Two opposing trends are currently substantially altering Israel’s national security picture.
On the one hand, the IDF significantly postponed presenting its October 7 probes to the public, leading top dissenting officials to leak much of their key findings. This trend focuses on accountability and reform in the IDF to prevent more disasters.
On the other hand, IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Herzi Halevi is restructuring the army with crucial appointments to high command and elsewhere, despite widespread expectations that he would resign once the probes were published.
But Halevi withheld publication. The IDF chief believes that Benjamin Netanyahu will succeed at holding onto power for an indefinite period, and therefore does not want the prime minister to replace him until the current war is more wrapped up.
The publication date for the probes has changed multiple times. They were first due to be published in June, followed by a rolling basis over July and August.
However, heavy criticism of the July 11 probe into the battle of Be’eri, and the fact that it was presented before a broader presentation of the intelligence and doctrinal failures that led to October 7, led Halevi to push off the rest.
Additionally, Shlomi Binder replaced Aharon Haliva as IDF intelligence chief on August 21; he has likely been weighing in on the probe of the intelligence failures that Haliva managed until then.
Another possibility for the delay is Halevi may feel more pressure to resign once the probes are out, and he wants to put that off.
But delaying the probes has angered many officials who want to publicly hold accountable those who have failed the most.
Earlier leaks on Kfar Aza and Nir Oz showed that the reaction time and coordination of reinforcement forces were even slower and more incompetent than Be’eri.
In Be’eri, the issue was that only 13-25 soldiers got there in the early hours. Large forces arrived to overpower Hamas only around 1 to 2:30 p.m.
In Nir Oz, leaks indicated that by the time the IDF arrived, Hamas had already killed civilians and taken hostages.
The most disturbing finding from the latest leaks is that they not only show a larger scale breakdown of the border fence and defenses than was previously known but also signal problems with the military’s ability to probe itself.
Initially, after October 7, the IDF said Hamas had penetrated the border in 29 different places. However, after a much more comprehensive and meticulous review, the IDF updated that the border was penetrated in 60 locations by around 3,000 Gazans.
The latest estimates from unpublished probes, first reported by Channel 12 and confirmed independently by The Jerusalem Post, were that there were 119 penetrations by around 6,000 Gazans.
This not only doubles the size of the failure in terms of the border breaking down, but it also doubles the size of the forces that IDF intelligence missed and raises questions about why the IDF’s second meticulous review of the issue was so much lower than the reality.
IDF holding off on response
On the record when pressed on the issue, the IDF refused to engage, saying it will only get into the numbers when the probe is published – a date that has been pushed off twice with no new one on the horizon.
The numbers are all there, it simply does not want to discuss them yet.
Until the IDF explains how even its second careful review got the border picture so wrong, there will be doubts about whether even the third version and final probes are accurate or whether the chaos of that day was so great, that the military will never fully know how bad the situation was.
Besides Binder, Halevi is changing the face of the rest of the IDF: Avi Bluth replaced Yehuda Fuchs as the Central Commander for the West Bank a couple of months ago, while Dan Goldfus is set to replace Saar Tzur regarding force buildup and strategy for the Northern Command.
Northern Command chief Maj.-Gen. Uri Gordon will likely replace Amir Baram as deputy IDF chief sometime in the coming months, freeing up Halevi to appoint a new head of the Northern Command.
Publicly, the IDF disputed that Baram would step down, but even the public statement only said he would continue for some period of months. The Post has learned that Halevi and Baram have interpersonal problems that predate their current positions.
Sources have told the Post that Halevi only agreed to Baram becoming the IDF deputy chief as part of a complex compromise with Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Former Air Force chief Amikam Norkin was almost promoted to become the Director-General of the Defense Ministry.
Halevi opposed Norkin in this key post so strongly that he agreed to Eyal Zamir – his rival in the race for IDF chief – becoming the Director-General of the Defense Ministry, though he only received this concession on the condition that he accept Baram as his deputy chief.
Zamir is expected to succeed Halevi whenever the current IDF chief does resign, given that he was Netanyahu’s first pick for the position had he been prime minister when the post opened up (Benny Gantz had control as defense minister at the time under Yair Lapid as prime minister.)
Halevi also placed Barak Hiram as the new Gaza Division Chief in place of Avi Rosenfeld and has made many other appointments changing the leadership of key divisions and brigades across the IDF.
Also, Unit 8200 chief Yossi Sariel is expected to resign in either the coming weeks or months, which will let Halevi continue to change military intelligence leadership along with his prior appointment of Binder.
Several months ago, Halevi replaced the IDF intelligence analysis chief Amit Saar and the IDF Southern Command Intelligence chief.
An increasing number of current and former IDF officials are criticizing Halevi for changing the IDF when many think he should have resigned months ago.
Even opposition figures Benny Gantz and Gadi Eisenkot, both former IDF chiefs, have called for him to resign.
They are still demanding this knowing that Netanyahu – who they do not trust – will pick his replacement.
All of this means that radical changes are occurring to Israel’s national security structure, but lacking consensus and transparency about October 7.
Halevi is credited by most with doing an excellent job of managing the war since October 7.
However, the long-term negative consequences of these processes regarding the probes and the appointments could eventually destabilize the IDF and continue to undermine the general public’s faith.