While Israel Slept: How Hamas Surprised the Most Powerful Military in the Middle East by Yaakov Katz, Amir Bohbot

It's been over a year now since the events of October 7, 2023, and books are finally starting to come out about the events that happened that day, the lead up to the terrorist actions that resulted in over a thousand lives lost and hundreds taken hostage, as well as the followup operations, both military and intelligence, that have been in the news since Israeli politicians and military leaders decided to initiate an invasion of Gaza, parts of Lebanon, and hunted the individuals behind the planning and execution of October 7th.

The author are two journalists and this volume definitely resembles a journalist effort in its readability. With these events still fresh on our minds and consistently being reported on in the media, the amount of background information will always be richer than studies of current events both on October 7th and since then. Consequently, many of the pages of this text offer a rich array of background information on the foundation of Hamas, the backgrounds of some of its most important leaders (spiritual/religious and military) as well as their roles in perpetrating October 7th and when they were killed/assassinated by Israeli forces. Similarly, there is background offered about Israeli intelligence operations, and failures, including the numerous issues that plagued Israeli intelligence agencies and resulted in a complete failure to predict the actions of October 7th, even though numerous warnings were given from a variety of intelligence sources and agencies. Lastly, there is a deep-dive into the history behind the various Israeli administrations' relationship with Hamas, including how they deluded themselves into thinking by supplying Hamas and Gaza with Qatari money and Israeli goodwill (with work permits in the tens of thousands) they were changing hearts and minds and preventing war and discussions about a larger Palestinian state. The reality is that they were delaying the inevitable and allowing Hamas to amass a significant war chest that allowed them to purchase military equipment and construction equipment, which they put to effective use on October 7th. Netanyahu's government, and Netanyahu himself, have much to answer for as their plans went up in flames along with countless Israeli civilians as the largest pogrom since the Holocaust took place on Israeli territory with the IDF scrambling to do all it could to limit a massacre that should have never happened in the first place.