Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged for the first time Tuesday evening that Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel, one of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi's closest associates, landed in Israel a week and a half before the October 7 massacre. In an interview with Channel 14, Netanyahu said he had not met with Kamel because he was attending a memorial ceremony for fallen IDF soldiers. According to published reports, Kamel warned at the time of "a major attack being planned by Hamas."
Two days after the massacre, ynet's Smadar Perry reported, following an Associated Press report about an Egyptian warning, that according to a senior Egyptian source, Kamel had conveyed a message to Netanyahu's office warning of "something unusual, a massive operation" about to be launched from Gaza. The Prime Minister's Office denied the report.
Netanyahu meets with Abbas Kamel in 2021
(Credit: Roy Avraham, Government Press Office)
"He didn't speak to me. Since when does an intelligence chief speak to a head of state? It's never happened to me. There's no such thing. He would always come with someone," Netanyahu said Tuesday.
But just two years earlier, Netanyahu had hosted Kamel at the prime minister's residence in Jerusalem. In a video released at the time by the Prime Minister's Office, Netanyahu and Kamel were seen shaking hands and talking. Kamel was then leading a delegation of senior Egyptian officials visiting Israel.
Netanyahu claimed he did not know whom Kamel met during his secret visit to Israel on Sept. 26, 2023.
"Egypt's intelligence minister was here. He spent 59 minutes on the ground. I'm turning to the security and law enforcement authorities — I want to know whom he met. Someone who met with him is trying to pin this on me," Netanyahu said.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. He sent his intelligence chief on a one-hour visit, underscoring the importance of the information
(Photo: SAUL LOEB / AFP)
Last month, The Atlantic reported that Kamel had made a brief visit to Israel on Sept. 26, warning that Hamas was preparing a major attack and urging Israel to ease economic restrictions to prevent an escalation.
According to the magazine's investigation, a chartered Cessna aircraft linked to Egyptian intelligence services landed at Ben Gurion Airport and remained in Israel for just 67 minutes before departing for Cairo.
A former Israeli official who spoke to the magazine said the Egyptian intelligence chief's decision to make such an unusually brief visit should itself have made the urgency of the warning clear. As the official put it, "The messenger was the message."
About two hours after the Egyptian plane landed, Netanyahu attended a ceremony in Jerusalem marking the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War.
"As a central lesson from that war, we do not underestimate any threat," Netanyahu said at the time.
Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal reported that Kamel called Netanyahu in early October 2023 to warn him of an impending attack from the Gaza Strip, after two previous Egyptian warnings had gone unheeded.
Kamel "was growing anxious," the newspaper reported, further corroborating Smadar Perry's revelations about an Egyptian warning, published just days after the massacre.