Reports emerge of pre-October 7 warning from UAE leader to Benjamin Netanyahu

Approximately ten days before the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, the President of the United Arab Emirates, Mohamed bin Zayed, allegedly held a 45-minute telephone conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. According to a report by Haaretz and details from the book 'Kidnapped: 843 Days of Abandonment' by journalists Shlomi Eldar and Ruth Yuval, the UAE leader explicitly warned that Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar was planning a large-scale operation against Israel. Sources indicate that the warning originated from information linked to Sinwar during ongoing indirect negotiations.

While some accounts claim Netanyahu dismissed the significance of the warning, believing Hamas was focused on the West Bank, the Prime Minister’s office has categorically denied these allegations, labeling them as an absolute falsehood and asserting that such a conversation never took place. The book, which cites dozens of high-ranking Israeli and international officials, suggests that Netanyahu did not share this information with his security leadership or take specific preventive actions. The conflicting accounts highlight a major controversy regarding the intelligence and political communication preceding the Hamas offensive.