A Texas congressman and chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee said Wednesday that Egypt had warned Israel about Hamas’ surprise attack in the weeks leading up to the attack that killed at least 1,200 people.
Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican, spoke Wednesday, confirming what Egyptian intelligence has previously said and contradicting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
‘There appears to have been an intelligence error. We’re not sure how we missed it. We’re not quite sure how Israel missed it,” McCaul said.
He had just received a closed-door briefing from Biden administration officials for an update on the crisis.
“We know that Egypt had warned the Israelis three days earlier that an event like this could happen. We know this may have been planned a year ago,” McCaul added.
Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican, spoke Wednesday, confirming what Egyptian intelligence has previously said and contradicting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Netanyahu’s office called reports that Egyptians had warned them “fake news” in a tweet sent on Monday.
“The report that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu received advance notice from Egypt is absolutely false,” the prime minister’s office account said.
‘There has been no advance notice from Egypt and the Prime Minister has not spoken directly or indirectly to the head of Egypt’s intelligence service since the formation of the government. This is totally fake news,” she added.
When McCaul was asked who he had heard from, he said the intelligence was out there.
‘I don’t want to get too much into advertising, but a warning has been given, I guess the question is at what level’
In the aftermath of the attacks, allies who share intelligence with Israel said security services misread reality.
An Egyptian intelligence official said Egypt, which often acts as a mediator between Israel and Hamas, had repeatedly spoken to the Israelis about “something big,” without elaborating.
He said Israeli officials focused on the West Bank and downplayed the threat from Gaza.
Netanyahu’s office called reports that Egyptians had warned them “fake news” in a tweet sent on Monday
When McCaul was asked who he had heard from, he said the intelligence was out there
Netanyahu’s government is made up of supporters of Jewish settlers in the West Bank, who have demanded a crackdown in light of a growing wave of violence there over the past 18 months.
“We have warned them that an explosion of the situation is coming, very soon, and it would be big. But they underestimate such warnings,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the content of sensitive intelligence discussions with the media.
Israel’s intelligence services have acquired an aura of invincibility in recent decades thanks to a series of achievements.
The state has foiled plots in the West Bank, is said to have hunted down Hamas operatives in Dubai and has been accused of killing Iranian nuclear scientists in the heart of Iran.
Even as their efforts failed, agencies like the Mossad, Shin Bet and military intelligence have retained their mystique.
But that weekend’s attack, which caught Israel off guard during a major Jewish holiday, casts doubt on that reputation and raises questions about the country’s preparedness against a weaker but determined enemy.
More than 48 hours later, Hamas militants continued to battle Israeli forces on Israeli territory, and dozens of Israelis found themselves in Hamas captivity in Gaza.
“This is a big failure,” said Yaakov Amidror, a former national security adviser Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “This operation actually proves that the (intelligence) capabilities in Gaza were not good.”
Amidror declined to provide an explanation for the failure, saying lessons should be learned when the dust settles.
Joe Biden said on Wednesday that he had seen photos from Israel this weekend of “terrorists beheading children” – confirming Israeli soldiers’ accounts of almost unimaginable horror and emphasizing that the US was working feverishly to rescue the hostages.
Biden held a meeting with Jewish community leaders at the White House on Wednesday and said he was shocked by the brutality of the Hamas attack.
At least 1,200 Israelis were killed in Saturday’s massacre, which began when Hamas militants crossed the border from Gaza into Israel and killed people at a music festival and in their homes near the border.
“This attack was a campaign of sheer brutality, not just hatred, but sheer brutality, against the Jewish people,” Biden said.
He added: ‘I never really thought I would see and confirm pictures of terrorists beheading children.’
And he warned Iran, which acts as Hamas’s patron, not to interfere.
