Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi, a senior researcher on Middle East affairs and radical Islam at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, published a series of reports that were issued by terrorist organizations on Telegram only hours before the October 7th massacre.
These reports contained concrete information warning about Hamas' intention to attack Israel during the early morning hours of October 7, 2023. The details were published on the Telegram channel "Military Tactics," which is affiliated with the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas.
Dahoah-Halevy wrote that "if this information had been monitored, analyzed, and processed by Israeli intelligence officials, the IDF might have been better prepared to deal with the Hamas attack."
October 7, 2023
00:20: "The 5,12 people of the dawn are the people of Allah," the Telegram report read. Dahoah-Halevy explains, "The meaning of the numbers mentioned at the beginning of the message is unclear. It seems that it was the time of the morning prayers, which were officially scheduled for Gaza at 5:20 a.m. and Ramallah at 5:13 a.m. It is a special virtue for believing Muslims to wake up early and perform the morning prayer, which is considered a pillar of the soul in Jihad and the blessing of Allah is assured to those who observe it. So it seems that the author intended to say that the Muslims who rise up to pray and take action against Israel, which he notes later in his remarks, both them and their actions will receive the blessing of Allah. The time of the morning prayer is therefore the time of gathering in preparation for the aforementioned action."
00:22: – "We say to the Zionist enemy, no one has previously experienced the [operation] that will come to you." Another post seconds later read: "There are many, many, many, many, many surprises."
A minute later, a message read: "We swear by Allah, we will humiliate you and destroy you completely, and the next stage will be difficult for you and all the faint-hearted settlers."
It continued: "The pure guns are charged, and your heads are the target."
Two minutes later, it was written: "We will fight you in all [fighting] arenas, and the Al-Qassam Brigades [Hamas] and the Al-Quds Brigades [Islamic Jihad] will roar with the thunder of gunfire and explosions in every [fighting] arena, to the extent that the media will be flooded with urgent reports about the existence of dead and seriously wounded in the ranks of the enemy forces."
"Your attacks against the Al-Aqsa [Mosque] in recent times will return to you with fire and flame," it added.
Another minute later, it was written: "You have been warned. What is expected will be a huge [event]."
Another minute later, it read: "We swear by Allah, we will humiliate you and destroy you completely, and the next stage will be difficult for you and all the faint-hearted settlers."
It also reads: "Pure guns are charged, and your heads are the target."
Two minutes later, it was written: "We will fight you in all [fighting] arenas, and the Al-Qassam Brigades [Hamas] and the Al-Quds Brigades [Islamic Jihad] will roar with the thunder of gunfire and explosions in every [fighting] arena, so much so that the media will be flooded with urgent reports about the existence of dead and seriously wounded in the ranks of the enemy forces."
"Your attacks against the Al-Aqsa [Mosque] in recent times will return to you with fire and flame," it added. Another minute later, it was written: "You have been warned. What is expected will be a huge [event]."
On September 17, less than a month before the massacre, the Al-Qassam Brigades correspondent posted on the Telegram channel: "We will most definitely prove to you that you will not find your shattered security anywhere. No one will be able to provide you with the security you dream of. Soon you will see the blood of your soldiers dripping on the fangs of our lions. Expect a big security incident that will come soon."
A day later, it was written: "A message to the settlers of the Gaza envelope, before it is too late, run and get out of here, because we have made an unequivocal decision that has no mercy. We will turn your skulls into a bridge, over which we will cross to Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa. You are under illusions about your weak army and your crumbling government. Nothing will help you except escaping from here. Woe to you for our next hours, which will bring you what no eye has seen and no ear has heard. The revolutionary youth, the Gaza Strip."
The channel's description of "Military Tactics" states that the operator is "a Martyr, an Al-Qassam Brigades operative, who is in charge of the channel and its owner, Hamam Al-Masri, Abu Hefz." According to Dahoh-Halevi, he is an operative in the "Nukhba" force, who, according to the channel, "is one of the heroes of October Seventh."
He ran another Telegram channel affiliated with the Al-Qassam Brigades called "Al-Qassam Brigades Correspondent." A video uploaded to the channel shows Hamam al-Masri detonating an explosive device attached to the border wall between the Gaza Strip and Israel in the weeks preceding the October 7th attack.
One of the channels claimed that Hamam Al-Masri was "the first to open the way for the Mujahideen when they entered the Gaza Envelope region." Hamam al-Masri was killed on November 1, 2023.