For Years, Israelis Trusted the Army to Defend and Inform Them. Now Many Feel Abandoned 

10 October 2023, Israel, Sa'ad: Israeli forces patrol areas along the Israeli-Gaza border as fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas gunmen continues. (dpa)
10 October 2023, Israel, Sa'ad: Israeli forces patrol areas along the Israeli-Gaza border as fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas gunmen continues. (dpa)
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For Years, Israelis Trusted the Army to Defend and Inform Them. Now Many Feel Abandoned 

10 October 2023, Israel, Sa'ad: Israeli forces patrol areas along the Israeli-Gaza border as fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas gunmen continues. (dpa)
10 October 2023, Israel, Sa'ad: Israeli forces patrol areas along the Israeli-Gaza border as fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas gunmen continues. (dpa)

It was, they thought, an ironclad social contract. Israeli citizens would serve in the military and live along enemy borders. In exchange, the army would defend them.

That contract was shattered Saturday when hundreds of Hamas fighters breached Israel’s defenses from the Gaza Strip, pouring in by air, land and sea on a rampage that would leave hundreds dead. The infiltration caught Israel’s storied high-tech army completely unaware and stunned a country that prides itself on military prowess.

Further shocking Israelis was how long it took the military to respond. As thousands in southern Israel suddenly found themselves besieged, their cries for help went unanswered for hours. Holed up inside homes and safe rooms as militants rampaged, they turned in desperation to social media, to journalists and to friends, beseeching the army to save them.

The weekend attacks and the military's response brought an unsettling new sense of vulnerability and abandonment. Thousands of families had no idea whether loved ones were alive or had been taken as captives to Gaza. At the height of the violence, there was no one to turn to for guidance or information. Contact centers were eventually set up, but the focus was on soliciting information from families rather than offering it.

Six members of Jonathan Silver's family are missing, and he approached authorities for help. At least three relatives are captive in Gaza, he said, and the others are assumed to be there, too. He saw video of a cousin and two children taken hostage from their kibbutz, Nir Oz.

But the family has received no information, Silver said.

"We tried to reach everybody – the homeland command, police, friends, acquaintances, people on the kibbutz," he said. And for hours, "there was no one to talk to."

He's particularly concerned for his aunt, who has Parkinson’s disease and needs her medication. He's frustrated, but he also said now is not the time to criticize too deeply.

"I have a lot of questions and a lot to say. The day of reckoning will come," he said, but "now I prefer to stand beside the army."

In Israel, military service is compulsory for most Jewish men and women. In the eyes of many citizens, it is the glue that keeps the country together in a region widely hostile to its presence, and it's recognized worldwide for its technological advances and intelligence-gathering capabilities.

That it could be taken so completely by surprise by an armed group is something Israelis are hard-pressed to fathom.

For Merav Leshem Gonen, a feeling of helplessness gripped her when her daughter called in a panic from a music festival that was attacked.

"Mommy, we were bombed. They shot at us. The car was shot, we cannot drive, everybody here is hurt," Gonen recounted her daughter saying.

"She was talking to me and said, ‘Mommy, help us, we don’t know what to do.’ And I’m saying, ’We love you, and it’s OK. We are trying to find a way to take you out of there. We are sending people,’" Gonen told a news conference outside Tel Aviv. "And I know I’m lying because we don’t have answers, and we didn’t have any answers. Nobody had."

Journalist Amir Tibon had good fortune that many others didn’t: While the army struggled to regroup, his 62-year-old father, a retired general, entered the breach. Noam Tibon headed from his home in Tel Aviv to Nahal Oz, a kibbutz where his son, his wife and their two young daughters were hunkering in a safe room. On the way, he connected with another retired general and a group of commandoes.

After firefights with gunmen along the way, the elder Tibon extricated his son and family. More than a dozen others at Nahal Oz did not survive.

"The terms of the contract between us and the state had always been clear: We protect the border, and the state protects us," Amir Tibon wrote in an article retelling the rescue for his newspaper, Haaretz.

"We fulfilled our share of the deal heroically. For all too many of our beloved friends and neighbors, on this black day of Saturday, October 7, the state of Israel did not fulfill its share."

Maayan Zin said she learned that her two daughters had been abducted when a relative sent her photos from a Telegram group appearing to show them sitting on mattresses in captivity. She's among dozens of distraught families who say there's been a lack of support from Israeli authorities about their loved ones held in Gaza.

"There is no information. No one has contacted me since yesterday. Not the army, not the government, not the police," she said.

At first, she couldn't believe what she saw in the images. "I thought it was Photoshopped," she said.

But videos she found online confirmed her worst fears. Dafna, 15, and Ella, 8, were shown weeping and terrified. Their father, her ex-husband, was seen being taken across the border into Gaza, his leg bleeding heavily.

"Just bring my daughters home," Zin pleaded. "Bring everybody home."



Israel Wary of Egypt's 'Military Infrastructure' in Sinai: Peace Treaty at Risk?

Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
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Israel Wary of Egypt's 'Military Infrastructure' in Sinai: Peace Treaty at Risk?

Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)

Israel has voiced growing concerns over Egypt’s military presence in the Sinai Peninsula, fearing a potential escalation between the two sides amid the ongoing Gaza war.

