Netanyahu under fire after schedule shows he didn't meet security heads for 3 hours after waking on Oct 7

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came under attack from political opponents as well as family members of hostages and victims of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, after it was revealed on Thursday that he did not speak with the IDF chief for around three hours after being informed of the attacks. 

A report on the public broadcaster Kan News revealed that Netanyahu did not speak with then-IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi until a situational assessment at around 9:45 AM, despite being informed of the attacks at 6:29 AM. 

In a video last week, Netanyahu claimed that defense officials chose not to wake him, fearing he would order an immediate escalation. 

“They knew that I would activate the air force, and I would call up the army, and I wouldn’t allow anyone (from Gaza) to approach the border, to kill them immediately,” Netanyahu claimed in an interview last week. “So they said, ‘This will lead to an attack or an exchange of fire with Hamas, and that has to be prevented.’” 

“If they would have awakened me, everything would have looked different,” Netanyahu said in the video released last Sunday. 

The October Council, a group of survivors, bereaved families, and former hostages from the Oct. 7 attacks, slammed Netanyahu’s previous description of the situation.  

“This morning we are discovering the harsher truth – even when he was woken up, he did not ask to speak to the chief of staff for three hours,” the group said in a statement. 

“In those hours, our children, our parents, our brothers and sisters were still alive,” the statement continued. “They hid in the battalion headquarters, bled in the field, called for help, waited for the army and the state to arrive. The Prime Minister was already awake. The country was burning and he did not speak with the Chief of Staff.” 

Referring to Netanyahu’s claim that he would have immediately “activated the military,” the council stated, “The question is no longer just who woke Netanyahu up and when. The question is what the Prime Minister of Israel did from the moment he woke up, while Israeli citizens were being slaughtered and kidnapped.” 

“These three hours are not a footnote. They could be the difference between life and death. And we will not let anyone bury them,” the council said, reiterating its demand for a state commission of inquiry. 

“Precisely on account of these three hours we must establish a state commission of inquiry,” the council said. “Not a commission that Netanyahu will appoint, not an investigation that he will rule over, but a state commission that will investigate, minute by minute: who knew, who called, who gave instructions, who didn’t, and most of all: why, while our loved ones were still alive, the state wasn’t there to save them.”

Yonatan Shmeriz, whose brother Alon was killed in Kfar Aza that morning, said those confronting Hamas couldn’t understand why the government did not respond quickly: 

“14 heroes, fighters of the Kfar Aza emergency squad, did not understand how they were fighting for hours, until the last drop of their blood, alone against dozens of terrorists,” Shmeriz wrote. “After an hour of fighting, my good friends fell and those who remained alive, including my little brother, did not understand where the army was, where the state was.” 

“It turns out that Benjamin 'If they had woken me up' Netanyahu was busy, after they woke him up, with everything except managing the situation,” Shmeriz said. 

The Yashar! party, led by former IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, said the timeline demonstrates “further proof of his lack of leadership and weakness in the most difficult moments in the country's history.” 

“No matter how many Arabian Nights stories he tries to spread, and how much he and his associates try to rewrite history with the pathetic spin 'If only they had woken me up' - nothing will erase the simple truth: At the moment of truth, Netanyahu did not function,” the party said in a statement. 

Yair Golan, head of the Democrats party, said the timeline shows “evidence of his [Netanyahu’s] poor and failed functioning” on that morning. 

Golan has threatened to sue Sara Netanyahu over comments she made insinuating that he had advance knowledge of the attacks, rushing down to the Gaza Envelope that morning to help confront the Hamas threat. 

“When you are a military officer of such a high rank and claim that you fought on October 7, you were already there early in the morning, already dressed and prepared," Sara Netanyahu said in an interview with Israel's Channel 14.

"At a very early hour, when others did not know, such as the prime minister,” she added, referring to her husband. 

“While Hamas terrorists are occupying Israeli settlements, murdering, raping, and kidnapping, the Prime Minister is incomprehensibly disconnected from the Chief of Staff,” Golan wrote on social media, criticizing the prime minister’s behavior. “This is the most serious evidence of his poor and failed functioning.” 

Golan also said that Netanyahu, and people around him, are trying to “rewrite history and blame those who woke up and went out to fight for their homeland.” 

However, Brigadier General (res.) Oren Solomon, the former head of the IDF’s Oct. 7 investigations, said the criticism of Netanyahu is unfounded during an interview on Galei Israel. 

“The prime minister's role in this matter is almost irrelevant. The Chief of Staff and the senior command team should be allowed to manage the event,” Solomon said. 

Asked if then Chief of Staff Halevi should have tried to reach Netanyahu earlier, Solomon said, “No. He was supposed to be busy conducting the war, giving orders and giving instructions.” 

The timeline released by Netanyahu shows that the order to close the border completely only came after the morning briefing with Netanyahu and the security chiefs. 

For many Israelis, the release only heightens questions over why the security response was so delayed that morning.