Netanyahu warned of the Hamas mine - and then stepped on it with eyes wide open | Ben Caspit

Back to the danger

At the beginning of October 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a discussion with the heads of the security establishment under the title "Multi-front situation assessment." He did not know that in a week he would find himself in exactly such a multi-front situation. But he should have known. This knowledge was lying at his feet, under the lamp. One only had to look at it. But Netanyahu preferred to continue running with the judicial coup, the reasonableness standard, etc. It was much more urgent for him. In the dilemma between the security of the state and the lives of its citizens and his personal security and freedom, there is no dilemma.

In that same discussion (the story is brought in Amos Harel's excellent book "06:29"), the head of the Shin Bet, Ronen Bar, repeated his claim that Israel should prepare for a major operation in Gaza, and recommended the assassination of senior Hamas officials. In the summary of the meeting, Netanyahu gave instructions: "To increase the use of humanitarian benefits, to promote a settlement process in the Strip, and conversely, to upgrade operational readiness for assassinations."

What did that mean in practice? To continue to appease Hamas. "To promote operational readiness" is empty talk. The operational readiness was there. It was not necessary to "promote it," but to give the order to execute it. But what Netanyahu did in those days was to approve the increase of benefits for Hamas, according to the demands of Yahya Sinwar: increasing the quota of workers entering from Gaza (an all-time record), an effort to convince Qatar to increase support in dollars, expanding the fishing range, etc. Sinwar made sounds of appeasement. Netanyahu was satisfied. Hamas's deception exercise succeeded. Netanyahu took a "calculated risk," as Sinwar suggested.

All this is known to the point of nausea. But here comes the punchline: at the end of the discussion, Netanyahu informed those present that "Israel is on the verge of a historic peace agreement with Saudi Arabia, there will be 'states and organizations' that will try to sabotage it."

That is, Netanyahu, who knew he was on the verge of signing with Mohammed bin Salman, and out of his vast experience and the intelligence he read, understood the danger. He understood and even explained it. He knew that signing with Saudi Arabia meant the end of the Palestinian dream, at least at this time. He knew that Hamas could not let such an event pass in silence and would do everything to torpedo it. And therefore he issued this explicit warning, which is anchored in the protocol.

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Blind in a minefield

TULIP is called Tal Angert. I didn't know him before. This week he drew my attention to his tweets in real time. A talented young man, a Tel Avivian, who works at the Resilience Center in the Eshkol Regional Council, in the Gaza envelope. Treats trauma victims, experiences it all over again every time. "This story is a significant point that touches on the failure in general, and that night between October 6 and 7 in particular," he told me. "How do I understand this and no one else does? How does Netanyahu understand this, warn against it, but do nothing about it?"

What should we understand from all this? Not much, except for this clear and bright insight: Netanyahu, who considers himself a statesman, is unable to read two steps ahead. Like the disastrous exit from the nuclear deal, when he didn't understand that he had no Plan B, that there was no alternative, that exiting the agreement would advance Iran toward a nuclear weapon, like the failed announcement of the overthrow of the Iranian regime, so it is with the Gaza issue. To say to himself a simple thing: I am going to peace with Saudi Arabia. Mohammed Deif and Sinwar see this as a historic defeat of biblical proportions. It seals their fate. They will try to do something.

This failure is the deepest and most horrific in the history of the state. To navigate a Middle Eastern minefield without seeing one step ahead. To say that there is a mine ahead and then step on it with complacency. Without saying wait, let's secure the dangerous flank from which evil might come, when we are finally burying Hamas and the Palestinian state. There was no need for the four Aman letters and not even for all the warnings of the senior officials of the system and not even for Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. All Netanyahu needed was to understand his own warning, to take off the ridiculous pink glasses he was wearing, to stop the publicized vacation trip with "my wife" and to protect the security of Israel, as he was supposed to do. But as has already been written here, it was not the security of Israel that was on his mind, but his own security.

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Filth and nonsense

I ask myself if there is even one person in the Likud campaign who thinks that the attacks of Yinon Magal or the clumsy and low-level smearing of Yaakov Bardugo or that tattered clown from the radio who called Eisenkot a "jobnik" (slacker), are game changers. Will this pathetic campaign convince the undecided not to vote for Eisenkot? In my opinion, there is no such person. And if we are already talking about the Likud campaign, I ask myself if there is such a thing.

There is no professional eye that looks at the situation and does not reach the conclusion that the Likud campaign is in collapse. Or at least in a deep crisis. There is no landlord, neglect reigns, nothing is managed. First, there is no campaigner. Ofer Golan defected to Itamar Ben Gvir and was defected from there too, but did not return (for now) to Netanyahu. Yonatan Urich, post-Qatar and arrest, is revealed as a balloon that inflated beyond its natural size, and not only in kilograms. He hasn't tweeted for about a week, which caused the sewage level to drop below the Ayalon.