Bloomberg: Israel's intelligence service is going back to basics – training spies with Arabic skills

Israeli intelligence, amid a lack of awareness of Hamas's 2023 attack plans, will now focus not on technology but on human intelligence and training its spies. This was reported by Bloomberg, citing an unnamed military intelligence officer.

"The service is making profound changes, including re-establishing an Arabic-language recruitment program for high school students and teaching all service members Arabic and Islamic," the article says .

The plan is to rely less on technology and instead create a cadre of spies and analysts with extensive knowledge of dialects-Yemeni, Iraqi, Gazan-and a deep understanding of radical Islamic doctrines.

Unnamed military intelligence officer says Israel had a "fundamental misunderstanding" of Hamas' ideology and specific plans before the attack.

The officer called the renewed focus on language and religious training for agents a "profound cultural shift" in the organization, where even senior officers rely on interpreters. The goal is to create an internal culture "that lives and breathes the way our enemy thinks.".

As part of the intelligence changes, the service is reviving a program it closed six years ago that encourages high school students to learn Arabic and plans to expand training in dialects.

The officer noted that it was difficult for the eavesdroppers to understand what the Yemeni Houthis were saying because many of them were chewing khat (a herbaceous plant that grows in the Somali and Arabian Peninsulas; in these regions, chewing the shrub is a millennial custom, but the World Health Organization has recognized khat as a drug – Ed.) Therefore, elderly Yemeni Israelis who speak Arabic, unlike most of the younger generation, are engaged to help with translation.

The Service plans to deploy undercover agents in the field and build an interrogation unit.

As Bloombeg points out, this goes against the shift over the past decade to working with technology – satellite imagery and drone data.

• on October 7, 2023, Hamas terrorists launched a massive rocket attack on Israel and invaded its territory. This resulted in numerous casualties and hostage-taking.
• After that, Israel launched a military operation in the Gaza Strip and officially declared a state of war .
• On January 15, 2025, Israel and Hamas agreed to a truce and the release of hostages.
• But a few months later, in March, Israel resumed attacks .