What Hamas' meticulous battle plan for Kibbutz Nir Oz looked like

Documents left behind by Hamas in Kibbutz Nir Oz – a quarter of whose inhabitants were murdered or abducted – shows the high level of intelligence aquired by the terrorist organization. The IDF, which invested billions on technology and physical obstacles, failed to notice

Nov 9, 2023 11:39 pm IST

The major difference between the massacre in Kibbutz Nir Oz and the atrocities that Hamas perpetrated in the other communities of the Gaza Envelope – the kibbutzim, moshavim and towns adjacent to the Gaza Strip – lies in the conditions under which the terrorists left the kibbutz on that Black Saturday. Kibbutz members who were there relate that the gunfire and the talk in Arabic that they were able to hear from their besieged safe rooms stopped about an hour before the Israel Defense Forces arrived on the scene. According to people who examined the footage from the security cameras of the kibbutz, the terrorists even had time to collect their dead, apart from one body that was exceptionally heavy and was left lying on the green grass of the kibbutz.

Still, even though the terrorists in Nir Oz were not subjected to hot pursuit by the IDF, there was one item they forgot at the scene: a group of aerial photographs accompanied by an abridged version of the operational order for the massacre that Hamas unleashed against the kibbutz, which left about 100 of its members either dead or in captivity.

The documents left behind by the terrorists are instructive about the orderliness of the operation, the degree of the planning that went into and the extent of the intelligence information in the possession of Hamas. They also suggest that the October 7 attack was not necessarily planned to take place on that day.

One aerial photograph that was found lying on the ground in the kibbutz, accompanied by text and a diagram, delineates the structure of the force that invaded the kibbutz and the division of its areas among the different sub-groups within the force. The operational plan divided Kibbutz Nir Oz into two sectors: northern and southern. On the map, the northern sector was colored green, the southern was shaded in red. A “group” of terrorists was assigned to each sector – the size of the groups is not specified on the document – with each group divided into two teams.

The “mode of invasion” of the kibbutz was elaborated at the bottom of the document: “Group 1 will move via Route 133 as far as Route 299 and will cross over via the fence that is southwest of the kibbutz, where it will split into two teams for a raid on the population from the southwest.” As for “Group 2,” it “will move via Route 133 and then 299, and will split into two teams for a raid on the population from the northwest.” The route numbers here are part of Hamas’ internal code, in the same way that the IDF uses codenames for roads on its maps. The Hamas documents added, “The invasion will take place via the fence of the kibbutz and not by way of the gates opposite the targets, which are the population concentrations.”

The documents apparently belonged to a member of Group 1, as the text refers in detail to the area that was assigned to that squad, the red territory. “The areas in red,” the text states, refer to places “where it is expected that residents will be at the time the mission is executed.” The authors of the order anticipated that the residents of the kibbutz “will automatically evacuate the regions of the gardens, the farms [apparently referring to the field crops], the factories and all the public areas, should it happen that the time of the mission’s execution coincides with working hours.”

Clearly, whoever drew up the operational order did not know that the attack would end up taking place on a Shabbat and on the festival of Simhat Torah, when most workplaces would be empty. Accordingly, the author of the document also did not anticipate the scenario that unfolded in real time: Most of the residents of the kibbutz were at home on the morning of the incursion, and instead of running through the public areas they rushed to their safe rooms.

As recounted by survivors, the terrorists spared no effort to force them out of those rooms. Many houses were set ablaze and when those inside tried to escape the flames they were shot, while others were seized alive and taken to Gaza as captives. Horrifically, a number of charred bodies were found in kibbutz homes.

Most of those who survived the onslaught did so because they hid themselves well in the secure spaces until the attack ended, some of them, to their good fortune, in houses that the terrorists did not attack, for one reason or another.

Paint by dots

Ten different locations in the kibbutz are marked on the Hamas map. The significance of these markers isn’t entirely clear, though the text at the bottom of the page – “targets in the kibbutz” – may refer to them. The “targets” include “population concentrations, shelters, the security secretariat” and “the gates.”

An examination, with the aid of a kibbutz member, of the places marked on the map reveals that they designate, among other things, a playground, an open space facing the kibbutz dining hall and a bus stop – in other words, what might have been locations of “population concentrations” on a regular weekday. Also marked are the kibbutz’s emergency command center – a target that might correspond to what’s listed as the “security secretariat” – and also a position close to the home of the community’s head of security, Shachar Butler.

The IDF noted in press briefings that Hamas possessed intelligence about the location of the homes of the security chiefs in the different kibbutzim and aimed to strike at them at the start of each the attack. Butler in fact encountered a large group of terrorists opposite his home at the very start of the attack, at around 6:30 A.M. He tried to join up with the others in the emergency team that went into action to defend the kibbutz, but unsuccessfully.

