No drinking water on base, no transportation: Logistical failures post Oct-7

The IDF faced major logistical hurdles, leaving them dependent on civilian volunteers during the Israel-Hamas war, the unofficial civilian probe of October 7 heard Thursday.

In one case, the IDF did not have enough drinking water for soldiers and reservists on the Tze'elim base and took days to bring water to the soldiers, two managers of a civilian group that organized to help with logistical challenges told the probe.

The probe,which was announced in July, is composed of security and legal experts and it will investigate the “events before October 7, which formed the foundation for the biggest security failure in the state’s history” and examine the failures of the military and political systems, it said. One of the primary goals of the probe's committee is to initiate the foundation of a state probe, which was shot down by Israel’s political echelon.

Geffen Yamin and Eyar Halav, who founded on October 7 a group that transported soldiers and reservists heading to and from their service, testified before the probe, giving a number of examples of failure by the state to contend with the logistics involved in the reserves call up.

In one example they gave, the women were called on by a senior IDF commander who told them that there was such a severe water shortage on the Tze'elim base, that their soldiers did not have drinking water. The commander had found a civilian donation of water, and called the women to find someone to bring it to the base.

Confirming this problem with the IDF's Technological and Logistics Directorate, Yamin and Halavwere were told that this was a problem the directorate was aware of, but would only have a solution for in four days.

"I told them, 'Listen, they don't have water right now. We are continuing to send forces there, water needs to be brought there.' Their answer was 'we need the civilians [help]," said Yamin.

The organization was also called on to move military equipment such as drones and tank parts, the women said.

The women began assisting with logistics on the morning of October 7. "We saw that the state was in shock and no one was acting and things weren't functioning," said Halav.

"There were requests [for transportation] from soldiers and there was a need, so we just filled it. I come from project management and [Yamin] comes from operations."

Public transport on Shabbat

The women also pointed to the lack of public transportation on Shabbat as a major problem at the beginning of the war, meaning soldiers and reservists had no way to get from home to base or back.

Around a month and a half into the war, the Transportation Ministry started providing transportation on Shabbat, but did not widely advertise, and cancelled the transportation when it was not widely used, the women said.

This lack of transport on Shabbat "was a painful thing," said Yamin. "There were soldiers who got [short leave], who did not have leave for 30 days of fighting in a row and were given a few hours to go home - to hug mom and come back. They were not' released for leave because they didn't know how they could get back to base."