Israeli media reports said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has asked both Washington and Cairo to dismantle what it describes as a “military infrastructure” established by the Egyptian army in Sinai.

However, an informed Egyptian source and experts cited by Asharq Al-Awsat insisted that Egypt has not violated its peace treaty with Israel. They argued that Cairo’s military movements are a response to Israeli breaches of the agreement.

Israel’s Israel Hayom newspaper, citing a senior Israeli security official, reported that Egypt’s military buildup in Sinai constitutes a “major violation” of the security annex of the peace treaty.

The official said the issue is a top priority for Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, stressing that Israel “will not accept this situation” amid what it views as Egypt’s growing military footprint in the peninsula.

The official added that the issue goes beyond the deployment of Egyptian forces in Sinai exceeding the quotas set under the military annex of the Camp David Accords.

The real concern, he said, lies in Egypt’s continued military buildup in the peninsula, which Israel views as an irreversible step.

Moreover, he stressed that while Israel is not seeking to amend its peace treaty with Egypt or redeploy troops along the border, it believes the current situation requires urgent action to prevent a potential escalation.

Egypt-Israel relations have not seen such tensions since the outbreak of the Gaza war, particularly after Israel violated a ceasefire agreement with Hamas brokered primarily by Egypt. Israeli forces resumed airstrikes on Gaza last month and failed to fulfill their commitments to withdraw from the Philadelphi Corridor and Palestinian border crossings.

A senior Egyptian source dismissed Israel’s accusations, telling Asharq Al-Awsat that “these repeated Israeli pretexts ignore the fact that Israeli forces have violated the peace treaty, seizing control of areas where Egypt objects to their presence without the necessary coordination with Cairo.”

Egypt has the right to take all necessary measures to safeguard its national security against any threats, emphasized the source.

“Nevertheless, Cairo remains fully committed to the peace treaty and has no intention of aggression against any party,” it added.

Israeli forces seized control of the Gaza-Egypt border, including the Philadelphi Corridor and the Rafah crossing, in May 2024. Israel has accused Egypt of not doing enough to stop weapons smuggling into Gaza through border tunnels—an allegation Cairo has denied.

Under the terms of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas, which Israel later broke, Israeli forces were supposed to begin withdrawing from the Philadelphi Corridor on March 1, completing the pullout within eight days. However, Israel failed to do so and instead resumed airstrikes on Gaza.

Israel also announced the creation of an administration aimed at facilitating the “voluntary departure” of Gaza residents, a move Cairo strongly rejected and formally condemned.

Egypt has insisted that Palestinians must remain in their homeland and has put forward a reconstruction plan for Gaza and called for the implementation of the two-state solution. The plan was endorsed at an emergency Arab summit three weeks ago.

Media reports have indicated that Egypt responded to Israel’s control of the Gaza border by increasing its military presence near the frontier—an act that some Israeli officials claim violates the peace treaty and threatens Israel’s security.

Former Egyptian intelligence official Gen. Mohammed Rashad told Asharq Al-Awsat that Israel itself violated the peace treaty by seizing the Philadelphi Corridor, controlling border crossings, and blocking aid to Gaza while seeking to forcibly displace Palestinians into Egypt.

“Every Israeli action along Gaza’s border with Egypt constitutes hostile behavior against Egypt’s national security,” said Rashad, who previously headed the Israeli military affairs division in Egypt’s intelligence service.

“Egypt cannot sit idly by in the face of such threats and must prepare for all possible scenarios.”

The Philadelphi Corridor is a strategically sensitive buffer zone, serving as a narrow 14-kilometer passage between Egypt, Israel, and Gaza, stretching from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south.

Military expert General Samir Farag insisted that Egypt has not violated the peace treaty or its security annex in over 40 years, arguing that Israel has repeatedly breached the agreement and is attempting to shift blame onto Cairo.

“Israel is doing this to distract from its internal problems, including public discontent over its ballooning defense budget,” Farag told Asharq Al-Awsat.

“It also wants to deflect attention from Egypt’s reconstruction plan for Gaza and leverage its claims to pressure the United States for more military aid by portraying Egypt as a threat.”

Farag emphasized that Egypt’s actions are solely aimed at protecting its national security, adding: “There is no clause in the peace treaty that prevents a country from defending itself.”

“The so-called ‘military infrastructure’ Israel refers to consists of roads and development projects in Sinai.”

“The US has satellite surveillance over the region—if Egypt had violated the treaty, Washington would have flagged it. Moreover, security coordination between Egypt and Israel continues daily,” he explained.

Egypt and Israel signed their landmark peace treaty on March 25, 1979, committing to resolving disputes peacefully and prohibiting the use or threat of force. The agreement also established military deployment guidelines and a joint security coordination committee.

Meanwhile, US Republican Party member Tom Harb told Asharq Al-Awsat that Washington has received intelligence from multiple sources indicating that Egypt has amassed a significant military force in Sinai.

Israel considers this a breach of the peace treaty, which designates Sinai as a demilitarized zone to prevent surprises like the 1973 war, Harb said.

While the US fully supports Israel’s concerns, it also wants to prevent further escalation, as that would destabilize the region, he added.

Ultimately, Egypt must clarify whether its troop movements are aimed at threatening Israel or preventing Palestinians from crossing into Egyptian territory, he stated.