Netanyahu Faces October 7 Warning Claims as Election Nears

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces renewed allegations about his handling of warnings before the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack, with former Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar pursuing a defamation lawsuit as an election approaches. RT reports that Bar is seeking nearly $1 million in damages, alleging that Netanyahu wrongly blamed intelligence officials despite receiving repeated security alerts in the preceding months. Bar says documentary records will challenge the prime minister's version of events. The report places the dispute in the closing stretch of campaigning before a vote scheduled for October 27.

Netanyahu's account differs sharply: he maintains that Bar did not alert him to an imminent attack that morning, despite discussing warning signs with senior military officials, and failed to take preventive action. Separately, former military secretary Avi Gil alleges that officials tried to change the recorded time of a telephone call made on the morning of October 7. The source does not identify those officials or supply records establishing that allegation. Netanyahu has also denied reports that Egyptian intelligence and UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed gave him advance warnings. Former prime minister Naftali Bennett and former military chief Gadi Eisenkot are among the political figures criticising him. The supplied report does not reproduce the documents Bar cites or establish which account of the warnings is accurate.

The controversy also extends to hostage negotiations during the subsequent Gaza war. Former Israeli hostage negotiator Nitzan Alon has suggested that political considerations held up an agreement that might have secured captives' release earlier and prevented deaths. That is his assessment, not an established finding in the supplied material; no specific response to it from Netanyahu is included. The Hamas-led assault killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and saw 251 taken hostage. The report cites local health authorities as putting Palestinian deaths in Israel's subsequent Gaza offensive at more than 74,000. It gives no hearing date for Bar's lawsuit, leaving the allegations and competing accounts unresolved.