Military investigation into Hamas attack that killed 72 in border city reportedly uncovers how ‘bureaucratic red tape’ left team with only pistols to fight hordes of well-armed Hamas fighters
ed note–So, once again, ladies and Gentile-men, several ‘beaureacratic mistakes’ taking place just prior to Oct. 7th, BY PURE COINCIDENCE, ALL CAN REST ASSURED, including the absence of any assault rifles for the city of Sderot’s security forces, as well as the electronic locks on the protective bomb shelters not functioning and therefore, facilitating the Mista’arvim agents embedded deeply within Gaza posing as Hamas or PIJ to engage in some of the more ‘Jramatic’ events of that day, such as the rapes, murders of civilians, babies cooked in ovens, etc, that have been inflated, exaggerated and ‘Jramatized’ in order to paint Israel as the ‘defenseless victim’ that was ‘taken by surprise’.
Times of Israel
A military probe of the events in the southern city of Sderot, where 72 people were killed during the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, found that red tape had tied up the municipal security team’s assault rifles at an out-of-town army base, leaving members with just pistols to fight against dozens of well-armed Hamas fighters, the Ynet news site reported Thursday.
The Israel Defense Forces is in the process of a series of investigations into failures that enabled Hamas to lead thousands of fighters on a devastating invasion of southern Israel in which they took 251 hostages.
One of those investigations dealt with Sderot, a border city where Hamas fighters riding in pickup trucks were able to roam through the streets, slaughtering over 50 civilians, and killing 20 police officers in a major battle at the city’s police station.
According to the report, the IDF found that on the day of the attack, there were 22 members of the city’s security defense squad present. The squad, armed by the IDF, is operated by the municipality’s security department, and its civilian chief, the community security coordinator, is the go-between with the military.
In 2022, the then-chief left the role and handed back all the squad’s rifles, for which he was responsible, to the IDF’s Gaza Division headquarters. His replacement, Ronen Gabay, was only installed months later.
The return of the rifles was caught up in ‘bureaucracy’ as the new security squad chief took over, during which time there was no one who could sign off on the return of the rifles.
The situation was unknown to Mayor Alon Davidi, who reportedly was not aware that his city’s security team was left without automatic weapons.
Davidi only found out about the paltry weapons on the day of the attack. Furthermore, the probe found that security team members were not given proper training by the IDF, as required.
As a result, squad members were left with just their pistols to engage the heavily armed and overwhelming numbers of terrorists.
Gabay was seriously injured as he battled terrorists at the city’s police station.
The probe also found that many police officers gathered at the station but did not spread out across the city, apparently due to a lack of information on what was happening around them, and a focus on the station where there was a raging battle with gunmen.
Among other key incidents in the city on October 7, terrorists massacred 13 elderly people who were on their way to an outing at a Dead Sea resort. The party had set off on a minibus but it had a flat tire and halted at a bus stop. As the group was waiting, Hamas launched its invasion, which came under cover of a barrage of thousands of rockets fired across Israel.
There was a small public bomb shelter at the bus stop but it was fitted with a smart lock which was supposed to automatically open during a rocket attack. However, the system apparently did not work, leaving the retirees stuck outside.
Minutes later, Hamas terrorists riding pickup trucks arrived and shot dead all 13 people in the group. Gruesome images of the elderly Israelis lying dead outside the shelter were some of the first to be shared on social media on the morning of the massacre.
The IDF said in a statement to Ynet on Thursday, ‘On October 7 the IDF failed in its mission.’
‘The IDF is investigating the events of October 7 and what happened before that, including the battles in Sderot. When the probe is completed it will be presented with full transparency to the bereaved families, to the residents, and afterward to the public.’
In its own response to Ynet, Sderot municipality noted that the security squad is operated by the IDF ‘and is subordinate to it.’
The IDF, it said, ‘is required to ensure that all its members have weapons ,which unfortunately did not happen on the morning of October 7.’
As for the murders at the public shelter, city hall said it would not comment as the matter was in litigation. Eight families of those 13 elderly bus victims filed a lawsuit for NIS 12 million ($3,345,470) against the municipality and Motorola alleging that their loved ones were unable to enter the shelter due to a failure with the shelter’s locking system and were therefore vulnerable to the terrorists.
Many of the issues have since been resolved and Sderot now has a robust, well-funded security team, Ynet reported.
However, amid tensions between Gabay and the new head of the municipal security department, Erez Gaz, the mayor dismissed Gabay and the city is in the process of finding someone to take his place.
The Sderot probe was among a number by the IDF set to be completed in the coming weeks.
At the end of December, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi instructed the military to complete its various probes by the end of January. Defense Minister Israel Katz had told Halevi that he would freeze the promotions of senior officers in the IDF until he was presented with the conclusions on the investigations, issuing a January 31 deadline.
Last week, Halevi and the head of the IDF Southern Command said they would both be resigning from the military over their roles in the failures that led to the Hamas onslaught.
While the government has refused to appoint a state commission of inquiry and has opposed any probes that could include looking at political failures surrounding the devastating surprise attack, its lead-up, and its aftermath, the army has conducted internal investigations to learn what went wrong.