Tuesday marks two years since October 7, yet time has done little to dull the horror or utter unfathomability of what happened on that dreadful day.
The questions that arose immediately – how Israel could have been so wrong about Gaza, how it left itself so unprepared, how it was caught so completely by surprise – still hang in the air.
The military successes that followed have been truly remarkable: Hamas’s capabilities shattered; Hezbollah, decapitated; Iran, humbled.
But those victories cannot erase the failures that made them necessary. If anything, they magnify those failures.
October 7 was not just an operational collapse; it was a conceptual one. It destroyed the belief that Israel could, through passive defense, contain those sworn to its destruction, that technology could replace manpower, that deterrence and diplomacy could substitute for vigilance and will.
Quiet became the ultimate goal. The economy was booming, life was good, and the country preferred not to look too closely at what was happening a few kilometers away. That quiet turned out to be an illusion, and October 7 shattered it.
Lessons learned on October 7
The first lesson of that day is that passive deterrence alone is not a strategy.Israel misjudged Hamas by assuming it would not do anything crazy for fear of provoking a devastating Israeli response. But Hamas’s calculation was not Israel’s. Its aim was Israel’s destruction, and if that meant sacrificing Gaza so that Iran, Hezbollah, and others would join in and rain hellfire down on the Jewish state to consume it, so be it.
The same misreading must not be repeated with anyone else in the region, first and foremost Iran, animated by a burning ideological hatred. Take your enemies at their word and act proactively to prevent them from carrying out their malevolent designs.
The second lesson is that passive defense is insufficient. Fences and cameras cannot replace soldiers. Technology is a force multiplier, not a substitute for force.
On October 7, there simply were not enough soldiers along Gaza’s border to stop the onslaught. Since then, Israel has relearned what it once knew: security rests not only on ingenuity but on presence – visible, boots-on-the-ground human presence.
The third lesson pertains to self-reliance. Among the many shocks Israelis woke up to after October 7 was the realization that the country was dependent on foreign countries – primarily the US – for basic tools of war: bullets, mortars, and bombs. The government has since moved to expand local production of munitions and reduce reliance on others, an effort that must continue.
Possible war-ending negotiations are underway
Now, as negotiations get underway in Cairo for a deal that could end the war, another test looms: what will Israel do with the hard-won lessons of the last two years?The temptation will be to exhale – to believe that if the hostages return, the reservists go back to their families and jobs, and the Houthi rockets stop, normal life can resume, and the old illusion of stability can return. Yielding to that complacency would invite the next disaster.
Israel cannot afford to slide back into the habits that preceded October 7 – the wishful thinking and the belief that threats can be managed rather than defeated. The war’s end, when it comes, must not signal a return to false comfort but a new vigilance grounded in clarity: our enemies are implacable, security depends on readiness, and actual deterrence comes only from unmistakable strength and the willingness to use it.
October 7 was a national trauma, but also a reckoning. It stripped away illusions and forced the country to confront truths it had tried to avoid. Two years later, as Israel stands on the cusp of what could be an end to the fighting, the real measure of recovery will not be the rebuilt and reinvigorated towns and kibbutzim around the Gaza border, but whether those truths endure.
The worst outcome would be to forget – to allow comfort once again to dull awareness and for habit to replace vigilance. The most fitting memorial to the victims of that day is not only remembrance, but resolve: never again to let security rest on flimsy assumptions, or survival depend on wishful thinking.