Israel has long prided itself on the ability to pre-empt and crush threats to its borders and people. That Hamas could launch such an audacious attack suggests a massive failure, says the Financial Times’ Middle East editor Andrew England.
File photo. A view shows a police station that was the site of a battle following a mass infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Sderot, southern Israel on Oct 8, 2023. Images on social media showed Israeli civilians - who would have been sleeping or resting during the Sabbath, Israel’s day of rest - fleeing for their lives across fields.
It is a pivotal moment for Israel, a nation acutely aware of its vulnerability to hostile forces, but which has long prided itself on the ability of its security and intelligence establishment to pre-empt and crush threats to its borders. Despite fighting at least four wars with Hamas since the group seized control of Gaza in 2007, Israel clearly underestimated the militants’ capacity.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presides over the most far-right government in the nation’s history, which took office promising to take a tougher line on security. Extremists within his coalition are likely to push for the most hardline response. Iran-backed Hezbollah has a far larger and more sophisticated rocket and missile arsenal than Hamas, which tends to rely on homemade rockets.
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