To what extent were Hamas allies aware of the October 7 plans? Confidential documents lift the veil on this essential question. Around thirty pages show that the Islamist organization, responsible for the death of 1,200 people that day, tried to persuade Iran to participate in this massacre planned for years.
Minutes of ten Hamas meetings – seized by the Israeli army and obtained by the New York Times – provide a detailed account of the planning of the October 7 terrorist attack. They were discovered on a computer found at the end of January 2024 by Israeli soldiers in the town of Khan Younes, in southern Gaza, from where the group’s leaders had recently escaped.
Originally, what Hamas had called “the great project” was planned for the fall of 2022. Except that the Palestinian Islamist group preferred to delay the execution of the plan while its leader, Yahya Sinwar, tried to convince Iran and Hezbollah, a Lebanese paramilitary militia serving Tehran, joined the assault. Or at least to engage in a broader alliance against Israel. Objective: mount a combined aggression against the Jewish state from the north, south and east.
“General support from its allies”
According to the August 2023 report, Khalil al-Hayya, a senior Hamas official, informed Mohammed Said Izadi of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps that his men would need help to strike sensitive sites during “the first hour” of the assault. “According to the document, Mr. Izadi said that Hezbollah and Iran were in principle favorable to the plan, but that they needed time ‘to prepare the environment,'” reports the New York Times. A report also indicates that Khalil al-Hayya intended to discuss it with Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah – who has since died.
“Hamas felt assured of the general support of its allies, but concluded that it might have to move forward without their full participation,” rewinds the New York Times. If the Islamist organization decided to go it alone, it was to better anticipate “the imminent establishment of a new Israeli air defense system”.
We also learn, in these meeting minutes, that Hamas leaders were planning a terrorist offensive even more deadly than that of October 7, with the idea of perforating a skyscraper in Tel Aviv. And in order not to dissipate the element of surprise, they have done everything possible to camouflage their major plans, giving the illusion of a period of calm until October 2023. “Archives show that the military group avoided several escalations since 2021 to falsely suggest that he had been dissuaded”, continues the New York Times.
“One of the most crucial moments in the modern history of the Middle East”
In another detailed article, THE Washington Post discusses letters from Hamas, this time from 2021, to Iran’s top leaders requesting hundreds of millions of dollars in funding and training for 12,000 additional Hamas fighters. “In these letters, Yahya Sinwar describes the extensive damage Hamas suffered during clashes with Israel in May 2021 and asks the Iranians to compensate for losses and help the group prepare for much greater battles to come,” indicates the daily.
Note that Hamas’ decision to attack Israel can be explained by the tense geopolitical context in the region at that time. Indeed, the Palestinian organization wanted to disrupt efforts to normalize relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, as well as the strengthening of Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Added to this was the desire to stop Israeli efforts to exercise greater control over the compound of the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, sacred in Islam and Judaism and known to Jews as the Temple Mount. .
“The documents provide greater context for one of the most crucial moments in the modern history of the Middle East,” note the journalists of the New York Times. These revelations are all the more important because they occur after numerous contradictions. While Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has publicly denied any Iranian role in the October 7 assassinations, Hamas leaders have spoken widely about the support they received from their regional allies. The Israeli army, in a separate internal report also obtained by the New York Timesconcluded that the documents were real.