Aharon Haliva, Military Intelligence chief during Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, said in a recording aired by Israeli Channel 12 that mass murders deaths in Gaza were ‘a message for future generations’
Haaretz
The former Israeli military intelligence chief said the high number of Palestinians murdered in Gaza is ‘necessary for future generations,’ according to recordings broadcast Friday on Israel’s Channel 12 News.
In the recordings, Maj. Gen. (res.) Aharon Haliva can be heard saying that ’50 Palestinians must die’ for every victim of Hamas’ attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023. ‘There’s no choice, they need a Nakba every now and then to feel the consequences,’ Haliva added, referring to the 1948 displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians out of what would become the border of the State of Israel.
‘I’m saying this as a message for future generations,’ he added.
Haliva also commented on the military intelligence’s role in the failures that preceded Hamas’ attack. ‘Even if the chief of staff had woken me that night, I would have said I accept the assessments of the division’s intelligence officer, Southern Command and the Shin Bet, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar,’ Haliva said.
On Oct. 6, the day before the Hamas assault, Haliva was on vacation with his family in the southern resort city of Eilat. Hours before the attack, he was woken by a phone call warning of troubling signs of Hamas activity along the border, but he downplayed the report and went back to sleep.
He said former Chief of Staff Herzl Halevi ‘is not a negligent man,’ and defended his decision to schedule the first situation assessment at 8:30 A.M. following signals of suspicious activity in Gaza. ‘The fact that he set it for 8:30 shows that everyone who briefed him gave him the impression that the events were unusual but not immediate,’ Haliva explained.
Hamas’ attack began at 6:29 A.M., over two hours before.
Haliva said that a year before the October 7 attack, Hamas’ plan to storm Israeli communities near Gaza had been presented to him. ‘The Gaza Division intelligence officer told me: ‘I want to show you this,’ Haliva said in the recording. ‘In the end, we thought it was a plan to gain power. You can’t imagine, in your wildest dreams, a scenario like 6:29 [A.M. on Oct. 7] without having a lot of information about it. So one report would not have changed anything. Such a scenario did not exist, and everything that happened [leading to the attack], you could make up an explanation for because of existing preconceptions.’
He said the failure stemmed from ‘years of strategic assumptions that Hamas was deterred and could be kept calm’ through Qatari cash.
‘I didn’t understand; those before me didn’t understand,’ Haliva said.
In the recordings, he also placed responsibility on Israel’s Shin Bet security service. ‘The Shin Bet – its responsibility for Gaza is at least, if not more, than the Military Intelligence’s responsibility,’ he said.
In April 2024, six months after Hamas’ disastrous attack on southern Israeli communities, Haliva resigned from his post – the first senior figure in Israel’s political and security establishment to step down over responsibility for the failures. In his resignation letter to the chief of staff, Haliva acknowledged that the intelligence directorate under his command had not fulfilled its mission.
‘Throughout all my roles, I knew that alongside authority lies heavy responsibility,’ he wrote. ‘With the outbreak of the war, I expressed my desire to take responsibility and end my position. After more than half a year, I asked to retire from the IDF at the conclusion of the investigation stage,’ he added.
He also called for the creation of a state commission of inquiry ‘to thoroughly, deeply and comprehensively examine all the factors and circumstances that led to the grave events.’