Israel Sees Iran's 'Fingerprints' After Hamas Attack: Ex-Ambassador

Israel's former ambassador to the United Nations has alleged varied covert Iranian efforts to destabilize the country as it responds to last weekend's surprise attack by Hamas and prepares for what is expected to be a devastating ground offensive into the blockaded and bombarded Gaza Strip.

Danny Danon, who served as Israel's UN representative from 2015 to 2020 and is now a member of parliament representing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party, spoke with Newsweek on Monday amid allegations that Tehran may have helped plan or direct the Hamas infiltration operation, which has killed at least 900 people and wounded more than 2,400.

"It's no secret that Iran is heavily invested in the region," Danon said. "They provide funding to Hamas, training, and even sometimes explosive materials. I wouldn't be surprised if they were the ones who picked the timing."

Asked if he had seen any evidence suggesting a direct link, Danon responded: "I won't go into specifics, but we can always see the fingerprints of Iran in the region."

Newsweek has contacted the Iranian mission to the United Nations to request comment.

The Hamas infiltration—conducted under the coverage of a massive rocket barrage—took Israel by surprise. Militants were able to neutralize Israeli observation posts before cutting through the fence that separates the blockaded Palestinian enclave from Israel, quickly overwhelming nearby military outposts and attacking civilian settlements.

Hamas officials have credited Iran and its Lebanese Hezbollah client group with supporting the offensive, though Tehran has rejected reports of direct involvement while celebrating Hamas' success. Israel's military and the State Department have also said there is as yet no evidence directly linking Iran to 'Operation Al-Aqsa Flood,' as Hamas named the operation.

White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Monday that while the U.S. considered Iran "complicit" in the weekend's events, "in terms of specific evidence on this, these sorts of attacks, no, we don't have anything."

Iran has long armed, funded, and trained Hamas, seeking to wield the group against its strategic rival Israel. Hamas is part of a network of regional militant groups cooperating with Iran, along with Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and a range of Shiite militias in Iraq.

Hamas—like the other militant groups in Iran's wider network—does maintain a significant level of operational independence and is not merely a proxy of Tehran.

The Hamas attack appears to have derailed a planned normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which would have fostered closer economic, security, and political cooperation between the two former enemies. This agreement—and the broader "Abraham Accords" normalization deal between Israel and other Arab states—threatened to further unite the region against Iranian meddling.

"I'm not sure that they're happy to see the development with the Saudis in the region," Danon said of Tehran. "I think whenever we have signs of peace in the region, you have the radicals trying to sabotage it."

Alleged Iranian involvement in Hamas operations, plus ongoing skirmishes on the northern Israeli border with Hezbollah and PIJ fighters, threaten to escalate the war into a wider regional showdown. The nuclear-powered USS Ronald Regan aircraft carrier is now heading to the Mediterranean to bolster Israeli security as it plans to hit back against Hamas' Gaza stronghold.

Asked if Israel had seen any indication of imminent direct Iranian aggression, Danon said: "We haven't seen it directly, but indirectly we have detected activity in cyber areas and with their proxies."