Israel Defence Forces “failed” in their duty to protect residents of the largest kibbutz on the Gaza border, the military’s first internal report into the October 7 Hamas attack has concluded.
During 12 hours of horror, more than 100 members of the Kibbutz Be’eri and 30 security personnel were murdered by Hamas terrorists, including a well-known peace activist, Vivian Silver. Another 32 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza. Eleven of these people remain in captivity.
“Kibbutz Be’eri was captured and the IDF failed in its mission to protect its residents,” the investigation, led by Major General Michael Edelstein, a retired army veteran, concludes. It adds that “the enemy succeeded fully in its plan”.
On the day of the deadly assault, Hamas fighters entered the kibbutz, which had a population of 1,100, from both sides of its perimeter fence and despite members trying to notify the IDF, it took seven hours before large-scale Israeli forces began moving into the kibbutz.
By then all the hostages had already been taken into Gaza and there were still hundreds of gunmen inside. About two-thirds of them were Hamas members, and the rest were from smaller Palestinian organisations, members of a Gazan crime gang and armed looters.
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According to the report, when the attack began, only six residents, members of the community’s security team, were armed with rifles, while a few others had handguns.
The kibbutz’s armoury with more weapons was locked and the two members with keys were killed in the early stages of the fighting. A small team from an IDF special forces unit which arrived in a helicopter about 90 minutes after the attack began, joined local security guards but retreated after taking casualties.
Along with other soldiers who began arriving, they took up positions around the kibbutz gate, unaware of the breach in the fence on the other side, closer to Gaza, through which more attackers were going in and others leaving for Gaza with hostages in tow. Some of the soldiers, instead of being sent into the kibbutz, were deployed to a nearby IDF base which was also under attack.
Only at about 13.30, seven hours after the attack began, did the IDF start sending in larger numbers of soldiers but it would take several more hours before a full picture of what had been happening in Be’eri emerged.
As the IDF soldiers began fighting their way through the kibbutz, killing about a hundred of the attackers, whose total number has been estimated at 340, many of them fled to Gaza while others gathered 15 hostages and barricaded themselves in one of the homes.
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What would take place next was to be one of the most controversial episodes of that day. Under the orders of a general who had arrived to take command of the situation, a tank fired four shells towards the house in an attempt to get the terrorists to surrender.
In a botched rescue attempt by an Israeli counter-terror unit, 13 of the hostages died.
Some of the kibbutz members have blamed the general for causing the deaths by using tank fire. However, the investigation exonerated him because video showed that the shells were not aimed at the house itself, though one of them ricocheted off the ground and hit the house.
The report was presented on Thursday morning to members of the kibbutz, most of whom are still living in temporary lodgings in a large hotel by the Dead Sea, before being released to the public.
Their response was mixed. In a statement, the members said that the “probe was comprehensive and helped the kibbutz members understand some of the complexity of the fighting in the different parts of the kibbutz”.
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However, they added that they were still waiting for answers to “critical questions, for example why didn’t [the army] enter the kibbutz for long hours while forces were concentrating at the gate, the kibbutz was burning and its members calling for help?”
They ended their statement with a call for the Israeli government to sign a deal with Hamas to release the remaining hostages and for a national commission of inquiry “which will leave no stone unturned” and investigate the years of government policy leading to the war.
The defence minister Yoav Gallant echoed their call, when in a speech at a graduation ceremony of new IDF officers, he said that military investigations focused on the tactical level were not enough.
“We are obligated to hold an inquiry at the national level which will make the facts clear, a national commission of inquiry. The commission must be objective and must investigate everyone, the government, the army and the security agencies. It must probe me, and it must probe the prime minister and the IDF chief of staff.”
Gallant’s words were directed at Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, who was also present. In public he has opposed the idea of an investigation taking place before the war in Gaza is over.
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In private he has also opposed a national commission of inquiry being set up even after the war since such a commission, by Israeli law, would be fully independent, with members appointed by the president of the supreme court.
Netanyahu, whose government attempted last year to pass a series of laws weakening the powers of the supreme court, is anxious to avoid such an independent commission. His allies have been trying to build support in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, for an inquiry whose members will be appointed by politicians.
The report is the first in a series of operational investigations into the events of October 7.
Some 1,200 people were killed and a further 250 hostages captured during the Hamas attacks, according to Israeli figures.
