Rarely does the IDF lift the veil between the headquarters of a top-secret classified intelligence unit and the public.
The IDF’s Gaza battlefield intelligence collection unit (“the collection unit”) is an exception to that, serving as HQ for all of the information coming in from different sources: satellite imagery, spying, and a whole slew of different technologies.
In the multiple command centers, each staffer works at their computer to collect or analyze a different aspect of intelligence, including satellite imagery, human spying, a variety of signals, sensors, and cyber intelligence.
Some computers are zoomed in on a specific house; some show the full Gaza map with a variety of colors and shapes, designating different kinds of forces and sensitive locations; some hold newly received signal intelligence items; others showcase classified intelligence information.
Intelligence staffers explained how quickly they must operate to save the lives of IDF soldiers in the field, as well as to strike maneuvering Hamas targets before they move to another position, making a carefully planned counterstrike obsolete.
The unit is not only unique because of the vast amount of operational IDF intelligence it combines, linking with IDF targeting command and forces on the front, but also because it has multiple different coordination levels with the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency).
There are separate joint teams with Shin Bet interrogation agents and field targeting forces.
The first few days of the war, the collection unit saved troves of civilian lives in the South, directing them to safety or sending reinforcements to rescue them.
Since October 10, the unit worked with IDF divisions 162, 252, and 26, eventually adding others, to plan the ground invasion of Gaza.
Updated tablets are handed out at top, medium, and lower command levels to keep the collection unit plugged into the many different levels of field commanders.
“For over a month, the collection unit mandatory and reserve service members have provided results to all of the invading forces in the South as well as to the forces in the North,” a senior IDF officer said, adding: “At the divisional and brigade levels, there are officers from all the collection and analysis disciplines, including wireless monitors, online analysis officers, photo-video analysts, researchers, and interrogators – all for the purpose of providing tactical operational results.”
“The unit’s headquarters constitute a multidisciplinary intelligence apparatus and emphasize cooperation with other intelligence units” to help attack enemy forces and engage in force protection,” he added.
In one incident, the unit, as well as portions of IDF Golani Division 36, collected information regarding Hamas’s intention to ambush a specific Golani patrol. Using a mix of human spying and technological spying, the unit flagged the meeting spot of the intended members of the Hamas ambush and carried out a full evaluation of the planned ambush.
The collection unit also provides critical defensive updates
The unit then passed on the information to the IDF divisional forces in the field as well as to the local Shin Bet liaison to develop a counter strategy for striking the Hamas terrorists.
Furthermore, the collection unit personnel, associated with the IDF division and relevant brigade, connected the relevant analytical and targeting data points to prepare a strike.
As soon as other forces indicated that a critical mass of the Hamas terrorists were at the strike point, they were taken out.
The constant sharing of information between the collection unit and the IDF field division enabled ongoing tracking of Hamas’s movements as well as quickly targeting them in real-time and removing them from the battlefield.
The collection unit also provides critical defensive updates, and it helped plan the targeted killing on Saturday of Ahmed Siam, a Hamas Naser Radwan company commander who had held about 1,000 Gazan civilians hostage in Gaza’s Rantisi Hospital. Highly trained analysts from the unit analyzed data that emerged from the scene to ensure Siam’s elimination.
The collection unit provides all of the battlefield intelligence needs that IDF forces in Gaza require, IDF Maj. “M” said.