Good morning. After a surprise assault, Israel says it is at war with Gaza. |
 | | In Gaza City.Samar Abu Elouf for The New York Times |
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Nearly 50 years to the day after the Yom Kippur War in 1973, Israel was again taken by surprise by a sudden attack. |
Unlike the series of clashes with Palestinian forces in Gaza over the past three years, this appears to be a full-scale conflict mounted by Hamas and its allies, with rocket barrages and incursions into Israel proper, and with Israelis killed and captured. |
At least 250 Israelis have been killed, officials said, and more than 1,400 injured. The Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza said at least 313 Palestinians were killed, and 1,990 injured, as Israeli forces launched retaliatory airstrikes and the two sides engaged in pitched battles. |
The psychological impact on Israelis has been compared to the shock of Sept. 11 in America. So after the Israeli military repels the initial Palestinian attack, the question of what to do next will loom large. There are few good options for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has declared war and is being pressured into a major military response. |
Given that scores of Israelis have died so far and an unknown number have been taken hostage by Hamas, an Israeli invasion of Gaza — and even a temporary reoccupation of the territory, something that successive Israeli governments have tried hard to avoid — cannot be ruled out. |
As Netanyahu told Israelis in declaring war, "We will bring the fight to them with a might and scale that the enemy has not yet known." |
 | | By The New York Times |
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But a major war could have unforeseen consequences. It would be likely to produce sizable Palestinian casualties, civilians as well as fighters. And it might disrupt diplomatic efforts with Saudi Arabia, whose leaders have been negotiating a putative treaty to normalize relations with Israel in return for defense guarantees from the United States. |
The conflict will unite Israel behind its government, at least for a while, with the opposition canceling its planned demonstrations against Netanyahu's proposed judicial changes and obeying calls for reservists to muster. It will give Netanyahu "full political cover to do what he wants," said Natan Sachs, the director of the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution. |
Nevertheless, Sachs added, Netanyahu has in the past rejected calls to send thousands of troops into Gaza to try to destroy armed Palestinian groups like Hamas, given the cost and the inevitable question of what happens the day after. |
"But the psychological impact of this for Israel is similar to 9/11," he said. "So the calculus about cost could be quite different this time." |
- Israeli citizens were barricaded in their homes near the Gaza Strip. Some called into TV stations, reporting in whispers that gunmen were moving door to door. Militants took several Israelis hostage, including children, according to the Israeli military.
- Hundreds fled an outdoor music festival in southern Israel to escape incoming rockets and gunfire, according to Israeli news outlets.
- Hamas continued to fire rockets into Israel this morning. One struck Sderot, an Israeli city that was the site of intense fighting on Saturday.
- Israeli airstrikes demolished three buildings in Gaza and damaged a fourth, residents said. The streets of Gaza City emptied as residents took shelter at schools.
- The Israeli government said it had cut off its electricity supply for Gaza, which gets two-thirds of its power from Israel.
- After a late-night meeting, Israel's security cabinet announced that the goal of its operation in Gaza was "to achieve the destruction of the military and governing capabilities of Hamas and Islamic Jihad."
- Israel's military said it was still battling gunmen on Israeli territory this morning, more than 30 hours after the initial attack. Read the latest updates here.
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- Israelis pride themselves on the prowess of their intelligence services. Now, many are questioning how the country could have been blindsided by such a large and complex attack.
- Hamas said its assault was "in defense of the Aqsa Mosque," which is in a compound that both Muslims and Jews consider sacred. Tensions have been rising since the Israeli police raided the site in the spring.
- Yair Lapid, a centrist leader, said he was prepared to join a wartime coalition government — a move that could potentially allow Netanyahu to end his alliance with the far right.
- Officials in the U.S. and Europe condemned the assault. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine likened the attack to Russia's invasion of his own country.
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 | | Herat Province, Afghanistan, in the aftermath of an earthquake.Mohsen Karimi/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images |
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- Mayor Eric Adams visited Mexico, Ecuador and Colombia to warn migrants against traveling to New York City.
- "People are extremely internally conflicted": The migrant crisis is testing the limits of New Yorkers' openness to new arrivals.
- Migrants are building homes in a fast-growing development outside Houston. It has highlighted a Republican tension between business freedom and border controls.
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Over one-third of Supreme Court decisions are decided unanimously — evidence the court is united, even if many Americans don't think so, Nora Donnelly and Ethan Leib argue. |
The Sunday question: Should Democrats have helped Kevin McCarthy keep the House speakership? |
House Democrats' decision to join eight hard-line Republicans in removing McCarthy last week was "a cynical display of short-term political gain" at the expense of stability, Patrick T. Brown writes for CNN. But Democrats can't hold the majority together and allow Republicans "to get away with all they've done to nurture MAGA's pathologies," The Washington Post's Greg Sargent writes. |
All encompassing. Entertaining. Appetizing. Discerning. And sporting. |
No matter what you're into, it's all in The Times. Subscribe today to enjoy everything we offer. |
 | | Pop-Tarts advertised in the 1960s.Kellogg's |
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Lives Lived: Henri Dauman was a Holocaust survivor and photographer who made his name capturing celebrities like Marilyn Monroe, Yves Saint Laurent and Elizabeth Taylor. He died at 90. |
| TALK | FROM THE TIMES MAGAZINE |
 | | Errol MorrisMamadi Doumbouya for The New York Times |
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I spoke with the Oscar-winning documentary director Errol Morris, whose upcoming film, "The Pigeon Tunnel," is about the late, enigmatic spy novelist John le Carré. |
In le Carré's letters, he mentions that you want to work on this film and that he really wants to do it. When a guy who doesn't like interviews, understands them as a performance and is a liar says you're the guy to tell my story, does that raise any questions? |
What is the purpose of an interview, anyway? A lot of people think it's this gotcha idea: You're required to come up with a difficult question that pins the butterfly to the board. That's not part of the deal. An interview should be investigative, in essence. |
But to go back to my question, which is, did you have any concerns about why it was that le Carré thought you were the guy to tell this story? |
The whole premise of what you're saying is utterly ridiculous. |
You tell me this is a guy who is an admitted liar, why would you want to talk to him? I wanted to talk to him because I had read a lot of his novels. I read "The Pigeon Tunnel," [Morris' film is adapted from le Carré's memoir of the same name] and he is a smart and interesting person. |
When people see your films, do they see the truth? |
What did Godard say? That cinema is the truth, 24 frames a second. It's lies at 24 frames a second. We live in a world of lies. When you asked me, does it bother me that David [Cornwell; le Carré's real name] is a known liar? The answer is, How does it make him different from anybody else? It doesn't! |
 | | A production of Jon Fosse's "I Am the Wind."Sara Krulwich/The New York Times |
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Our editors' picks: "North Woods," about the occupants of a single house in Massachusetts over several centuries, and eight other books. |
- Tomorrow is Columbus Day, a federal holiday in the U.S. Many states also recognize Indigenous Peoples' Day.
- The Nobel Prize for economics will be announced tomorrow.
- Liberia will hold elections Tuesday.
- House Republicans will hold a party vote Tuesday to nominate a speaker.
- New Zealand will hold elections Saturday.
- A solar eclipse will pass over the United States on Saturday, from Oregon to Texas. Here's how you can safely view it.
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 | | Christopher Testani for The New York Times |
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Can you put eight historical events — including the development of dating, mRNA and The Supremes — in chronological order? Take this week's Flashback quiz. |
Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. |
 | Editor: David Leonhardt News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Lauren Jackson, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch |
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