DON SHIFT: Lesson’s From Israel’s 9/11, Part 1

By now, the scale and ghastliness of Hamas’ incursion into Israel is clear. These kind of things have always happened in history, but now we are seeing it in high-def from a first-world country.
So what are the lessons that an American prepper and patriot can take away from the 7 October incursion?

The first lesson is that the images we’ve seen are just a taste of the horror, surprise, and desperation that SHTF will feature. What transpired in Israel is more consistent with what urban warfare and especially sectarian violence look like than urban riots. When such violence eventually happens here, Americans will fall prey to similar atrocities because many of them are unarmed, untrained, unserious, and have no teams to operate with.

2020’s rampant rioting and political violence gave the wrong impression of civil unrest to Americans. While riots should be considered, they are not the only facet to civil warfare. This is not to discount the idea that angry mobs might come to a neighborhood, but multifaceted infantry assaults by non-state actors against civilians is a very real possibility. Ethnic/class divisions and organized crime (cartels) will likely be the base from which fighting organizations similar to the Hamas militants spring in the US.

In a military sense, this was a raid where positions taken are not held and the enemy intends to retreat behind his lines after the mission is accomplished. The purpose of raids, as seen in Israel, include demoralization through killing and destruction, capturing personnel, and destroying enemy military positions. The atrocities perpetrated on civilians were likely the main goal; terrorism is about demoralization through hitting soft targets, after all.

Military

One of the most notable features of the attack was that the invaders totally disrupted the normal response mechanisms in the affected areas. Soldiers were either dead or unable to deploy effectively, police were outgunned, and EMS was unavailable. This disruption paralyzed the local responders giving Hamas free reign for hours. No one could defend the populace in the early stages.

It appears that in the initial breach phase, Hamas engaged some military facilities, pinning the soldiers down, while other terrorists pursued soft targets. Even if the officers/troops were not killed, they may have been stuck fighting defensively or diverted to other objectives. The delay in responding to the attacks was due in part to the local garrisons being captured or engaged, so local QRF capabilities were neutralized, leaving citizens to their own devices.

Even the special operations unit Shaldag was unable to assist at first. A small element of approximately 20 men inserted by helicopter to liberate Kibbutz Be’eri was apparently wiped out. Only after 12 hours did other IDF forces retake the compound.

Such a situation is not impossible in the US but for different reasons. The US military does not have any meaningful “flying squads” that can respond to a mass event like this. The National Guard is not on standby. Local police and FBI SWAT teams can respond in a timeframe of one to two hours, but do not have the same equipment or training to engage in infantry combat. Furthermore, should a civil war begin, there probably will not be any official forces able to respond.

Do not expect anyone to come to your rescue. I quote Matt Graham’s ‘Killhouse Rules’: “NOBODY IS COMING TO SAVE YOU. Whether an event lasts a few seconds, a few hours, or even a few days – you have to work as though nobody is coming to save you. 2. You are your savior, so start working because EVERYTHING IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY.” Thankfully, in the US the Second Amendment guarantees the survival of the militia system, though collective training is woeful.

Enemy tactics

While westerners have made much ado about civilians not being legitimate targets of war, that is only true in the sense of the Geneva Convention and a European sense of honor. In total war, which Hamas engaged in, civilians are legitimate targets. Wars of genocide don’t happen between belligerent forces only. Killing of civilians demoralizes one’s adversary, complicates the military response, and also harms the very fabric of a nation.

Hamas attacked in an unpredictable way inconsistent with its prior patterns. The sheer numbers (some accounts are indicating 10,000-18,000) is one and all were surprised by their ability to hold out for so long. Militants held out for hours and even days. Supporting fire from snipers and mortar fire was used to good effect. As a result, the Israeli counterassault stalled. In short, the IDF failed to conceive of what Hamas was capable of and how far they would go.

The attacks were multifaced in their attack methods and target selection. Rocket air raids were launched concurrent with the ground infiltration. Complacency seems to have allowed rocket attacks to be seen as the main, or only, threat, forgetting the past infiltrations. This was a threefold event: use the rockets partially as a diversion, pin down the military (response forces), and go after the civilians.

The beginning rocket barrage, which would funnel individuals to shelter in place and tend them to congregate in bomb shelters, consolidated targets. Thus confined, killing the shelterees would be like shooting fish in a barrel. That is exactly what happened. Shelter doors were even blasted open with explosives in some cases and in others, homes were set alight in order to force the occupants out lest they burn alive.

