Israel-Gaza War: Hamas boss Yahya Sinwar's calculated effort, illusions in distracting Benjamin Netanyahu explained
Bloomberg report. In the wake of Hamas’s long-planned and brutal October 7 assault on Israel, the Israeli security establishment is looking back on his words in a new light: as part of an effort to create the illusion that Hamas, considered a terrorist group by the US and European Union, was limiting its embrace of violence to focus on governance. Israeli officials now acknowledge that a sense of complacency had set in around Hamas.
In recent years, the military had greatly reduced its surveillance of the Gaza border fence, relying on electronic sensors and transferring troops out of the area to guard settlements in the West Bank. Analysts believed that Israel had started focusing on Iran and Syria because working on Palestinian issues was not considered of existential importance. The overarching sentiment was that Hamas had been deterred, and that the real challenges lay further afield.
“Sinwar read the Israeli consciousness very well," said Michael Milshtein, former head of Palestinian research for the military’s intelligence department. “He wanted Israel to believe that Hamas was concentrating on stability in Gaza, promoting civil affairs. He planted this wrong idea in the minds of Israelis." Today, as the Israeli military reduces much of Gaza to rubble in its mission to destroy Hamas, killing more than 11,000 people in the process, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, Sinwar is emerging as the assault’s mastermind.
Read more on livemint.com
