Eleven minutes. That is the difference between the time a senior aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu allegedly wanted entered into an official record and the time a crucial telephone conversation actually occurred on October 7, 2023.
In a report for The Media Line, Gabriel Colodro examines explosive allegations by Maj. Gen. Avi Gil, Netanyahu’s former military secretary, and the competing accounts of what Israel’s leadership knew before Hamas launched its devastating attack.
In an October 8 interview with Israel’s Channel 12, Gil said a stenographer told him she had been instructed by Netanyahu’s then-chief of staff, Tzachi Braverman, to change the timestamp of a secure call from 6:40 a.m. to 6:29 a.m.
During that conversation, Gil had told Netanyahu, “We are at war.”
Channel 12 subsequently reported that Braverman acknowledged changing the timestamp but maintained that the original was incorrect. Police reportedly gathered evidence against him, although prosecutors have not announced charges.
Netanyahu accused Gil of failing to alert him promptly to the attack. Likud rejected the allegations against Braverman as “a false blood libel that was already investigated.”
The controversy reaches beyond one disputed record. Gil says Netanyahu received warnings months earlier that Israel’s internal divisions were weakening its deterrence, although he acknowledges that no specific warning of the October 7 invasion reached the prime minister.
Retired Maj. Gen. Yaakov Amidror, a former Netanyahu national security adviser, defends the prime minister and criticizes Gil for revealing confidential conversations. Yet Amidror draws a firm line on official records: “There is no such thing as changing a protocol.”
Attorney Tomer Naor of the Movement for Quality Government argues that the allegations warrant criminal scrutiny, while stressing that Netanyahu could face legal responsibility only if investigators established his involvement.
Gil also questions the government’s handling of hostage negotiations and the accuracy of Netanyahu’s account to the state comptroller.
Colodro’s full reporting brings together original interviews, competing interpretations, and the legal questions surrounding the disputed records.
Gil preserved 16 handwritten notebooks from his years in office. Together with the original telephone recordings, they could help establish what happened during the opening hours of Israel’s deadliest security failure.