Netanyahu rejects claim he was warned ahead of Oct. 7, as 2023 attack fuels pre-election furor

September 9, 2026 / 11:50 AM EDT / CBS News

As Israelis prepare to vote next month in a tightly contested legislative race that will determine the country's next government, they're still debating how their country was caught by surprise on Oct. 7, 2023, when the U.S.-designated terrorist group Hamas stormed across the border and killed more than 1,200 people and kidnapped hundreds more.

The discussion got new fuel when the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported Monday that, just days before the attack that sparked the war in Gaza and arguably the much wider conflict across the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was warned in a phone call by the leader of the United Arab Emirates that Gaza's Hamas leaders were planning a major assault.

The Haaretz report said Netanyahu did not pass on the warning to Israel's security leaders.

CBS News has not independently confirmed Haaretz's reporting, which the Israeli newspaper said it stood by in a Tuesday statement.

The day Hamas attacked, Israel was caught by surprise, despite having observed preparations by Hamas for the assault, some of which the group itself posted in videos online.

Netanyahu's office denied in a Tuesday statement that he had received…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/moneywatch/