In the years preceding its attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, Hamas meticulously crafted a strategy to destroy the Jewish state, coordinating closely with Hezbollah and Iran, according to confidential documents released by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center.
The documents reveal that Iran played a key role in financing Hamas’s efforts to destroy Israel. Hamas’s leadership, particularly Yahya Sinwar, pushed for a multi-pronged assault, believing that their military force could eventually bring Israel to the brink of collapse. This plan culminated in the coordinated strikes on October 7, which included land, sea, and air attacks, marking a significant escalation in Hamas’s long-standing objective to annihilate Israel. Despite years of military buildup in Gaza, Israeli intelligence was caught off guard by the scale and suddenness of the attack, leaving security forces inadequately prepared.
Before 2019, Hamas’s military strategies were largely defensive, focusing on bolstering Gaza’s infrastructure to withstand potential future conflicts. This was reflected in a document titled “The Movement’s Strategy 2013-2017.” The document also outlined a “realistic plan” that involved sparking an uprising in the West Bank and “mobilizing forces to carry out jihad,” in addition to seeking to pursue Jews and military personnel through international legal channels.
However, by 2019, there was a marked shift in Hamas’s approach, with a more aggressive stance emerging by 2021, as evidenced by internal documents retrieved from Gaza. In 2019, Hamas began prioritizing coordination with Iran’s Quds Force and Hezbollah through a “joint defense agreement,” as detailed in a document from Sinwar’s office. This agreement outlined a multi-front war against Israel, with the ultimate goal of “liberating al-Quds [Jerusalem].”
The Israeli military’s Operation Guardian of the Walls in 2021 served as a turning point in Hamas’s strategy, according to Itai Brun, former chief of the IDF Intelligence Research Division. This operation, which aimed to dismantle Hamas’s military infrastructure, followed rising violence and rocket attacks from Gaza. In the months after the operation, Sinwar, military leader Mohammed Deif, and deputy Marwan Issa wrote to Esmail Qaani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, requesting $500 million to fund their war efforts. They expressed confidence that “by the end of these two years or during them, if Allah wills, we will uproot [Israel], and together we will change the face of the region.”
The documents reveal that by 2022, Hamas had firmly committed to a multi-front confrontation with Israel. Sinwar outlined this plan in a letter to Ismail Haniyeh, detailing three possible scenarios for the attack. The first, dubbed the “preferred scenario,” envisioned a large-scale assault involving all actors of the “Axis of Resistance,” excluding Iran. This plan called for a sudden attack from multiple fronts, timed around a Jewish holiday like Passover, with support from Hezbollah, Yemen, Iraq, and Syria, alongside guerrilla operations in Jordan.
The second, or “intermediate scenario,” envisioned Hamas as the primary force in the attack, with Hezbollah deploying a smaller portion of its strength, keeping the rest in reserve for deterrence. The third scenario, described as a “scenario of necessity,” envisioned Hamas bearing the brunt of the fighting, with Hezbollah indirectly supporting the operation by activating Hamas forces from Lebanon.
The letter also mentioned the potential establishment of a Hamas combat unit in Lebanon, consisting of at least 250 fighters, who would utilize Hezbollah’s networks to conduct operations against Israel. In response, Haniyeh confirmed that Iran and Hezbollah had approved the first scenario, outlining a coordinated assault on Israel: “[The first scenario] was approved in the discussion we held with our allies; we are awaiting its final review in additional meetings, particularly with the Iranians, and we will follow up on the necessary preparations for it as outlined above.”
Leading up to October 7, Hamas leaders continued to discuss plans for a future attack. In April 2023, Sinwar told Hamas political bureau member Muhammad Nasser that the previous Operation Guardian of the Walls had been “a walk in the park” for Israel, and that the next attack would be “so powerful that it will shatter the enemy into fragments.”
The documents align with public rhetoric from Hamas and its allies. In September 2021, Palestinian factions gathered in Gaza at the “Promise of the Hereafter – Post-Liberation Palestine” conference, where they discussed the goal of governing all of Israel’s territory, “from the river to the sea.” The conference’s concluding statement outlined steps for the creation of a new Palestinian state, which included confronting Jews and purging “hypocrite scum” from Palestine and the Arab and Islamic world.
Similarly, in May 2023, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah declared, “Today, hope is greater than ever for the liberation of Palestine from the sea to the river, for prayer in Al-Aqsa Mosque,” further claiming that Israel’s home front was “weak, fragile, anxious, always ready to pack up and leave.” Nasrallah was killed in an IDF airstrike on Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut in September.
The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center suggested that Israeli intelligence may have underestimated these statements, dismissing them as empty threats. The study concluded that although Hamas and its allies faced significant setbacks in the current conflict that began on October 7, their ultimate goal of destroying Israel remains intact.
“In the long run, if Hamas recovers, it is not improbable that the movement could once again regard destroying Israel as a practical plan,” the report warned.
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