Oct. 7 activation of Hamas SIM cards at heart of PMO investigations

Did Netanyahu know of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack? Allegations reveal Israeli SIM cards activated in Gaza before the assault.

By ELIAV BREUER NOVEMBER 11, 2024 13:22

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) speaks with Cabinet secretary Tzachi Braverman during the weekly government conference at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem on June 17, 2018. (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/POOL)

The question about what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knew about the activation of Israeli SIM cards in Gaza, the first early indications of a Hamas attack on the night between October 6 and 7, is at the heart of the slew of investigations into the Prime Minister's Office that became public over the past week, according to Yediot Ahronot reporter Ronen Bergman.

The three current allegations include the obtaining, alteration, and leaking of classified documents to foreign press to serve the prime minister's political agenda; tampering with protocols of meetings and phone conversations at the beginning of the war; and blackmail of a former senior IDF officer in the military secretariat.

Bergman, who also writes for the New York Times, wrote on Monday morning that according to a "series of officials who are familiar with the most relevant intelligence material," the tampering involved a phone call to the military secretariat with information about the activation of a large number of Israeli SIM cards in the Gaza Strip in the hours ahead of the attack.

According to the report, the SIM cards were the product of an espionage operation intended to enable a warning ahead of a possible attack. Hamas fighters obtained the Israeli SIM cards to use them once they entered Israel since their existing cell phones would lose reception. The Israeli SIM cards were intended to enable communication between the attackers and to upload documentation and recordings of the attacks to social media.

The Prime Minister's Office has repeatedly said, since the first days of the war, that the prime minister had been completely surprised by the attack and received no prior warning. According to Bergman, the military secretariat, which reports directly to the prime minister, may have indeed received an early indication about the SIM cards, indicating that the Prime Minister's Office did receive early warning. This would undercut the prime minister's claims that he was unaware of anything abnormal.

The Nova Massacre Scene (credit: Arie Leib Abrams/Flash90)

A possible coverup

According to Bergman, the officer at the center of the blackmail case would have received the update regarding the SIM cards. The attempt to blackmail him may, therefore, be related to the effort to tamper with protocols in order to hide the fact that the Prime Minister's Office was indeed warned ahead of the beginning of the Hamas attack.

The Prime Minister's Office said in response, "Another total lie that is also part of an unprecedented media witch hunt against the Prime Minister's Office during wartime, intended to cover up the severe failures of others on the night of October 7."