Israeli spies knew of Hamas‘ plans to attack partygoers at the Nova music festival just hours before the terrorists carried out the bloody assault, it has been reported. 

Secret agents and military commanders held late-night meetings hours before the October 7 attack began, an investigation by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz said. 

The first meeting took place over the phone close to midnight with senior figures of the IDF, such as its chief of staff Herzl Halevi, being made aware of the warnings.

A second briefing was then held at 3AM with the IDF concluding that Hamas was conducting a training exercise on the Gaza border rather than preparing for the deadly attack.

Despite the conclusion, Israeli forces increased the number of drone surveillance flights in the area, while Team Tequila – a operational unit that focuses on preventing abductions – were deployed to the Nahal Oz, a kibbutz close to the country’s border.

While these precautions were taken by the Israeli military no warnings were relayed to the organisers of the festival that was taking place near Kibbutz Re’im, just three miles away from Gaza.

Just hours later, shortly after 6.30am, Hamas terrorists broke into the site, unleashing its raid of terror, that saw 360 people killed and a further 40 taken hostage. 

The festival had been orgnaised in close operation with Israel’s military and had been approved by those soldiers working in northern parts of Gaza. 

But now festival organisers have claimed that when they rang officers they had been liaising with as the massacre began to unfold they were told the forces were in disarray and they would have to cope on their own.

The production team told the Israeli paper that if it had received prior warning to the attack – even just an hour before – youngsters could have been evacuated in time. 

Army units on duty, however, are said to have had no knowledge of the festival taking place in southern Israel. 

The IDF eventually attended the devastating scene at 3pm after victims had been killed or those who survived had been playing dead or fled on foot. 

An inquiry will take place when the war in Gaza is over but the festival is expected to be one of the most highly-scrutinised parts of the procedure.

‘The military understands that the Re’im festival will be at the center of the inquiry commissions that will be established at the end of the war,’ an IDF source told Haaertez this week. They added: ‘This massacre should have been prevented.’

Responding to the claims the IDF said that a ‘detailed and in-depth investigation of the matter, to ascertain the details, will be carried out when the operational situation allows’.