The reported warnings before the attacks

The question of what Netanyahu knew before the deadly attacks three years ago hangs over Israel's longest-serving leader as he seeks another term. On October 7, 2023, thousands of Hamas-led militants breached the Gaza-Israel border in a surprise attack, killing 1,205 people and seizing 251 hostages who were taken into the Gaza Strip. Israel's military campaign in Gaza since has killed at least 74,347 people, according to the enclave's Hamas-run health ministry.

The new reports go to the heart of that question. Israeli journalists Shlomi Eldar and Ruth Yuval reported that UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan phoned Netanyahu roughly 10 days before the October 7, 2023 attacks to warn that a major confrontation with Hamas was coming. Extracts of their book were first published by Haaretz on September 8, citing three foreign senior sources and a Palestinian adviser to bin Zayed who confirmed that the call took place.

The extracts describe the 45-minute conversation in these terms:

• •Bin Zayed allegedly told Netanyahu that former Gaza Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was planning a major operation that could lead to "bloodshed" and even "destabilise the region".
• •Bin Zayed was surprised that Netanyahu "reacted calmly" and said "Israel was prepared for any scenario".
• •Per the report, Netanyahu briefed neither Shin Bet, nor Mossad, nor his army chief of staff about the call.
• •Bin Zayed later told former CIA director William J. Burns about the conversation.

Separately, The Atlantic and the Wall Street Journal have reported that Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel also warned Netanyahu in the days before Hamas breached the border.

Denial, a defamation suit and a secret trip

The prime minister's office denied that any warning was given and called the report a "wicked fabrication with clear political timing" by left-wing Israeli officials. Netanyahu has sued Haaretz for defamation, but the newspaper is standing its ground and has been backed by The New York Times, which confirmed the report and added details of its own.

The UAE has not directly addressed the reports, acknowledging only that, when necessary, "all relevant intelligence has been and continues to be communicated" - a practice it traces back to the restoration of its relations with Israel in 2020.

On September 27, Netanyahu travelled secretly to Abu Dhabi and met bin Zayed for about an hour, as first reported by Israel's Channel 12. A source said the discussion centred on the Haaretz report and that Netanyahu asked the Emirati leader to deny having warned him. Netanyahu's office dismissed that account as fake news, while the official Emirates News Agency said the two sides met to discuss "bilateral relations".

Blame shifted to the security chiefs

Where several of Israel's senior security officials have accepted responsibility, Netanyahu's response to the reports has mainly been to shift the blame onto others. Former military chief of staff Herzi Halevi took responsibility for letting the October 7 attacks happen and stepped down in January 2025. After his resignation, an internal Israeli Defence Forces investigation acknowledged the assaults as one of the army's "greatest failures".

The treatment of Shin Bet head Ronen Bar followed a different pattern:

• •The government later dismissed Bar, partly over an internal report on the attack, with Netanyahu also citing an ongoing "lack of trust".
• •Bar replied in a letter that the arguments were unsubstantiated and that the real aim was to prevent investigations into the events leading up to October 7.
• •On September 28, hours after Netanyahu renewed his accusations against Bar, the former Shin Bet chief threatened to sue for defamation, saying the prime minister was aiming to deflect blame onto those who warned him at the time.

Netanyahu has claimed his security chiefs deliberately left him asleep for hours after the assault began, fearing he would trigger an aggressive response and put the whole military on alert. In a campaign video posted on X in August, he said: "If they would have woken me up, everything would have looked different". A schedule published by his own office contradicts that version, showing he was informed at 6:29am of an attack from the Gaza Strip.

No inquiry, a challenger and a base that holds

Netanyahu has repeatedly refused calls for a state commission of inquiry into October 7, saying an investigation can only be launched once the war is over, even though the army and the intelligence services have examined their own conduct. In November of last year he claimed most Israelis did not believe in an independent commission, proposing instead a committee established by the prime minister himself. Much of the Israeli public is in favour of an independent investigation.

Gadi Eisenkot, a former military chief who is now Netanyahu's main election challenger, has accused the prime minister of dodging accountability for the security failures. In a post on X, Eisenkot said Netanyahu had "ignored" dozens of warnings before October 7 and declared him "unfit" to lead. Netanyahu's rivals, Eisenkot among them, have pledged to establish an independent commission of inquiry if they win the election.

Analysts point instead to well-rehearsed reflexes of political survival. Nicolas Rouger, an Israel-based journalist and author of "Netanyahu – Agent of Chaos", said Netanyahu deflects pressure by alleging a "deep state" of security services and left-wing bureaucratic elites working to bring him down, and that in his account generals, security agencies and judges engineered his downfall by letting the attacks happen. Rouger added that Netanyahu casts himself as a captain steering the Jewish people through catastrophe after catastrophe - a frame voters have internalised.

Sylvaine Bulle, a sociologist at Paris's EHESS and an expert on Israeli society, said neither Netanyahu's ongoing corruption trial nor the allegations of ignored warnings have damaged him. She described him as nimble and politically astute:

Bulle said the opposition carries little weight and its campaign is thin on substance, having ceded social issues such as housing and inequality to religious parties among working-class religious voters. Some, the report notes, believe Israeli voters are unlikely to be swayed by the centrist bloc Eisenkot leads amid the electorate's increasingly rightward shift.

Israelis go to the polls on October 27, where Netanyahu is running for another term with the question of what he knew still hanging over him - while his rivals, Eisenkot among them, have pledged to establish an independent commission of inquiry into October 7 if they win.