Air Force commando pushes back against criticism in probe of October 7
Challenging official investigation, former member of elite Shaldag unit claims timelines incorrect, soldiers put up crucial fight against terrorists in Kibbutz Be’eri
Commandoes from the Air Force’s elite Shaldag unit rejected the findings of an Israel Defense Forces probe into the battle with Hamas terrorists at Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7.
In a social media post, Lieutenant Colonel (Res.) Roni Eliav, a past commando from Shaldag who also served in the elite Sayeret Matkal unit, refuted details from the timeline presented in the IDF’s official probe last week and suggested that the investigation was “trying to flatter the kibbutz’s local security team” and was “full of lies and incorrect conclusions.”
IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari on Monday appeared to try to smooth over the situation, offering praise of the official investigation while also commending the “heroism” of the Shaldag soldiers.
In all, 101 civilians and 31 security personnel were killed in Be’eri on October 7 — a community of around 1,000 residents — and a further 30 residents and two other civilians were taken hostage by the Hamas terrorists. Eleven of those still remain in Gaza. At least 125 homes in the community were damaged or destroyed amid the fighting.
The kibbutz’s local security team, assisted by a handful of lightly armed civilians, is considered to have waged an epic battle, alone and without help from the military, while vastly outnumbered by the attacking terrorists.
The official probe was critical of Shaldag soldiers who arrived at the kibbutz, characterizing as unprofessional their alleged failure to stay and fight alongside the local security team and civilians.
Much of Eliav’s complaints related to specific details of events during the battle rather than the decision-making of Shaldag soldiers, and were based on his own investigation into the events.
The official probe spent hundreds of hours reviewing many sources of information, from residents’ WhatsApp messages to both Israeli and Hamas radio communications, to surveillance videos, aerial footage, interviews of survivors and those who fought, alongside visits to the scene.
According to the timeline presented in the IDF probe, Hamas terrorists from the Nuseirat Battalion’s 2nd company crossed the border from Gaza on motorcycles and headed toward Be’eri at 6:42 a.m. on October 7. The last members of the company reached the kibbutz at 7:20 a.m.
Until the Shaldag commandoes arrived, the local security team along with several armed civilians fought back against the terrorists who moved from home to home, murdering those inside and setting fire to buildings.
According to the probe, 13 members of the elite IAF unit arrived at Be’eri at 9:03 a.m., but Eliav wrote that the troops “arrived at 8:45 a.m. and jumped into the battle in the western neighborhoods, walking into an ambush of hundreds of terrorists.”
IDF publishes new footage showing members of the elite Shaldag unit battling Hamas terrorists in the southern community of Be’eri, and other troops rescuing residents amid the October 7 onslaught. pic.twitter.com/4xPttdiliE
— Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian (@manniefabian) October 25, 2023
“Someone is falsifying reality,” he wrote.
The probe also said that the Shaldag team withdrew to the entrance of the kibbutz to evacuate two soldiers, one who had been killed and one who was seriously injured. It charged that this failure to stay to fight alongside the local security team and civilians represented poor decision-making and a grave professional lapse.
Surveillance footage showed the Shaldag team entering and leaving the kibbutz at the times mentioned in the probe.
But Eliav wrote that while the commander arranged for the two casualties to be evacuated, “the force remained in the center of the kibbutz and two fighters with two members of the local security squad evacuated the wounded.”
He also criticized the head of the official probe, Maj. Gen. (res.) Mickey Edelstein, a former commander of the Gaza Division. Eliav claimed that Edelstein had told him personally that the Shaldag soldiers halted the progress of the terrorist attack on the kibbutz.
“So why didn’t he write that?” Eliav asked and added that it was a “complete lie” that the kibbutz security team was left to face the terrorists alone. He noted that the security team had been unable to get to the kibbutz armory to retrieve rifles, apparently suggesting that such a lightly armed force could not have taken on the heavily armed terrorists.
Rather, he said, the probe should have stated that from 9 a.m. until 1:30 p.m., the only people who fought back against the terrorists were 11 Shaldag soldiers.
“The reason it is written differently is an attempt to flatter the kibbutz’s security team,” he wrote, claiming the soldiers were the only ones to kill terrorists.
The Ynet outlet reported that officers in another elite unit also criticized the findings. The official probe said that those soldiers had waited for an hour outside the kibbutz until their commanders arrived, but the officers rejected that and claimed that Edelstein had not interviewed them at all.
The Srugim outlet reported that soldiers in the unit, reportedly a counter-terrorism team, claim they only waited 15 minutes before entering the kibbutz.
Military spokesperson Hagari, speaking Monday at an economic conference organized by the Calcalist outlet, praised both the official probe and the Shaldag soldiers.
“In my opinion, this is a professional, high-quality, and very tough investigation,” Hagari said.
“I have to say something clear about this investigation because I see the publications about fighters and I have to say — the heroism of the fighters and the units that operated on October 7, including the Shaldag unit, this is very great heroism.”
He said soldiers strove to make contact with the enemy everywhere, calling them “a generation of commanders and warriors who are a source of pride.”
Be’eri was the hardest-hit community in Hamas’s October 7 onslaught, during which some 3,000 terrorists stormed across the border and massacred close to 1,200 people in their homes and at a nearby music festival in southern Israel, and took 251 hostages to Gaza.
The Be’eri probe was presented first among the long list of IDF investigations into the October 7 onslaught for two reasons, according to the military: First, the IDF considered the investigation the first to be ready to be presented to the public, although some final details still need to be ironed out. Second, the military sees the presentation of the probe as a way of rebuilding trust with the kibbutz in particular and the Israeli public in general, following the IDF’s failures on October 7.
