From the special reporter "Vijesti"
Former Mossad chief Danny Yatom said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should resign immediately.
Speaking about the Hamas attack on southern Israeli communities, Yatom said his country had never suffered such a blow and that the bloodshed happened because Israel was not prepared.
"Our intelligence service, which is so well known around the world, and perhaps the best security apparatus, has completely failed," Jatom told reporters in Tel Aviv.
When asked by the News if Netanyahu should resign because of the war and the crisis Israel is in, Yatom answered: "Yes, he should resign immediately, today."
He said that before this war, Netanyahu's government was concerned with only one thing, and that was judicial reforms, which he called a judicial coup.
"Many Israelis rejected them, they cause divisions in society and nobody needs them now. I expect that my government and the prime minister now clearly say that the reforms are dead because we have much more important things to do".
He said that Israel is the strongest when it is united and that the reforms that the government wants to implement have broken that unity, which the enemy saw and took advantage of.
Jatom (78) served in the Israeli army from 1963 to 1996 and worked in the Sayeret Matkal special operations unit. He was the head of the Israeli Central Command with the rank of major general. He headed the Mossad between 1996 and 1998. He represented the Labor Party in the Knesset and was chief of staff and security adviser to Prime Minister Ehud Barak between 1999 and 2001.
He said that he had buried many of his commanders and subordinates, but that he had never seen such a crime, which affects every Israeli, and that they needed revenge.
The main mission of Hamas is to kill Jews and to destroy Israel, Jatom said, adding: "We must destroy Hamas because it is waging a war against us that we did not want."
He pointed out that it is also a question of part of Israel's image in the Middle East, that is, the deterrence capacity, which has fallen apart and which they must restore.
"The war against Hamas is Israel's war against what we call the 'axis of evil' - Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, Shia militias, the Houthis and many others," said the former Mossad chief. He added that Israel will achieve this goal faster if it joins forces with regional and international allies.
He pointed out that Hamas is identical and even more cruel than the Islamic State, which the USA managed to "stomp".
Israel's long-term goal is that there are no terrorist organizations in the areas it borders and that, in his opinion, the solution for the "day after" is for Israel to hand over the keys to some international forces that would stay there until the situation stabilizes.
The long-term solution, he said, is for the Palestinian Authority to take over the Gaza Strip as well.
Speaking about Hezbollah, Jatom assessed that it may be an even more difficult enemy than Hamas, because it is better equipped.
"The goal of all Israel's enemies, most of whom are Shiites, is to destroy Israel because we are infidels. But they are disbelievers, even though they are Muslims, they act according to the Koran”.
The number of victims and the scenes of violence committed by Hamas in communities in the south of Israel shocked the citizens.
Netanyahu leads one of Israel's most extreme right-wing coalitions, and pressure is mounting on him as the public rages over the failures that allowed the attack to happen.
He refused to accept responsibility, saying only that everyone will have to answer tough questions when the war with Hamas is over, and at one of his rare press conferences he dismissed a question about whether he would resign.
Netanyahu sent a tweet late this week blaming his intelligence chiefs for not warning him of the Oct. 7 attack. The tweet was deleted the next morning and Netanyahu apologized, but the damage was done and a firestorm of criticism followed from the press and across the political spectrum.
Dahlan does not want to take over the management of Gaza
Muhammed Dahlan, the former security chief of the Palestinian Authority, was mentioned as a possible future leader of the Palestinians. However, commenting on rumors that he could be Israel's choice to lead Gaza after the war, he denied that he wanted the role.
Dahlan presented his vision of the enclave in an interview for "Economist", which was run by the Palestinian Authority until 2007, after which Hamas took control.
Dahlan, who has ties to all sides in the conflict, proposes a two-year transition period with an administration led by technocrats in Gaza and the West Bank. This, in his opinion, would reunite the Palestinian territories after more than a decade of internal conflict. He then proposes parliamentary elections based on a Palestinian state with undefined borders at that time.
Dahlan believes that Hamas will not disappear and that it should also be allowed to participate. Even after the war, it will be impossible to govern Gaza without the consent of the militant group, he claims.
Dahlan envisioned a parliamentary system and a prime minister instead of the presidency currently held by Mahmoud Abbas. He assessed that it is an illusion that any man can solve the Palestinian issue and pointed out: "The time of heroes has passed with Arafat."
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