Hamas attacked in strength; 70 or so overran Kibbutz Be’eri. The assailants systematically and fairly professionally assaulted the military facilities and settlements, many of which were somewhat isolated. House to house searches were conducted. Terrorists maintained dispersion and spread out, moving slowly using cover to provide mutual support and overwatch if needed. It appears that they maintained some semblance of sectors of fire as they advanced. There was minimal talking.

Due to the lack of an immediate response from the military and little or no resistance, the terrorists were able to take their time breaking into homes. Atrocities were likely greater than anticipated due to the invaders essentially having hours before IDF arrival in many cases. Also, in some cases instead of retreating back to Gaza, many militants lay in wait for responding troops. Where they did retreat, boobytraps were left behind, including in homes.

Rampant drive-by shootings were committed by terrorists in technicals and firing from pickup truck beds. Motorcycles were used for better mobility. In more urban areas, we saw images of helpless victims gunned down in public, such as a handful of civilians at a crowded bus stop. Passing civilians on foot and in vehicles were not safe. Cars, including those attempting to flee, were fired upon.

Captured military vehicles were used by Hamas in some cases. Captured military vehicles and IDF uniforms were used by Hamas in some cases. Local police were engaged, including one station that was captured, putting the first line of defense either out of action or tying them up attempting to defend their own lives. EMS crews were attacked, including one CASEVAC bombed by a drone.

The scale of the atrocities was also unprecedented. While soldiers were captured and killed, the main thrust seems to have been against soft targets—civilians. No quarter was given. Hamas terrorists executed a grandmother in her living room and used the victim’s phone to share the video to her own Facebook. Videos were taken by Palestinians and shared in real or near-real time of their barbarism and captives.

Defense

While armed defenders were present, it does not appear many locations had enough of them to make any meaningful impact. Police and the military were the only credible defenders for most. That left the overwhelming majority of the citizenry at the mercy of the invaders. With time on their side, Hamas was able to overcome many passive defenses like panic rooms.

The terrorists knew they would be storming basically unarmed houses. One survivor from the Alumim kibbutz reported that their community had a cadre of military-age males who were trained as a militia. This group was able to defend the community from dawn until the IDF relieved them after midnight. There was also an alert system with various undisclosed methods of communication.

At Kibbutz Nir Am, security coordinator Inbar Lieberman distributed firearms to their 12-man security team. The team was able to ambush Hamas infiltrators, with a total of 20 killed over four hours. Nir Am apparently did not suffer anywhere near the same number of casualties as other nearby communities.

Others were not so lucky. Israel has very strict gun control laws. Very few individuals are permitted to own firearms at home, meaning that a militia type response was impossible. This conflicts with a large history of smaller-scale raids on kibbutzim and isolated settlements dating back to before statehood.

Weapons are kept centrally at kibbutzim, which understandably delayed deployment. One survivor told The Guardian “I am supposed to be the first emergency responder for the kibbutz and I couldn’t help them. There is a weapons cache stored 2 metres away from our house, and I couldn’t do anything.”

This happened because Israel didn’t believe it was possible. Planning appeared to be far too focused on rocket attacks while the border walls were inappropriately relied upon to contain any potential incursions. European-style disarmament kept firearms out of the hands of settlers who desperately needed them in defiance of Israel’s history of not dissimilar attacks.

The IDF seems to have gotten complacent and trusted too much that their border defenses were impregnable. Additionally, whether due to more (bad) strategic planning, low holiday staffing, or simply being bottled up on the defense, local troops were unable to rapid deploy and counter-attack.

While the United States is unlikely to be directly invaded, terrorist sleeper cells, criminal gangs (cartels) and foreign agents are certainly present. After some sort of cataclysm that causes social order to disintegrate, there is no reason why Americans or the foreigners amongst us wouldn’t be capable of degenerating into a force capable of what Hamas did.

Sectarian violence and civil warfare often looks like what happened in Israel. On a purely structural level, similar battles happen in Latin America all the time between drug cartels, the only difference being most of the times they aren’t wantonly targeting civilians. These kinds of attacks are not new in history. Americans can look to its past for comparable attacks by Indians or conflicts like “Bloody Kansas.” Those planning to face a domestic conflict should examine these kinds of events for what the gruesome reality of urban civil warfare.

About the author: Don Shift is a veteran of the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office and author of the Suburban Defense/Rural Home Defense series, a cop’s guides to surviving riots, civil war, or SHTF.