A Washington Post report published on Sunday revealed that Hamas’s plans for October 7 included traveling deeper into Israel and attacking major Israeli cities and military bases and reaching Israel’s Biblical heartland, Yehudah and Shomron.

The report, entitled Hamas Envisioned Deeper Attacks, Aiming To Provoke An Israeli War, said that the first clues of Hamas’s plans came from the bodies of the dead terrorists: maps, drawings, notes, weapons and gear they carried.

In Beeri, a kibbutz town overrun by Hamas on Oct. 7, one dead fighter had a notebook with hand-scrawled Quranic verses and orders that read, simply, “Kill as many people and take as many hostages as possible.” Others were equipped with gas canisters, handcuffs and thermobaric grenades designed to instantly turn houses into infernos.

Along with maps and other documents, many dead fighters were outfitted with handcuffs and gas canisters, as well as instructions to torch homes. The tactic aimed to smoke residents out of their safe rooms, said witnesses and first responders who arrived at the scene.

“We know from interrogations that Hamas came in with detailed plans of their attack, including which commander should rape which soldiers in different places,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told The Washington Post.

According to intelligence officials, Hamas planned the attack for over a year. In order to con Israel, they used handheld radios and land-wire networks in the tunnels. At the same time, they continued using codes on “open networks” which they knew Israel was monitoring.

As deadly and devastating as the October 7 attacks were, Hamas’ plans were much more extensive. Some of the terrorists were equipped with enough food and weapons to last several days and carried instructions to continue deeper into Israel and attack major cities and IDF bases.

Hamas terrorists succeeded in infiltrating Ofakim, a city about 15 miles from the Gaza Strip – half the distance between the Strip and Yehudah and Shomron. One of the Hamas units was carrying maps and information indicating plans to continue the assault to that area.

“They planned a second phase, including in major Israeli cities and military bases,” a senior Israeli official said. “If that had occurred, it would have been a huge propaganda win — a symbolic blow not only against Israel, but also against the Palestinian Authority,” a former US official who was briefed on the evidence from the attack told the Post.

What was Hamas’s goal? According to current and former intelligence officials and counterterrorism experts, they wanted to kick-start a new wave of violent Palestinian resistance and torpedo efforts at normalizing relations between Israel and Arab states

“Will we have to pay a price? Yes, and we are ready to pay it,” Ghazi Hamad, a member of the Hamas politburo, told Beirut’s LCBI television in an interview aired on Oct. 24. “We are called a nation of martyrs, and we are proud to sacrifice martyrs.”

“They were very clear-eyed as to what would happen to Gaza on the day after,” a senior Israeli military official said. “They wanted to buy their place in history — a place in the history of jihad — at the expense of the lives of many people in Gaza.”

Hamas’s pronouncements welcoming a broader conflict evoke statements by al-Qaeda leaders in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, noted Rita Katz, executive director of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organization that studies the ideology and online communications of extremist groups. Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden expected a furious American response after the attacks on New York and Washington, Katz said, and he welcomed what he believed would be a violent, global confrontation between the Muslim world and the West, with Islam ultimately prevailing.

“Hamas knew Israel would strike back hard. That was the point,” Katz said. “To Hamas, Palestinian suffering is a critical component in bringing about the instability and global outrage it seeks to exploit.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)