Butler is currently on reserve duty, under the authority of the army, and so could not be interviewed for this article. However, from conversations he held with several kibbutz members it emerges that he found himself in a lengthy shooting battle with the terrorists, during which he was lightly wounded by shrapnel or a bullet. Finally, he retreated, bleeding, into his home’s safe room together with his family. As a result, the emergency team had to operate during the hours of the fighting without its commander.

The document the terrorists left behind states that the commander of “the a-Sadiq forces will form from them a team that will be tasked with conducting an ambush at the intersection of routes 133 and 128 [a junction close to the kibbutz, according to the maps]” and will appoint “a team to purge the Nirlat factory,” the kibbutz’s well-known paint manufacturer. The document does not specify who the “a-Sadiq forces” are.

This part of the plan, too, suggests that the assumption was that the attack would take place at a time when Nirlat was operating, hence the need to “purge” it. In other words, the operation was planned to take place, or might take place, on a weekday and not on the morning of October 7.

Above the radar

The Hamas maps attest to a close acquaintance with the topography of the kibbutz and its surroundings, and to an impressive level of intelligence collection, in contrast to what we knew about the organization on the eve of the seventh of October. Thus, for example, at the northeast edge of the map is a site that is labeled as “Rada radar.” It’s here, an investigation by TheMarker found, that the radar of the Red Alert warning system is located.

“Rada” probably refers to Rada Technologies, a company that radar devices to the security establishment for the Red Alert warning systems against mortar shells.

Another pair of aerial photographs that were contained in the package left behind, show an additional route the terrorists could have used to breach the border fence and head for the kibbutz. One image, which seems to have been taken from a relatively low altitude, probably by a drone, marks the exact spot of a breach that Hamas’ operatives did indeed create in the border fence – a sophisticated technological obstacle that cost Israel billions of shekels to build. It would not be unreasonable to assume that the terrorist squads that burst through the fence at tens of other places also received a similar set of maps, and that if Israeli intelligence had intercepted that aggregate of maps in time, the October 7 disaster would have been prevented.

Visits to a number of open-source Israeli map websites reveal that a large number of the coordinates on Hamas’ aerial photographs are in the public domain. The location of shelters, mobile shelters, playgrounds and other places in Nir Oz and in the other communities in the region appear in the form of pins on some of the popular map sites. Other details, such as the location of the Red Alert radar stations, can be identified by analyzing aerial photographs that are posted on other freely accessible websites.

Even so, the possible use of open sources does not necessarily resolve the question of how Hamas knew that the radar system had been supplied by Rada Technologies, or the proximity of one of the markers to the home of the kibbutz’s security head. In any event, it’s clear that Hamas’ collection of information was systematic, well-organized and minutely detailed.

Another aerial photograph – a close-up of the southern part of the kibbutz – contains precise markings of key locations there: the dining hall, the tennis court, the swimming pool and others. An additional aerial photo details important sites in the landscape around Nir Oz, with an orderly list referencing the locations of “shelters,” “breaches,” “balloon” (apparently an IDF observation balloon), “collection rooms,” “radars,” “communications poles,” “camera,” various gates, “signals disruption system,” “monitoring system” and more. And these are just points of interest that appear within a few square kilometers that surround the kibbutz.

Under their nose

Among all the communities in which people were murdered that day, the fiasco at Nir Oz was probably the most shameful of the IDF’s performances. Of the 400 or so residents of the kibbutz on the morning of October 7, more than a quarter were murdered or abducted. To date, 38 bodies from Nir Oz had been identified, and Hamas is known to be holding captive another 75 others from the kibbutz. In addition, two elderly women from the kibbutz who were taken hostage, Yocheved Lifshitz and Nurit Cooper, were released by Hamas on October 23.

The terrorists encountered resistance from the nine members of the kibbutz’s defensive squad, who fought bravely and probably saved lives. But as far as is known the IDF did not wage a battle on the grounds of the kibbutz. The survivors say that at around 2 P.M. the voices of the terrorists were no longer heard, and that the army arrived only about an hour later.

The material described in this article reveals Hamas to be well-organized, with an intelligence arm that not only collects information but also doesn’t leak what it knows.

A ranking IDF officer was asked what happened exactly in Nir Oz, and whether the army engaged the terrorists there in battle. He was unable to answer the question. “What happened in Nir Oz is a black hole from our point of view,” he admitted. While the IDF lacks intelligence, even retrospectively, about the battle it did not fight in Kibbutz Nir Oz, the material described in this article reveals Hamas to be well-organized, with an intelligence arm that not only collects information but also doesn’t leak what it knows.

Hamas was able to collect the information and formulate the operational orders and share it with thousands of its men, without losing the element of surprise. The aerial photographs reveal that the main points of the operational order were even set forth in written form, and included such graphic elements as arrows and reference points; indeed, the precise plans were worked out using digital programs and were sent for printing. All this happened under the nose of the vaunted Unit 8200 and Shin Bet. The Gaza terrorists showed one of the world’s leading cyber powers how it’s done.