We now have an answer to one of the vexing questions of the October 7 attacks: Whether the carnage was the result of Hamas’s intention or its disorganization.
Intention it was. Israel has provided, and the New York Times has analyzed and confirmed, hours of Hamas communication on that day. Israel also provided the Times with a written directive that almost certainly came from Hamas honcho Yahya Sinwar himself. The Times reports:
“‘Two or three operations, in which an entire neighborhood, kibbutz, or something similar will be burned, must be prepared,’ the memo said.
“In an echo to the memo, just before 10 a.m. on Oct. 7, a commander from a Gaza City battalion referred to as Abu Muhammed told subordinates: ‘Start setting homes on fire.’
“‘Burn, burn,’ he said, according to the intercepts. ‘I want the whole kibbutz to be in flames.’”
“‘Set fire to anything,’ a commander in the northern Gaza city of Jabaliya referred to as Abu al-Abed said around the same time.”
What about the mass slaughter of civilians?
“Kill everyone on the road,” a Hamas commander called Abu Muath ordered. “Kill everyone you encounter.”
What about the taking of hostages of all ages?
“Guys, take a lot of hostages,” the commander told Hamas fighters who said they were killing large numbers of civilians at a kibbutz. “Take a lot of hostages.”
What about the fact that this brutality was broadcast to the world?
“It needs to be affirmed to the unit commanders to undertake these actions intentionally, film them and broadcast images of them as fast as possible,” the Sinwar memo instructed.
What about the genocidal nature of the attack?
“Document the scenes of horror, now, and broadcast them on TV channels to the whole world,” a commander from Gaza City instructed fighters at a kibbutz. “Slaughter them. End the children of Israel.”
So that’s it—riddle solved, question answered. Every Gazan who stormed through the destroyed border fence that day was a participant in an explicitly genocidal attack with specific encouragement toward heinous crimes against humanity and to document it all so there could be no confusion, no denial, no debate: “Undertake these actions intentionally.”
All of this was obvious from the moment it happened. But the ranks of Western anti-Israel activists are filled with people trained to deny the obvious. Now it is fact, and it is undeniable. Every accusation made against Israel by Hamas’s supporters was pure projection.
One can imagine how frustrating this might have been, at least at first, to Hamas itself. Its top leadership specifically called for the entire world to witness Hamas’s crimes, to know they were intentional, and to inspire others to globalize the intifada along with them. The fact that they inspired more such ghoulishness among Western activists than random Palestinians in the West Bank should haunt us all. Gaza became the last true Nazi citadel, and lots of people in Europe and America thought it was grand.
Moreover, the denialism that crept in was a strategic problem for Hamas. It contradicted the entire point of the operation.
Just as frustrating must have been the slow development of the assumption among many that Hamas’s meticulously planned operation was disordered and disorganized. It wasn’t. It’s just that many Palestinian “civilians” in Gaza joined in the bloodletting, giving the impression of randomness.
Why does it matter that the Hamas attacks were so meticulously organized? Because the idea of “disorganization” has been used by some in the “pro-Palestinian” chorus to claim that the very worst crimes were unintended. Gazans kidnapped and murdered and then mutilated the body of a baby. They were following instructions. Gazans abused defenseless women and children in horrific ways. They were following instructions. Gazans dragged elderly people in failing health across the sand into hellish captivity. They were following instructions.
I suppose “free Palestine” can mean different things to different people. But to those in America, Europe and Gaza, it means everything laid out above.
