Demonstrators stage large protest hours after briefly shutting off access to the major seaport in Haifa.

"We have seen the reports and are monitoring the situation closely," a White House spokesperson says in statement, adding that US supports "Israel’s security and right to defend its people against Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist groups."

This is no intifada. It’s a premeditated Iranian regime “pincer” war now executed from the northern Samarian hills.

  Leon Gautier, the last surviving member of the French commando unit that waded ashore on D-Day alongside allied troops...

Because the operation had been defined as a small-scale incursion, there was no need to convene the Diplomatic-Security Cabinet and get a green light, allowing the exact timing of the operation to be kept under wraps until the forces were already on their way.