[5] However, INS Hanit stayed afloat, withdrew and made the rest of the journey back to Ashdod port for repairs under its own power.

In fact, the investigative work of Ha'aretz journalists Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff showed that an intelligence officer identified only as Colonel K. had given a lecture on 21 April 2003, predicting that Hezbollah possessed shore-to-sea missiles.

One of the junior officers had shut down the central radar and parts of the defence system without notifying the commander, in the belief that the ship was not under threat.

[10] An official IDF report on the Lebanon war incident reveals that the crew did not act sufficiently in order to anticipate the threat.

"[11] As there were no perceived missile threats, an officer had left the ship's anti-missile suite disabled, in energy-saving standby-mode, while patrolling near the coast.