How October 7 Became a Political Weapon
Three years after Hamas killed 1,139 Israelis on October 7, 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu still hasn't ordered an independent inquiry into how the attack happened. This isn't negligence. It's strategy. By refusing to investigate the security failures that enabled the massacre—the ignored warnings, the flawed doctrine, the catastrophic unpreparedness—Netanyahu transforms a national catastrophe into political asset. The trauma becomes his shield against accountability.
What Western coverage misses is this: Netanyahu isn't unique in weaponizing collective trauma. I've covered enough of these cycles—in Russia, in the Balkans, in the post-Soviet space—to recognize the pattern. Governments under pressure don't reform security doctrine. They consolidate power around the trauma narrative. The public wants someone to blame. The leader offers enemies, not answers.
Three Years of Evasion
The attack killed more Israelis than any single incident in the nation's history. It captured approximately 250 people. It shattered the sense of security that had held Israeli society together. That's the trauma. But here's what happened next: instead of asking "How did this happen?" Israeli political leadership asked "How do we use this?"
Netanyahu immediately blamed defense officials. Then military commanders. Then previous governments. Then political opponents. Everyone except himself. When pressed on whether he'd ignored warnings, he offered a counterfactual: "As prime minister of Israel, I would have immediately given the order to put the entire military on alert." Note the conditional. Note the absence of acknowledgment that he didn't.
The three-year period that followed—October 2023 to August 2026—saw continuous military operations across Gaza, Lebanon, and escalating tensions with Iran. No ceasefire. No comprehensive resolution. No independent assessment of whether the security doctrine that failed on October 7 had actually been reformed. Just more war, justified by the trauma of the attack that the government refused to honestly investigate.
Political opponents demanded accountability. Academic analysts documented the pattern. Neve Gordon, watching Netanyahu's blame-shifting, observed: "Sara and Benjamin Netanyahu are just adding to the conspiracies that are already out in the public arena." Translation: The refusal to investigate generates its own mythology. People fill the void with speculation. The government's silence becomes evidence of guilt.
The Trauma Narrative Takes Over
Israeli media has done something remarkable with October 7. It's framed the attack as a foundational national trauma—comparable to the Holocaust, to the 1973 war, to the existential moments that define Israeli identity. Lev Grinberg, an Israeli academic, captured this: "The October 7 massacre was immediately interpreted as a new Holocaust... without recognition of the suffering of innocent people."
That last phrase matters. The trauma narrative doesn't just emphasize Israeli suffering. It actively excludes Palestinian suffering. The Gaza death toll—over 40,000 by most counts—barely registers in Israeli electoral discourse. The displacement of 1.7 million Palestinians, the destruction of civilian infrastructure, the humanitarian crisis: these aren't part of the national conversation. They're not part of the election.
Ayala Panievsky documented what this looks like on the ground: "For most Israelis, [October 7 is] the worst in the country's history... haunting public opinion and Israelis' very basic sense of safety." That's genuine. That's real trauma. But then she adds: "The fact that these elections will be about October 7 is not surprising really." Translation: The trauma has become total. It's not one factor in electoral politics. It's the only factor.
This is textbook trauma weaponization. The government doesn't need to defend its security doctrine because the trauma narrative makes criticism seem like betrayal. You can't question whether the response was proportionate when the attack itself was so devastating. The math doesn't work that way—but that's precisely why the trauma narrative is so politically useful.
What This Pattern Means
Here's what I've learned covering post-conflict societies: governments that refuse to investigate security failures don't suddenly develop better security doctrine. They develop better propaganda. The accountability mechanisms don't function because they're not supposed to. They're theater.
Netanyahu's refusal to establish an independent inquiry isn't an oversight. It's the strategy. An honest investigation would reveal which warnings were ignored, which decisions were made, which officials failed. It would create legal liability. It would undermine the narrative that the attack was unforeseeable, that the response was necessary, that the government did everything right.
Instead, the trauma narrative does the work. It justifies the military operations in Gaza. It explains why Lebanon was targeted. It contextualizes the escalation with Iran. Every decision becomes defensible because it flows from the trauma. The attack becomes the permanent justification for everything that follows.
The October 2026 elections will be shaped entirely by this dynamic. Security, accountability, military response—these will dominate the campaigns. But they'll be discussed within the trauma frame. The question won't be "Did we reform security doctrine?" It will be "Who will protect us?" The first question demands accountability. The second demands a strongman.
The Asymmetry No One Discusses
What's striking about Israeli public discourse is what's absent. The attack killed 1,139 people. That's a tragedy. It's also a number. In the three years since, Israeli military operations in Gaza have killed more than 40,000 Palestinians—a number that barely appears in Israeli electoral debate. The humanitarian crisis is real. The displacement is real. The suffering is real. None of it registers in the political conversation.
This isn't accidental. The trauma narrative requires this asymmetry. It requires that Israeli suffering be total, visible, commemorated. Palestinian suffering must be minimized, contextualized, explained away. One narrative is about victimhood. The other is about security necessity. They can't coexist in the same political space.
I've watched this dynamic in other places. In Russia, the narrative of WWII trauma justifies everything—the invasion of Ukraine, the suppression of dissent, the militarization of society. The past becomes a permanent justification for the present. The trauma never closes. It just gets weaponized more efficiently.
The danger isn't that Israelis remember October 7. Memory is legitimate. The danger is that the trauma has become total—so overwhelming that it forecloses other conversations, other possibilities, other framings. When trauma becomes the only lens, accountability becomes impossible. Reform becomes unnecessary. The cycle perpetuates.
What Happens Next
Netanyahu will likely win the October 2026 elections. The trauma narrative is too powerful. The opposition hasn't offered a compelling alternative frame. And the absence of an independent inquiry means there's no institutional mechanism to force accountability regardless of electoral outcomes.
Watch for three things in the coming months: First, whether any Israeli political figure dares to call for an independent inquiry. If they do, watch how quickly they're accused of betraying October 7 victims. Second, whether the humanitarian situation in Gaza stabilizes or deteriorates. Deterioration will reinforce the security narrative. Third, whether Iran or Hezbollah escalate. Any escalation will validate Netanyahu's security-first approach and make accountability questions seem almost treasonous.
The real story isn't whether Netanyahu ignored warnings before October 7. Multiple sources confirm he did. The real story is that Israeli institutions have failed to create mechanisms that force accountability regardless of electoral pressure or trauma narratives. Until that changes, expect more security failures, more evasion, more trauma weaponization. The cycle doesn't break. It just gets more efficient.
Resources
Political Trauma and Accountability in Governance – Essential reading for understanding how governments weaponize national trauma narratives to evade institutional accountability and reform.
Israeli Security Doctrine and Military Strategy Analysis – Provides critical context for analyzing how security failures are investigated, concealed, or weaponized in political discourse.
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