ΕΑΝ ΠΡΟΤΙΜΑΤΕ ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ ΠΑΤΗΣΤΕ ΤΗ ΣΗΜΑΙΑ ΣΤΟ ΚΑΤΩ ΜΕΡΟΣ ΤΗΣ ΟΘΟΝΗΣ
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New revelations about an alleged UAE warning to Netanyahu add to the evidence that Israel was not simply “caught by surprise”: warnings came from abroad, soldiers saw Hamas preparing at the border, and the security system repeatedly chose not to believe what it was seeing.
By Helleniscope’s Editorial Team
The emerging story of October 7 is becoming harder to describe simply as an intelligence failure. Israel had intelligence. The more disturbing question is why so much of it was ignored.
A new Haaretz investigation (link here) alleges that roughly ten days before the Hamas assault, UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed personally warned Benjamin Netanyahu that Yahya Sinwar was preparing a major operation capable of producing bloodshed and regional upheaval. Netanyahu’s office categorically denies that conversation occurred. But Haaretz reports that Netanyahu did not transmit the alleged warning to Israel’s security chiefs.
And the Emirati warning was apparently not unique.
Immediately after October 7, Egyptian intelligence sources said Cairo had repeatedly warned Israel that “something big” was coming from Gaza. Ynet reported that Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel personally warned Netanyahu about an “unusual, terrible operation” approximately ten days before the attack. Netanyahu denied receiving such a warning. Yet days later, U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Michael McCaul, after a classified briefing, publicly said Egypt had warned Israel, though he said it remained unclear at what level the warning was received.
Then there was the border itself.
Israel did not literally abandon surveillance, but its supposedly sophisticated security architecture was dangerously brittle. Surveillance soldiers later testified that cameras repeatedly malfunctioned, observation balloons had been out of service for long periods, and their reports of increasingly aggressive Hamas exercises were dismissed. Hamas trained in plain sight—practicing attacks on Israeli positions, using drones and moving armed convoys near the fence.
Meanwhile, the IDF entered the Simchat Torah holiday with reduced troop presence—a vulnerability its own postwar reforms now acknowledge Hamas exploited. When the assault began, Hamas drones and gunfire rapidly disabled observation towers and cameras on which Israel had become extraordinarily dependent.
Taken together, these facts challenge the comforting narrative of an unforeseeable surprise. Foreign governments reportedly warned Israel. Israeli soldiers warned their commanders. Hamas rehearsed aspects of the assault where Israel could watch.
The central failure was not that Israel saw nothing.
It was that Israel saw warning after warning—and its leadership had convinced itself they could not mean what they appeared to mean.
Sources
- Haaretz — Shlomi Eldar investigation: Netanyahu Got an Explicit Warning Before Oct. 7. He Didn’t Brief Security Chiefs
- The Times of Israel — detailed account of the alleged UAE warning: Days before Oct. 7, UAE leader warned Netanyahu Hamas was planning war
- The Times of Israel — Emirati source confirms the warning: Emirati source confirms Netanyahu was warned ahead of Oct. 7
- The Times of Israel — Egyptian intelligence warnings: Egypt says Israel ignored repeated warnings of “something big”
- The Times of Israel / Reuters — border surveillance failures and reduced holiday troop presence: Surveillance troops describe broken cameras and ignored warnings · IDF later changes holiday deployment policy after Oct. 7 findings
September 8, 2026, www.helleniscope.com, n.stamatakis@aol.com
DISCLAIMER: The views and statements expressed in this article constitute constitutionally protected opinions of this author.
