Im abby phillip, and this is news knnight. I want to begin by taking a moment to show you some of the horror of the war that has transpired in israel. Often, in terror and in war, its the children who are caught in the cross hairs. Their innocence taken away in just a moment. And in this conflict, it is no different. When hamas launched their brutal and deadly assault on the israeli people, its clear that they spared no one, the elderly, teenagers, toddlers, and babies. Not even the smallest, most defenseless victims were spared. I want to warn you that what im about to show you is horrific. It is graphic. But its the harsh, brutal reality of what happened. The israeli Prime Minister releasing this picture of a baby, an infant, no longer alive, covered in blood, tiny legs still in a diaper. Other pictures show others burned beyond recognition. Now, its a reminder that hamas, when they infiltrated those neighborhoods, homes, they did it to torture, to kidnap, and to execute their victims. And now, because of that massacre by hamas, the civilians of gaza, who the militants use as Human Shields, are now in the line of fire. And that includes hundreds of thousands of children. Listen to this bbc reporter, who went to his own neighborhood hospital in gaza city. Translator bodies lay everywhere. The injured scream for help. You can never forget these sounds. Among the dead and wounded, my cameraman, mahmoud, has seen his friend malik. Malik has managed to survive, but his family have not. Reporter this is my local hospital. Inside are my friends, my neighbors. This is my community. Today has been one of the most difficult days in my career. Ive seen things i can never unsee. This young girls home was destroyed. Her relatives have been killed, and she needs help. My daughter is the same age. I want to give her a hug. We try to understand what is going on. A mother sits next to the bodies of her family. Translator we were sleeping and they bombarded our house like everyone else. We dont have any Resistance Fighters in our building. All the building is full of residents. 120 people lived there. Reporter the corridors of the hospital are filled with bodies. The morgue can no longer hold the bodies of the dead have to be laid on the floor outside the hospital entrance. You never want to become the story. I feel helpless, as they did. Were given no dignity, and the injured are lift in pain. These are the scenes of war, anderson. And i know that, as a parent and youre a parent as well when we see the youngest and the smallest of these victims, it is deeply painful for so many right now. Yeah. Look, more than a Million People in the population of gaza are below the age of 18. The number of children in gaza say huge percentage of the population. And there are going to be more deaths. Theres no doubt about it. I mean, it is this is a land soaked the in blood and history and conflict. And there are children on both sides of that border, who are completely innocent victims in all of this. And that is part of the horror of any war and part of the horror of the situation and the complexity of the situation here. And there are a lot of people in israel who have suffered horrific this horrific surprise attack, and who are firm in their resolve to once and for all stop these kind of attacks from happening again. Many of the people ive talked to you know, it doesnt mean they want on this side of the border, it doesnt mean they want children in gaza to suffer. But they are there is a resolve here for what they believe is necessary to rout out hamas. And they make the argument that hamas is using the citizens of gaza as essentially Human Shields, as hostages, that hamas has built underground tunnels to protect hamsas terrorists. They havent built Bomb Shelters. Those tunnels are not for the Civilian Population and for children to hide in. Its for putting hostages in and moving rockets through. So, it is a complex and a difficult and just a horrific situation that no one wants to see the loss of these children anywhere. Absolutely. I mean, and its such an important point about who is not protected with these tunnels. One of the other elements of this story, you actually got to see first hand today. You went to the scene of that Festival Attack where these were not children or babies, but they were young people, trying to live their lives. What did you see when you went there, a place that was suppose to be a scene of revelry that turned into a Killing Field . Yeah, once you actually are there, its very confusing just seeing in videos to get a sense of the scale of the slaughter that took place there and the way it all occurred. Hamas came from the north. It came from the south. And it came from the west. So, from three sides, these party goers, some 3,000, were pinned. And the only way they could go is to run through this open field, in which they were open targets, some hid in Bomb Shelters. And i visited one of the Bomb Shelters today, that dozens of people hid inside. And ive now seen video from inside that bomb shelter, when grenades were tossed in my members of hamas into i mean, it was a death trap. And i will say, it is the most disturbing video i have ever seen. And i was in the bomb shelter today. And the blood is still on the walls, and the hand prints are still on the walls, and peoples bloody shoes are still on the ground. And there were a lot of Israeli