JERUSALEM: The outgoing head of Israeli military intelligence, Major General Aharon Haliva, asked Wednesday for “forgiveness” from Israelis for failing to protect them from Hamas’s October 7 attack.
According to a video released by the Israeli military, Haliva — the first high-ranking official to make a public appeal for forgiveness — said at a ceremony marking his departure that “we did not uphold the sanctity of our oaths.”
October 7, when Gaza militants stormed southern Israeli communities, army bases and a rave party, was a “bitter and dark day which I carry in my heart, on my conscience and on my shoulders every day and night since,” Haliva said.
“An apology won’t correct, heal or bring back the beloved ones who paid the heaviest of prices, but it must be said... On my behalf and on behalf of the entire intelligence wing, I ask for forgiveness.”
The military announced in April that Haliva had asked to be relieved of his duties, citing his “responsibility” for the failure to prevent the attack, which triggered the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has never formally apologized for the failure of his government or the country’s security forces to prevent the unprecedented attack, the deadliest in Israel’s since it was founded in 1948.
The Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of 1,199 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Palestinian militants also seized 251 hostages, of whom 105 remain in Gaza including 34 the military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed 40,223 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry, which does not give details of civilian and militant deaths. The UN rights office says most dead are women and children.
The Israeli military says 333 of its soldiers have been killed in Gaza since its ground offensive began on October 27.
Israeli military intel chief asks for ‘forgiveness’ over Hamas attack failures
https://arab.news/9bk3y
Israeli military intel chief asks for ‘forgiveness’ over Hamas attack failures
- The military announced in April that Haliva had asked to be relieved of his duties, citing his “responsibility” for the failure to prevent the attack, which triggered the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip
UN-sanctioned migrant smuggler killed in western Libya
- Libyan authorities report that a notorious militia leader, Ahmed Oumar Al-Fitouri Al-Dabbashi, was killed in a raid by security forces on Friday
- In 2018, the UN and US sanctioned him for controlling migrant departure areas and exposing migrants to fatal conditions
CAIRO: A notorious militia leader in Libya, sanctioned by the UN for migrant trafficking across the Mediterranean Sea, was killed on Friday in a raid by security forces in the west of the country, according to Libyan authorities.
Ahmed Oumar Al-Fitouri Al-Dabbashi, nicknamed Ammu, was killed in the western city of Sabratha when security forces raided his hideout. The raid came in response to an attack on a security outpost by Al-Dabbashi’s militia, which left six members of the security forces severely wounded, according to a statement issued by the Security Threat Enforcement Agency, a security entity affiliated with Libya’s western government.
Al-Dabbashi, who was also sanctioned by the US Treasury for trafficking, was the leader of a powerful militia, the “Brigade of the Martyr Anas Al-Dabbashi,” in Sabratha, the biggest launching point in Libya for Europe-bound African migrants.
Al-Dabbashi’s brother Saleh Al-Dabbashi, another alleged trafficker, was arrested in the same raid, added the statement.
In June 2018, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Al-Dabbashi, along with another five Libyan traffickers. At the time, the UN report said that there was enough evidence that Al-Dabbashi’s militia controlled departure areas for migrants, camps, safe houses and boats.
Al-Dabbashi himself exposed migrants, including children, to “fatal circumstances” on land and at sea, and of threatening peace and stability in Libya and neighboring countries, according to the same report.
Al-Dabbashi was also sanctioned by the US Treasury for the same reason.
Libya has been a main transit point for migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East. The country was plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
The country has been fragmented for years between rival administrations based in the east and the west of Libya, each backed by various armed militias and foreign governments.
