. To maintain routine life in the north and south, investment in defense-shielding protection is required—both active, such as the laser system, and passive, such as safe classrooms in schools and kindergartens. In the northern communities, these measures are almost non-existent.
International Legitimacy
In addition to the above principles, which deal with the areas of defense and attack, a third effort is required, which should be an integral part of Israel’s new security doctrine. There needs to be a continuous endeavor to establish credibility for an Israeli military action within the international community. The soft aspects of humanitarian aid and the treatment of an enemy population, legitimization media campaigns, and diplomatic and legal campaigns should be part of any war plan, and some of them should be dealt with as a matter of routine. In the IDF strategy published by then, Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, in 2016, the effort to legitimize is defined as an essential IDF effort for the IDF’s freedom of action in the campaign. This effort must function both in routine and in a state of emergency. We must prepare the information we want to expose, formulate the messages, and build platforms to resonate the message. This is not an effort that stems solely from the security agencies, but much of the information it requires stems from them. Success in this effort will clear many of the restrictions placed by the international community on the IDF’s activity in the current war, that are hindering its military achievements.
In summary, Israel’s new security doctrine must be based on principles that differ from warning and deterrence, which have stemmed from scarcity of resources. The new principles require creativity and cooperation between the military system and the civilian, security and non-security systems. Above all, they need to have a clear understanding of reality and eliminate the “Sin of Hubris” and the Israeli tendency to believe that “everything will be fine.”
Lt. Col. (res.) Sarit Zehavi is the founder and president of the Alma Center, which focuses on the study of security challenges on the northern border. She served in the IDF’s Research Division and in the Northern Command Intelligence. She holds a master’s degree in Middle Eastern Studies from Ben-Gurion University, and lives in the Western Galilee.
*Featured photo: Hamas tractor taking down Israel border fence on October 7th, 2023 (social media).
