MI official: "Israel`s" Intelligence work during war was unprofessional

Source: Haaretz, 07-01-2007
A senior intelligence officer says the performance of Military Intelligence during the war in Lebanon was "unprofessional and mediocre." Additionally, a senior Golani officer says that the absence of updated intelligence left the force without knowledge of Hizbullah`s deployment and the extent of its forces.
The "Israeli" Army had a good intelligence understanding of Hizbullah`s deployment, including how it would pursue its future confrontation against "Israel", but the intelligence picture regarding the short term Katyusha rocket deployment was "mediocre to inferior," said Brigadier General Yuval Halamish, who holds the position of chief intelligence officer.
Halamish is quoted in the "Israeli" Center for Intelligence Heritage journal, whose latest edition carries a series of interviews with Military Intelligence officers. Until now the "Israeli" Army has not authorized media interviews about MI`s performance in the war.
Halamish said the standard of intelligence in the field ran into snags, as "it was less focused," and the units that came to the Northern Command were not familiar with the terrain.
The "Israeli" Army was surprised when "an Iranian missile" was fired on one of its missile ships, and by the Hizbullah`s extensive use of anti-tank missiles in the war, he said. Also, Hizbullah outposts in open areas were well concealed, and "Israeli" troops discovered them only when they happened upon their underground bunkers, Halamish asserted.
"There appears to be an unjustified delay of several years in updating intelligence materials in the Northern Command. Also, some of the officers left [intelligence] material in the emergency storehouses. They did not realize this was war," he says.
Halamish says the regular forces arrived at the war in the North "with the attitude and concept characteristic of fighting in the territories...one must remember that intelligence officers and commanders, from battalion deputy commanders on down, are of a generation that has not had experience fighting in Lebanon, and that the units had not been trained properly for that arena," he said.
The inquiries carried out following the war "show that the intelligence work was carried out unprofessionally and was mediocre to inferior. The field officer`s duties are no longer challenging, therefore there are fewer officers who deal with these matters," he says.
Golani intelligence officer "Major Ilan" also says in an interview in the journal that "intelligence was a real problem. The most classified information did not reach the brigade in time."