After Saturday morning's strike against Israel by Hamas, Israel was reeling, with more than 700 dead and thousands missing or injured.
By Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, that entire narrative had been reversed, with Israel now going on the offensive.
Israel had controlled the Gaza Strip for decades until Hamas took it over in June 2007.
Since then, the tensions between Hamas and Israel have always been on high alert, but the attack on Saturday was clearly an act of war.
While initially staggered, Israel quickly reversed the roles, now the aggressor, intent on destroying Gaza.
On Tuesday, Israel unleashed a massive salvo of missiles on the Gaza Strip, making it clear that it plans to pulverize Gaza until it "will no longer be."
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, speaking to soldiers near the Gaza fence, said:
"Hamas wanted a change and it will get one. What was in Gaza will no longer be.
"We started the offensive from the air, later on we will also come from the ground. We've been controlling the area since Day 2 and we are on the offensive. It will only intensify."
Hamas had threatened to kill its hostages if Israel struck civilian targets, but as of Wednesday morning, no executions had been carried out, at least not publicly.
With the possibility of dozens of Americans among those hostages, everyone here in the United States is watching this intently.
The Department of Defense put out an official statement regarding its support for Israel in this conflict.
Biden confirmed that American citizens are believed to be among those being held by Hamas.
A Defense Department official stated:
"I want to differentiate this from other times we have seen conflicts between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
"This is ISIS-level savagery that we have seen committed against Israeli civilians — houses burned to the ground, young people massacred at music festivals."
The Defense Department also stated that it had made it quite clear to other adversaries that anyone looking to take advantage of the instability in the Middle East would pay a price.
The Department stated:
"We're also making very clear to adversaries or those that might be entertaining entering this conflict to escalate it that they should think twice and not take advantage of the instability."
The United States has already ordered a carrier strike force to the area and is preparing to ship munitions to Israel so it can keep the pressure on Hamas.
My guess here is that Israel will look to end this rather quickly based on how they have been aggressively bombing the Gaza Strip. They will want to end this before other countries even think about getting involved.
It will get very dicey if Hamas-supporting countries decide to get into the mix.
There are a lot of reports on this front suggesting that countries like Iran and Syria could directly enter the war, which would be a game-changer in terms of how long this war lasts.
If Israel is forced to defend a multi-front war, NATO countries are going to step in, including the United States, and that is when we start having World War III conversations.
This could escalate very quickly to that point, so we will continue to monitor and report as needed on developments.
