News - Middle East: The Israeli spy agency Mossad has admitted that it was "surprised" by the operation conducted by the Gaza-based Palestinian Hamas resistance group in early October.

Mossad made the acknowledgment for the first time in a document it composed for a bulletin published by the so-called Israel Intelligence Heritage and Commemoration Center, Haaretz newspaper reported on Thursday.

Mossad, the document said, “was also surprised on the morning of the holiday of Simchat Torah [October 7] by the code red alert sirens that pierced the sky.” 

Hamas launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the usurping entity in retaliation for its intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.

The unprecedented raid shook the occupying regime’s security establishment, leaving 1,200 Israeli settlers and military personnel dead and 252 others in captivity. Hamas released 105 captives during a week-long truce in late November. 

In response to the Hamas operation, the Tel Aviv regime unleashed a genocidal war on the besieged Gaza, which has so far killed 34,904 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 78,514 others.

Haaretz said that although the document is not signed, it's clear to anyone familiar with the Mossad's work procedures that every word in it has been approved by the agency’s director David Barnea.

In the scope of its role, Mossad is not focused on the Palestinian arena, but in practice, it certainly has contact and interface with several aspects related to the arena, it added.

Last month, the Israeli military's intelligence chief, Major General Aharon Haliva, resigned over the failure to prevent the October 7 operation.

The Israeli army’s chief of staff Herzi Halevi and Ronen Bar, the head of the regime’s so-called internal security service Shin Bet, are also expected to quit.

Some reports say Israeli military and intelligence officials missed or ignored multiple warnings that predicted the Hamas attack that caught the regime off-guard.

Source: Press TV