Over the course of the war in Gaza, hundreds of terrorists have surrendered to IDF forces, while hundreds of others have been taken prisoner during the battles. Both quickly become sources of intelligence and information, which is sent to the forces on the battlefield. How are terrorists expeditiously interrogated mid-battle? Arutz Sheva-Israel National News spoke about this with former Shin Bet official Yossi Amrosi, who for decades contended with security challenges, mainly in the Gaza region.
Amrosi opens by stating that in past spats of fighting, the forces did not apprehend a large number of fugitives. Therefore, the issue did not come to light as it does now when Israeli security authorities are catching hundreds of terrorists. During this war, Amrosi explains, there were three waves of terrorists who were captured and interrogated: the first interrogees were terrorists from Hamas' Nukhba force, who participated in the October 7th massacre and were apprehended during the first days of the war. Later, there were terrorists who were caught while moving from one area to another in the Gaza Strip through humanitarian zones. The third group is the group that is currently being caught in their tens and hundreds.
"The IDF and Shin Bet sent Shin Bet interrogators and interrogators from Unit 504 of the Intelligence Directorate to the field, and they interrogate in the field and pass the information along to the combat forces. Later, the interrogees are taken to Shin Bet interrogation facilities, where interrogators attempt to continue to collect tactical and strategic intelligence from them. For instance, we sit with an interrogee in Khan Yunis, and he tells us what he knows and not only about what he did. He knows about booby-trapped houses, tunnel shafts, launch sites, and more, and the information is passed on to the forces in the field within mere hours, and the battalion commander and the company commander on the ground know where the threats are. We don't know everything, but the information we pass on saves lives."
Amrosi himself was summoned to reserve duty during the first weeks of the war and currently works to interrogate terrorists. We ask if the terrorists from Hamas, which has proven to be a more sophisticated organization than we thought, open up easily or attempt to throw off their interrogators. "Interrogation is a profession. The interrogators are very experienced. I've dealt with fighting Gazan terror for thirty years. An interrogation involves a battle of minds, persuasion, and trickery, and you'll be surprised to hear that most interrogees talk. They understand that the deal is done, and they have nothing to lose anymore; there is no reason to hold out. We convince them that it pays to finish the interrogation, to tell us what they know, and to go to jail."
Amrosi continues to describe the amount of information that is collected from each terrorist: "The interrogators 'write books' with all of the intelligence that they get from them. Even an electrician who wired the tunnels could supply us with an incredible amount of information, and he gives that information. We interrogate him, check its reliability, and pass it to the forces, and within minutes or hours, it reaches the forces on the ground."
As an interrogator who participated in the interrogation of Nukhba terrorists, was he surprised by the findings? "I was surprised by the level of cruelty. I've never seen such cruelty, maybe excluding the case of the Fogel family and the murder of Shalhevet Pass, but we haven't seen such great cruelty in such a quantity."
The source of this cruelty, according to Amrosi, is split into three channels: "The extreme religiosity, incitement in the media and social media, and the education from birth. They, as well as the children in Judea and Samaria, are educated about the hatred of Jews and the destruction of the state and people of Israel. Look what Hamas summer camps have. While an Israeli kid goes swimming and plays soccer, they (Gazans) train on weapons so they can grow up to be a fighter against the Jews."
From the few parts of interrogations that were made available to the public, it would appear that every interrogee himself sounded hapless while only talking about the actions of others and not their own. Amrosi notes that even when the interrogee talks about what others did, the information is essential and suitable for the forces as intelligence is gathered, but their confession does not end with what someone else did; it also gets to their own actions. "Sometimes, even before I ask them what they did, I ask him for all of the information he has, but in the end, they also confess their own actions and will pay for them all."
Regarding issues that may develop during the terrorists' trials, Amrosi is convinced that Israel will not have to reach a level of detailed meticulousness and proof at the level of the specific murderer that he murdered a specific victim in order to incriminate him. "There is a lot of thought on how to reach a situation where there would be no legal requirement to prove a specific murder. If we charge everyone with genocide, we won't need to prove that a monster named Mohammed murdered so and so the Jew, but I'll leave that to the legal experts."
Regarding the treatment of each terrorist by his level of "seniority," Amrosi says that "when you meet them on the battlefield among the ruins, the first thing is the attempt to identify them to know who you're talking to. After that, using our information, we know his status, whether he is a member of Hamas or not, and what his status is within Hamas. The most important ones are flown to Shin Bet facilities for an in-depth interrogation, and the ones who aren't connected wait in one of the prisons in Israel until their fate is determined.
Amrosi concludes that collecting intelligence is "a substantial and fundamental challenge for Unit 504 of the Intelligence Directorate and the Shin Bet coordinators who work day and night, non-stop, since this intelligence is worth more than gold. You can point out specific cases where we prevented soldiers from entering a booby-trapped house an hour or two before they were supposed to go in. This is life-saving information."