Marking three years since the attacks, a report from Brisbane Times, WA Today and Sydney Morning Herald describes the events of October 7, 2023, as a pivotal moment. In the lead-up to the assault, Israelis were largely focused on domestic political divisions, particularly the Netanyahu government's moves to limit the power of the Supreme Court, while the Palestinian cause had receded from international attention. Days before the attack, then-US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan described the Middle East as quieter than it had been in two decades.
The scale of the attack, in which 1,200 people were killed and 250 taken hostage including young children and grandmothers, is often contextualised by Israelis as, in per capita terms, 13 times greater than the fatalities of September 11. The hostage-taking sparked a mass protest movement in Israel demanding the captives' release.
Australian Council of Executive Jewry co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin said the attack 'brutally showed the world that the days of Jewish torment, of women dragged to captivity, of decapitation, pack rape and thrill killing, did not belong to history. They are with us now and probably forever.' He added that for those who hate Jews and 'long craved to see them get what was coming to them, October 7 was euphoric.'
The Israeli state's failure to prevent or adequately respond to the worst terror attack in its history continues to shake public confidence. Danny Majzner, whose Australian-Israeli sister Galit Carbone was murdered on a kibbutz near the Gaza border, reflected the enduring question: 'Where was the army?'