The Hamas Documents Reveal the Real October 7 Plan

Noam Dworman, Dan Naturman and Periel Aschenbrand are joined by Professor Daniel Sobelman. They discuss his research into the strategic origins of October 7, the captured Hamas documents recovered during the war, how Israel's deterrence strategy failed and what the future of warfare means for Israel and the region. Sobelman explains why Hamas believed it could fundamentally alter the balance of power, what Israeli leaders misunderstood before October 7 and why the next generation of conflict may be driven by cheap drones, precision weapons, and asymmetric warfare. Daniel Sobelman is a professor of International Relations at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, in Israel, and a research fellow with the Harvard Kennedy School's Middle East Initiative. His area of expertise is the conflict and deterrence dynamics between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah. His current research focuses on the strategic foundations of Hamas's October 7th attack. His recent book is entitled "Axis of Resistance: Asymmetric Conflicts and Rules of the Game in Contemporary Middle East Conflicts." https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1057610X.2026.2613426#abstract CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 01:30 The article that changed the October 7 debate 06:25 How Hamas deterred Israel 15:25 Buying quiet: Qatar money and Hamas leverage 20:10 The captured Hamas documents 22:30 Hamas's plan for a regional war 26:25 How bad October 7 could have been 39:00 The documents discussing Israel's destruction 46:25 Would Hamas ever accept a two-state solution? 53:35 Israel's future after October 7 01:01:05 Can Israel reverse its global isolation?x