The Israeli military said Thursday that one of its generals had acted properly when he authorized a tank to shell a house in an Israeli village where Hamas fighters were holding hostages, in one of the most debated episodes of the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7.

Military investigators made the determination as part of a broader inquiry into the Hamas-led massacre in Be’eri, one of the hardest-hit Israeli communities on Oct. 7. They concluded that the Israeli shelling likely killed at least one captive and wounded another. All but one of the remaining hostages were killed during a subsequent firefight, and the inquiry said the majority were probably murdered by their captors.

The Israeli military’s investigation into the devastating attack on Be’eri, where over 100 Israeli civilians were killed, marks the beginning of a national reckoning. It is the first of dozens of inquiries set to examine how and why Israel failed to protect its citizens from Hamas’s devastating assault, though critics and some survivors have raised questions about the military’s ability to transparently investigate its own failures.

“This is the beginning of a long process of repair and rebuilding trust between the Israel Defense Forces and the public,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, told reporters on Thursday night.

In a statement summarizing the results of the investigation, the Israeli military conceded that it had “failed in its mission” to protect Be’eri and detailed a series of errors, including disorganization, a lack of coordination between forces and slow response times. The Hamas-led attack began at dawn on Oct. 7 and continued through the next day.

“In the first seven hours of fighting, the residents of Kibbutz Be’eri fought almost alone against the enemy,” Admiral Hagari said.