In response to an increase in insurgent activity, the Mandatory Palestine garrison and police force launched Operation Agatha on 29 June 1946.

While the operation was seen as a success by the Mandate, it created a great deal of public unrest and was labeled "Black Saturday" by the general population.

In response to Operation Agatha, the Irgun planted a bomb in the basement of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, were the Mandate government ran an office.

Plans were made for short periods of food distribution and essential services such as hospitals and utilities were continued under military guard.

In his memoirs, Irgun leader Menachem Begin, who escaped the cordon by hiding in a secret compartment of his house, declared that the operation had been a costly failure that had bolstered popular support for the insurgency.