Israel did not understand, and the world did not understand, that the intentions of this Islamist organization were not merely to continue challenging Israel with sporadic terrorist acts. Hamas's goals were much more far-reaching, and to fulfil them, it established an army in Gaza that was not at all similar to a terrorist organization.

The Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, under the Likud government headed by Ariel Sharon (which was not carried out as part of the implementation of the Oslo Accords, but as part of an attempt to cancel them), enabled the organization to establish a state framework that had a budget, government apparatuses, and an army. The goal instead of harassing Israel became the destruction of Israel.

The materials discovered in the Hamas tunnels reveal high-level intelligence, the collection of means of killing on a significant scale, and the preparation of precise plans. If Hamas had been able to bring the Lebanese Hezbollah organization into the war, as it had planned, its intentions would have been much closer to realization.

The Unintended Consequences of the October 7 Massacre

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nurtured Hamas, facilitated its funding, and made clear the fact that he saw the terrorist organization as a better partner for cooperation than the PLO and the Palestinian Authority. The motive for this was clear: the PLO recognized Israel, and its goal is to divide the land between Israel and a future Palestinian state. Hamas rejects the two-state solution, calls for Israel's destruction, and does not accept the Oslo Accords. Its most moderate statement refers to the establishment of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders as an interim arrangement, and Israel does not even mention its implementation. Since Netanyahu is not looking for a partner for a peace agreement, it seemed to him that Hamas was the ideal neighbour.

When October 7 exposed Hamas's limitless brutality, Netanyahu was asked how he saw the "morning after" the Gaza war, and he spoke of security forces in Gaza that would be neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority (or, in his language, "without Hamas and without Abbas"). For almost three years, Netanyahu has been engaged in an effort to put Hamas and the PLO on the same page, so as not to admit the mistake of his life, and he portrays the PA as a terrorist organization in disguise that could, at any moment, "turn its rifle barrels." That is why, as long as Netanyahu serves as prime minister, there will be no Israeli consent to massive PA involvement in the Gaza Strip, even though this is the most likely solution for the future of the Gaza Strip.

Although the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has returned to the international headlines, in Netanyahu's Israel, October 7 has become a code name that ostensibly proves that it is impossible to reach any political settlement with the Palestinians because they "understand only force" (three words that characterize many other conflicts in the world…). Not only that, but some of the opposition parties have also adopted the assertion that, after October 7, there can no longer be any talk of the establishment of a Palestinian state because it will inevitably be a terrorist state that would endanger Israel's existence. If the next government wants to break through a path to peace with the Palestinians, it will also have to deal with the nonsense of its spokesmen when they were still in the opposition.

Jewish Diaspora

Diaspora Jews were surprised to find themselves paying the price of the Middle East conflict. The ability of many in the world to differentiate between Jews and Israelis is limited. Demonstrations around the world against Israel's reactions to the massacre did not distinguish between Israelis and Jews. The latter found themselves threatened, hiding Jewish characteristics, and excluded from various places. Israelis found themselves rejected by hotels and restaurants.

Israel was established, first and foremost, in order to serve as a refuge for persecuted Jews around the world and became one of the causes of this persecution. Can today's Israel call on the Jews of the world to immigrate to it in order to free themselves from the anti-Semitism that has reared its head because of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

Moments of Truth

Israel sought to believe that its intelligence was among the best in the world and that it "knew everything" about its enemies. What has become clear during the ongoing war to this day is that it is possible to drown in an excess of knowledge, and even if a certain piece of information is on the table of the intelligence agencies, it can be rejected because of many other details.

Hamas's plan, in its details, was on the table of Israeli intelligence, but it was not alone, and, along with a great deal of other information, it was not strange that it was decided that it was not serious information. The military reliance on intelligence information, and the confidence that Israel would know well in advance about an enemy attack and would have time to prepare for it, caused the IDF to sink into dangerous complacency.

The Netanyahu government was convinced that the Arab countries, and especially Saudi Arabia, would want normalization with Israel because of their security and other interests and would not demand that it move toward peace with the Palestinians as a precondition for normalization. The war highlighted Saudi Arabia's insistence on political development between the sides, and normalization, which was supposed to be the highlight of Netanyahu's diplomatic activity, did not take place.

It can be assumed that if another government is formed in Israel following the upcoming elections, there will be a positive turn in this context as well.