Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said he only learned through media reports that the UAE and Egypt allegedly warned Israeli officials before Hamas’ October 7 attack.
Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Sunday that he only found out through recent media coverage about warnings that regional countries, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, reportedly gave to Israeli officials in the days leading up to Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack.
Speaking on Army Radio, Gallant said that if these warnings had reached Israel’s political leadership without being shared with defense officials, that would represent a serious breakdown in how the overall threat was evaluated. He also revealed that back in September 2023, a message passed through a communication channel between Hamas and Israel’s Shin Bet security agency signaled that then Gaza Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar was preparing to “shake” Israeli prisons, according to Haaretz.
The UAE Warning
Gallant pointed to an earlier Haaretz report indicating that UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed had personally warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu just days before the attack that Hamas was planning something major. Gallant said he, too, first learned of that warning through media coverage and has since seen additional reporting on it.
While he couldn’t confirm whether the account was accurate, he noted that more sources appeared to be backing it up over time. He argued that if true, a warning delivered to the prime minister from a foreign leader shouldn’t be treated as a political matter, but rather as intelligence that belongs to Israel’s defense establishment. Gallant added that had the IDF chief of staff been aware, during pre-attack discussions, that Netanyahu had received such a warning two weeks earlier, it likely would have factored into military planning.
Gallant Denies Getting an Egypt Warning
Addressing separate reports of a warning from Egypt, Gallant said no such information, written or verbal, ever reached him. He said it wasn’t passed along to the military chief of staff either, and he believes it likely didn’t reach the head of the Shin Bet.
Details of Egypt’s Alleged Warning
According to a report from The Atlantic published Friday, Egypt’s intelligence chief Abbas Kamel traveled to Israel 11 days before the October 7 attack to warn that Hamas was gearing up for a large scale assault and that time was running out to stop it. The report, which drew on accounts from Israeli, Egyptian, Arab, American and European officials familiar with the visit, said Kamel urged Israel to offer Hamas economic concessions to defuse tensions. He reportedly cautioned that failing to shift course could lead to disaster in Gaza, citing a former Israeli official who was briefed on the meeting afterward.
Kamel’s visit took place on September 26, 2023, the same day Israel marked the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. A plane connected to Egyptian intelligence landed at a secluded section of Ben Gurion International Airport, stayed there for 67 minutes, then flew back to Cairo. While Israeli media had previously reported on the flight itself, who was actually on board remained unclear until now.