Nadav Argaman, the former head of Israel’s domestic intelligence agency Shin Bet, revealed at the INSS conference in Tel Aviv that his organization had been pushing for a surprise attack on Hamas’ top echelon for years, but the political leadership repeatedly rejected the idea.

Argaman stated that the plan was proposed by both his predecessor and the current head of the Shin Bet, and that he himself had brought it up multiple times during his tenure under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from 2016 to 2021.

“If we had launched a surprise attack on Hamas, we would be in a completely different situation,” Argaman said, criticizing the government’s policy of viewing Hamas as a rational adversary rather than seeking to destroy it.

Argaman joins a chorus of critics who argue that Israel’s tacit policy of buying calm has come at a high price, and that the country has become “addicted to calm.” He called for the resignation of Netanyahu’s “disastrous government” and blamed it for preventing the creation of an American-led coalition of Sunni Arab countries.

Touching on the issue of draft exemptions for Charedim and Arab citizens, Argaman said that citizenship in Israel should be conditioned on military or national service.

It should be noted that in his address, Argaman also claimed that the Palestinian Authority, which pays money to murderers of Jews in “pay to slay payments” – is not a body that encourages terrorism. So take what he says with a grain of salt.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)