By Alyssa McMurtry
OVIEDO, Spain (AA) – Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel’s “arrogance” allowed for the Oct. 7 Hamas attack in an interview published on Tuesday.
“I am certain that Israel had all the intelligence it needed to know what was happening. There were even concrete warnings from friendly intelligence services,” Olmert told Spanish daily El Pais. “This was a psychological and intellectual failure, not an intelligence failure.”
Olmert explained his theory that Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas and alleged mastermind of the attack, understood from his time in an Israeli prison that “Israelis are very arrogant and they didn’t believe that the Palestinians could have done what they did; that they weren’t sophisticated or wise enough.”
Sinwar served 22 years in prison until he was released along with more than 1,000 other Palestinian prisoners in exchange for one Israeli soldier in 2011. The prisoner swap was authorized by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Olmert asserted that Israel overlooked the Hamas threat because Netanyahu was convinced he “could buy off Hamas with money,” a strategy that was proven wrong.
- 'Netanyahu is the problem'
Olmert, who served as Israeli prime minister from 2006 to 2009, and has had past spats with Netanyahu, told El Pais that it seems like the country’s current leader has “lost touch with reality.”
“He lives in a bubble … He has got to go. There is growing distrust of Netanyahu. Every day, more Israelis understand that he is not the solution. He is the problem,” Olmert said.
The former Israeli leader added that he thinks Netanyahu is refusing to talk about Gaza’s post-war future because he is trapped between competing interests.
“If he says what he really believes, it will be rejected by the international community. If he says what the international community wants him to say, he’ll lose his government,” he added.
Olmert is calling for Israeli forces to withdraw from Gaza and ensure that all the remaining Israeli hostages taken captive can return home safely. After that, he said Israel should talk to its allies to find partners who can take temporary control of Gaza to bring back stability and get ready for the Palestinian Authority to eventually take control.
He also questions Israel’s goal of eliminating Hamas.
“It’s very difficult to destroy a terrorist organization. Hamas has between 20,000 and 30,000 terrorists,” he said. “You kill 10,000. That’s a big loss. But they have another 20,000 and they’ll recruit even more because if there is no political future, people will turn into terrorists.”
He added: “If Israel doesn’t offer a political horizon and thinks, as opposed to the international community, that it can continue fighting indefinitely, it will lose even more international support,” he said.