Former Israeli defense minister says Hamas message on Oct. 7 events was ‘misread’

Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Sunday that intelligence agencies misinterpreted a message he said Hamas had conveyed before Oct. 7, 2023, while opposition leader Yair Golan accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of ignoring warnings ahead of the events.

Gallant told Army Radio that a message reached Israel indirectly from Hamas through the Shin Bet domestic security agency, saying the group would "shake the prisons." He did not explain how the message was conveyed.

Gallant said Shin Bet and the military intelligence directorate, known as Aman, assessed the message as relating to the abduction of Israeli researcher Elizabeth Tsurkov in Iraq. Tsurkov was released in September 2025.

Israeli Channel 12 reported Tuesday that former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar had sent an unusual message to Israel weeks before Oct. 7, warning of an expected "earthquake in the prisons" over the issue of Palestinian detainees. The report did not identify the intermediary who conveyed it.

For his part, Golan, leader of the opposition Democrats party, wrote on the US social media company X that Netanyahu had received "every warning in the world" before Oct. 7 but "chose to dismiss them."

Citing investigations published by The New York Times and Israel's Haaretz, Golan said intelligence about a possible Hamas attack had reached Netanyahu. He claimed that regional leaders contacted the prime minister personally and that intelligence officials clearly presented the seriousness of the situation to him.

Golan also accused Netanyahu of weakening the Palestinian Authority and silencing those who tried to warn of an "impending disaster."

"The first decision we make in the next government will be to establish a state commission of inquiry into the failures of all the systems, foremost among them Netanyahu," Golan said, adding that the public had a right to know the truth.

Netanyahu has resisted calls for a state commission of inquiry into the Oct. 7, 2023 events. His office has denied a separate Haaretz report alleging that the United Arab Emirates president warned him of a major Hamas operation days beforehand.

Following the Oct. 7 events, Israel launched a brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip, killing more than 74,000 people, injuring around 175,000 others and turning the entire enclave into ruins.