Israeli government failed in ‘its duty to protect its citizens,’ civilian-led probe into Oct. 7 finds

TEL AVIV — The Israeli government failed in its “primary duty to protect its citizens” in the lead-up to and during the Oct. 7, terrorist attacks, according to an Israeli civilian report released Tuesday.

The Civilian Board of Inquiry, which has been investigating evidence of intelligence failures around the Hamas attacks, laid the blame on Israel’s defense and intelligence establishment, as well as civilian leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who it said silenced ‘”dissenting voices” and did not strike Hamas pre-emptively.

“The foremost sin was arrogance, which blinded state leaders and security officials from confronting reality,” according to an NBC News translation from Hebrew.

The board, which is not connected to Israel’s government and cannot officially compel it to act, is made up of former members of the judiciary, military, civil service and relatives of Oct. 7 victims.

The report, which says it interviewed 120 witnesses, also called on the government to launch an official inquiry into the attacks, something Netanyahu has refused to do so despite calls from the families of hostages and other victims.

Netanyahu “bears significant responsibility” for the policy of “money for quiet,” the report also said, referring to allegations that the prime minister encouraged the Qatari government to send millions of dollars a month to the Gaza Strip in the hopes of maintaining the peace.

NBC News has approached Netanyahu’s office for comment but did not receive a response.

Some 1,200 people were killed and 250 taken hostage during the attacks as Hamas fighters infiltrated Israel from southern Gaza and launched thousands of rockets. The incident, described as the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust, profoundly shook Israeli society and damaged a sense of security built over years.

The war that followed the attack has killed more than 44,000 people in Gaza — most of them women and children — according to local officials, driven much of the population of the enclave to the brink of famine and destroyed many of its buildings.

The Israeli report also identified a “major cause” of the Oct. 7 tragedy as a “glaring failure” by Israeli intelligence branches.

It specifically pointed to Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security agency, and military intelligence for their inability to provide timely warnings or act on those that were issued.

Israel’s intelligence services appeared blindsided by the attack, despite having long been seen as some of the most capable in the world, with an array of human intelligence, eavesdropping and other technical means covering the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

In a response attached to the committee’s report, Shin Bet said that it “values civilian engagement,” but that a state commission of inquiry “must be established.”

Benny Gantz, a former defense minister and key rival of Netanyahu’s who quit Israel’s war Cabinet in June, echoed Shin Bet’s calls for an official inquiry, which he said “must be established without delay.”

In a response attached to the committee’s report, he said an official inquiry would help with “initiating the process of national healing, restoring public trust, and strengthening national resilience.”

The report also criticized Israel’s former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, for “reducing troop presence near Gaza, the lack of preparedness of southern forces, and ignoring multiple warning signs.”

NBC News has reached out to Gallant for comment.

In July, the Israeli military released an assessment of its failures to protect the residents of Be’eri, one of the communities hit the hardest by the attack, where more than 100 people were killed and dozens taken hostage in an assault that left much of the kibbutz destroyed.

The report, based on an internal inquiry, said the Israeli military “failed in its mission” to protect the kibbutz, a few miles from the border with the Gaza Strip, because of grave errors in Israel’s response to the multipronged assault.

In September, former soldiers from a military observation unit told NBC News that their warnings about suspicious Hamas activity ahead of the Oct. 7 terror attacks were repeatedly ignored.

“If I had been valued a little more — not much, just a little — maybe it could have ended differently,” Roni Lifshitz, one of the former observers, said. “It’s anger and sadness, mainly frustration, because I was there and no one listened to me.”

Omer Bekin reported from Tel Aviv and Freddie Clayton from London.