WhatsappIDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir delivered an important message from inside Gaza today: October 7 is not a closed chapter, and the terrorists who participated in the massacre should not assume that a ceasefire grants them immunity.
“The pursuit of the October 7 terrorists continues,” Zamir declared during a visit to Gaza. “Anyone who took part in the massacre will live under pursuit until they are eliminated.”
That statement matters far beyond the individual terrorists still being hunted.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has been forced to reconsider one of the fundamental assumptions that shaped its security policy for decades: that periods of quiet along its borders necessarily mean security.
They do not.
Hamas used years of relative quiet to construct an enormous military infrastructure in Gaza, train assault forces, manufacture weapons and prepare the invasion that ultimately devastated Israeli communities along the border.
Hezbollah followed a similar model in Lebanon, building an enormous missile arsenal and military infrastructure while positioning forces close to Israel.
Zamir is signaling that Israel cannot allow that strategic mistake to be repeated.
“The IDF is prepared and alert on all fronts,” he said. “We will not allow our enemies along the borders, with an emphasis on Gaza and Lebanon, to rebuild their strength.”
That is the real strategic significance of his remarks.
Israel cannot measure security simply by whether rockets are being fired today. It must also ask what its enemies are building for tomorrow.
That means identifying terrorist commanders, destroying infrastructure and acting before threats mature into another October 7-style catastrophe.
The policy also creates tension with international efforts to preserve the Gaza ceasefire. The US-led Board of Peace has reportedly called for Israeli strikes to be restricted to “immediate threats.” In recent months, the IDF has increasingly described October 7 terrorists targeted in Gaza as posing such threats.
But Israel also has another objective: accountability.
The terrorists who crossed into Israel, murdered civilians, attacked communities and participated in the October 7 massacre cannot simply disappear back into Gaza and wait for international diplomacy to protect them.
Zamir’s message is therefore deliberately simple.
A ceasefire may temporarily change the battlefield.
It does not erase October 7.
And for those who participated in the massacre, Israel intends to ensure that the pursuit continues.
