MOSCOW, November 13. /TASS/. A big commission will be set up in Israel to probe into the crimes committed by Hamas since October 7 when it attacked Israel, Israeli Ambassador to Russian Alexander Ben Zvi said on Monday.

"A large-scale investigation will be conducted. No secret that we made a big mistake. No doubts about that. But the question is how it was made," he said.

He recalled the Yom Kippur War of 50 years ago. "It caught us off-guard back then too," the diplomat noted. "Later, a big commission was probing into it. I am sure that such a commission will be set up this time as well. It will investigate both military and civilian crimes, including political."

Hamas, in his words, had been preparing for the attack for two years.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 200 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Clashes are also reported in the West Bank.

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said earlier that the IDF was expanding its ground operation in Gaza.