Channel 12 said Lt. General Herzi Halevi, the Israeli Army Chief of Staff, and other top generals in the General Staff held telephone consultations overnight in the hours before the Hamas attack but concluded that there was no need to act immediately. 

The commander of the Southern Command and the head of the National Security Agency took part in the discussions. 

These senior generals and officials reached a conclusion of waiting until the morning to process the information after concluding the information did not "warrant panicking," reported Channel 12.

These reported consultations were unusual due to significant warnings.

According to Channel 12, significant signs of a Hamas operation presented themselves on two separate occasions recently -  one about a month ago and the other in the hours immediately before the Hamas attack. 

The Southern Command held a situation assessment on Friday evening. It also conducted two serious phone calls with senior officials at two and again at four in the morning - just two hours and half hours before the attack started.

These top Israeli commanders concluded that these signs of an attack were not "gleaming" enough but the sequential turn in events showed that it was wrong to wait until the morning, Channel 12 said.

In his first public statement after the war between Israel and Hamas began on Saturday, Lt. General Halevi acknowledged "failures" that enabled Hamas's infiltration and attacks on the Israeli military.

"The IDF is responsible for the security of the country and its citizens, and on Saturday morning in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip, we did not handle it," he said from southern Israel.

Halevi added that "a time will come to investigate how Hamas managed to carry out the attack but now is the time for war,” reported The Times of Israel.

On Saturday, the Ezz Eddin Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian Hamas movement, launched an unprecedented attack on Israel at 6:30 on Saturday morning, prompting Tel Aviv to declare a state of war.

The ongoing Palestinian operation has left more than 1,200 Israelis dead, including more than 220 soldiers, and hundreds injured.

Hamas has also taken tens of Israeli captives in an attempt to secure the release of thousands of Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails.

Meanwhile, Israel has imposed an all-out siege on 2.3 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, cutting off all food, water, and electricity supplies. 

Round-the-clock Israeli bombing of Gaza since Saturday has killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, injured more than 6,000, and leveled tens of homes and apartment buildings, wiping whole neighbourhood out of existence.