Tforce tracking11/20/2023 Now, I was in Gaza in 2005 when Israel pulled out 8,000 Jewish settlers, literally dragging some of them from their homes, and they withdrew the military as well. MYRE: The big question is whether Israel will send ground troops into Gaza, something they've done only reluctantly and briefly in recent years. MARTIN: Greg, before we let you go, it's early days, but what should we be looking for as this continues? Now they have this huge arsenal capable of hitting deep inside Israel. And these parts have been smuggled into southern Gaza through these tunnels to Egypt. So a lot of these rockets were just made in auto repair shops. So Hamas was even cutting down light poles and using them as their launching tubes. ![]() Well, what about the other five? A couple apparently didn't make it out of Gaza, a couple probably landed in the Mediterranean Sea. I remember the Israeli military saying, at the end of the day, Hamas fired 10 rockets and five hit Israel. They traveled just a few miles, very inaccurate. MYRE: Yeah, the Palestinians first launched a major uprising in 2000 against the Israeli occupation, and that's when Hamas began firing these rockets. Can you tell us a bit more about how Hamas has developed these capabilities? MARTIN: So Greg, you've covered the region and you've covered this conflict for many years. We know they've had this very close relationship for many years, but not clear what Iran did, if anything, at this point. And there's also talk of what role Hamas' main patron, Iran, might have played. And in the past, just a single breach would have been considered a major failing.Īnd Israeli soldiers at the border have written on social media that militants overtook their base, killing soldiers, and that there were fewer troops there because it was a holiday over this weekend. But as our colleague Daniel Estrin has reported, militants cut through the fence or blasted through the fence in multiple points. And Israel has this very sophisticated border fence that even includes an underground wall to guard against Hamas militants digging a tunnel under the fence, as they've done in the past. Well, remember, Gaza is a small territory, maybe five miles wide, 25 miles long. Can we answer any of those questions at this point? I mean, do we know anything about how did they do this in such large numbers at such scale and with such coordination? MARTIN: So yes, those are all the questions we have. And how come the Israeli military wasn't better positioned when this attack began? Israel normally has a very robust force in southern Israel just outside Gaza. It has a large number of Palestinian informants working for them there. Second, how did Israel's domestic intelligence agency, Shin Bet, not know about these plans? There's sort of this long-standing belief that the Israelis can listen to almost any phone call or communications in Gaza. I think, first of all, how did all these weapons get into Gaza? The Hamas arsenal has always seemed to have limits in the past, and yet Hamas has fired hundreds, perhaps even a couple thousand rockets into Israel this time. Current officials are staying pretty tight-lipped, but the former officials say they're just stunned for a number of reasons. MYRE: Well, Michel, a real sense of shock. I'm sure this wasn't on the agenda to begin with, but what are you hearing there? And you're there because you're attending a conference of current and former national security officials. MARTIN: So you're joining us from Sea Island, Ga. MARTIN: So to try to understand this, we have NPR national security correspondent Greg Myre on the line with us now. The scale of the attack likely took months to plan, and Israel's security forces had all that time been focused heavily on Hamas. You think about the different aspects of this attack - the paragliders, the fighters getting over or around walls. How did Hamas fighters plan and carry out such a large attack and keep it secret until the end?
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