IICC Perspectives

Ambassadors Nimrod Barkan and Benny Dagan served 40 years in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Both of them headed the Ministry Center for Policy Research (CPR – "Mahamad"). In heir article, they claim that even before 2023, CPR had already warned that Hamas had not been deterred, and that its leader was motivated by ideological intransigence and a deep commitment to the vision of Israel´s destruction. PCR warning, which appeared in a series of widely circulated intelligence publications, was ignored by the political echelons both within the foreign ministry and beyond. To their opinion, the dominance of other intelligence bodies, especially Military Intelligence ("Aman"), also deflected attention from it, creating yet another layer of the October 7 intelligence and political failure.

On October 13, 2023, five years after it was disbanded, CED (Captured Enemy Documents Unit – "AMSHAT"), was re-established and has since become of supreme importance to commanders and fighters. Colonel D,
commander of the unit, said, "Today everyone knows the CED saves lives, and every commander understands that before any mission he has to study the relevant CED materials." The vision is for every unit to have a CED team and every frontline fighter will know he has to search for enemy intelligence material. There is no IDF Intelligence Directorate debriefing that doesn't rely on CED materials. Also important is proactivity: that's the difference between the way the CED Unit operates today, and the way it operated in the past.

This fascinating article reflects the knowledge, understandings and impressions of Itzhak (Itzik) Barzilai, a former Mossad senior official, of his service in Iran, which started back in 1968. His bottom line brings a quote of Sir Denis Wright, the British ambassador to Tehran in the early 1960s, that is very relevant today, when Washington and Teheran started a round of negotiation towards a new agreement between them.
Sir Write wrote in his end-of-service report that the Iranians are "a people who say the opposite of what they think, do the opposite of what they say, but that does not mean that their actions do not correspond to what they think. A defense pact cannot be signed with them because, simply put, they are neither trustworthy nor suitable for such a relationship".

The surprise attack of October 7 exposed a deep gap that had developed in recent years between the political, military, and intelligence perceptions of Israel's decision-makers and actual reality. B.G. Brun claims that this gap played a central role in the IDF's inadequate preparedness on the morning of the attack. Since then, it has become clear that, as in other historical surprises, the Israeli intelligence community did in fact possess information that should have indicated not only the existence of this gap but also its magnitude. However, this information, along with additional warning signs that indicated the gap, failed to undermine the flawed perception framework of the decision-makers or prompt them to take more appropriate measures to prevent the attack.

Proffer URI Bar Joseph, a very well known political science analyst, is an expert on security, Military and intelligence issues.
A couple of his books deal with the Egyptian surprise prior to the Yom Kipur war, of October 1973.
In this interesting article, Bar Joseph deals with the threats arising from the interface between populist leaders in liberal democracies, and their intelligence communities, giving the case studies of the USA and Israel.
We all should be worried!

In his article, Dr. Matti Steinberg claims that people who prefer not to see Israel slip into one state with Judea and Samaria, have to support dividing the territory into two states, where the Palestinian state includes the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Saying "no" to one state, means saying a determined "yes" to two states. Thus, there is no escape from a political arrangement for dividing the territory into two states, to ensure the existence of the State of Israel.   Dr. Steinberg taught at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Princeton University and Heidelberg University.

The objective of the following article is to define which aspects of the 'Iron Swords' War should be investigated. Three issues concern us here: first, morality manifested by the obligation to preserve individual dignity in all circumstances, regardless of who the individual is; second, the principles of waging a just war as developed in philosophical thought over many centuries; and third, the standards and principles of the IDF as presented in the document entitled "Spirit of the IDF”, which is the IDF code of ethics.

The Gaza war has demonstrated how female soldiers could, and did, fight courageously in the front lines, alongside male soldiers. It was a forthright response to all those who belittle and oppose, sometimes vehemently, the role of women in combat and their claims for equality. The courageous story of IDF's female soldiers, is told here by Dr. Shulamit (Shuli) Binah.

The war in the Gaza Strip has not ended and it is still too early to draw conclusions, but from its outbreak on October 7, 2023, many people noted the similarity between situations in 1973 and 2023: both were intelligence failures which led to crushing surprise attacks and catastrophic results. Colonel (Ret.) Shlomo Kashi and Brigadier General (Ret.) David Zur will try to shed light and understand the current event, examining similarities and differences, and particularly by looking for common sources for the surprises.

The Israeli Concept of National Security, was formulated in the early 1950s by David Ben-Gurion, who determined its three elements: deterrence, early warning and decision. Substantially, nothing dramatic about it was changed during the last seven centuries, up to these days. This article suggests that the terrible event of October 7 2023, force us to do so, and formulate a new doctrine, based on a new tripod table: defense, offense, and moderation. This really deserve deep thinking, that hopefully will take place soon, at the highest level of decision taking.