The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reports in “Israeli forces accused of killing their own citizens under the ‘Hannibal Directive’ during October 7 chaos,” that the “Israeli military is coming under increasing pressure to reveal just how many of their own citizens were killed by Israeli soldiers, pilots and police in the confusion of the Hamas attack on southern Israeli communities. Survivors and relatives have been asking not just ‘what went wrong,’ but whether the military invoked the controversial — and supposedly rescinded — ‘Hannibal Directive.'”
In July, Haaretz reported: “IDF Ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7 to Prevent Hamas Taking Soldiers Captive.”
RICHARD SILVERSTEIN, cell: richards1052@gmail.com, @richards1052
Silverstein writes at Tikun Olam. He has written extensively about the Hannibal Directive for years. He was one of the first to write about it after the Oct. 7 attack. On Oct. 9, 2023, he wrote the piece “Israel’s Hannibal Directive: Israeli Attack Will Likely Result in 120 Hostage Deaths.”
In November he cited an Israeli officer who revealed the Israeli military response to the Oct. 7 attack “was not only to counter-attack against Hamas, but also to kill Israeli hostages in Hamas vehicles which were fleeing toward Gaza. He called the IDF operation a ‘mass Hannibal.’ It is invoked when a soldier is captured by Hamas. In order to prevent him becoming a prisoner who will be used to force an exchange of Palestinian prisoners, the army finds it preferable to kill its own soldier.”
He said today: “What is important here is that in the past Hannibal was only invoked in cases of Israeli troops captured by Hamas. Oct. 7 is the first time Hannibal was used to kill civilians.”
In June, when asked about the possibility that U.S. citizens could be killed as a result of the directive, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller claimed: “I am not familiar in any way” with “that supposed directive.” See video on the Hannibal Directive from Double Down News.
Silverstein has also closely followed the killing of U.S. citizen Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi in the West Bank. Like him, she lived in Seattle.