Soldiers who were at that site today. And what they spoke to me about was about seeing that and the resolve that they have about what is to come and what they must believe what they believe they must do. So, it was deeply affecting for me during the day, just as it is deeply affecting for a lot of the soldiers who are going through that site. And theres going to be a lot of pain to come. Theres going to be a lot of grief to come and a lot of loss to come. I cant say it any better than you did. I mean, this is a tragedy all the way around. And we appreciate you, anderson, for joining us and sharing that with us. Its painful to witness it, but we have to witness it in order to fully tell this story. Thanks, anderson. And with every hour that passes now, theres concern growing for those hostages, who are believed to be inside gaza. And questions about how and if they can safely be rescued. I want to talk now with someone to help us walk through these considerations, aaron cohen. Hes a former member of the Israeli Special forces and is a founder of a cherrys counterterrorism school. Aaron, lets start with what is coming, which is potentially a Ground Invasion. When we look here at this is just broadly to look at the region here this is the terrain that we have, that we face here. But at the same time, the real story about gaza is what is inside of gaza, these the Civilian Population in gaza city. Thats right. A huge Civilian Population. Do israelis know anything about where the hostages might be and whether they need to be in some of these dense Population Centers in order to get them . Theyre definitely in the dense Population Centers. Gaza is about the size of delaware, just to give you context here. Israel is about the size of new jersey. What israel is doing right now is they are in the preparation phase, which means theyre gathering as much intelligence as possible to be able to activate operations to immediately go get those hostages. Unlike the Hostage Sieges that we saw in israel in the southern part of israel in ofakim, here, and we saw another takedown of another Military Base sauled sue fa, the israel seal team ended up rescuing approximately 250 hostages. So, that happened on the israeli side. They ended up killing about 60 terrorists. The difficult part here is this entire part of gaza is unsterile. And they have had a year, hamas, to be able to set booby traps, to be able to prep this battle space, to be able to ensnare any israeli soldier that enters there. Theyre doing Topographical Service here to figure out the best ways of entry. If they have to breach from the water, weve got the Israeli Intelligence units who are probably crawling around gaza as we speak using a general staffer reconnaissance mission, which is the Prime Ministers old special units. Theyre on the ground so that we dont hit innocent civilians. So, eight lot of intel right now to find out where the hostages are. Right now we are seeing smoke coming out. Were looking out, these live pictures of gaza city. Were seeing smoke coming out of gaza city at this moment. What do you believe could be happening right now . As we are talking about this, weve seen already quite a few air strikes occurring in israel throughout gaza. But the vast concentration of them are in gaza city. What do you think is happening tonight . Okay. So, the smoke that youre seeing right now, thats a result of direct f15 and f35 Israeli Air Force selective fire. Theres a unit called shell dog, a very elite tier one asset. Its called the king fisher unit. And they are on the ground helping to put those missiles into specific hamas buildings to completely dismantle hamas infrastructure so that it mobilizes them completely. Thats what the smoke is from. The other thing, the reason this is happening at night, it allows Clandestine Operations to be conducted within gaza, using deception for operatives to get inside there, tapping cell phones, putting down recording devices. Israel is setting an entire operation for two things. One for when that counteroffensive staerts. And two, to be able to get those hostages back. Lets take a listen here. You can hear those bombs going off in the background in gaza city. We dont always hear or see at this time of night. If youre on the ground, youre feeling that. Youre feeling that. Absolutely, absolutely. Can you even tell, listening to that, the force, the magnitude . Yeah, look, theres going to be a lot of destruction. A lot of people are going to get killed and hurt. Israel has no issues with the Palestinian People. The Palestinian People ideally would want to be able to cross the southern border of gaza to get into egypt. They cant. Hamas is keeping them closed in there. And like a whats his name said, that is a problem if theyre being used as Human Shields and it creates immense levels of risk to the palestinians. We do our best to follow international law. When we look at the before and after of some of these spaces, it looks like an enormous amount of rubble. Do you see a tactical strategy in the flattening of some of these buildings . Absolutely. All of that . Absolutely. The flattening of the structures, the Artillery Pieces that are going in there, theyre starting to open up lanes, if you will, for this massive counteroffensive thats being prepared. The other thing that were doing is were tiring out hamas. Were treating this as what we call, like, a Pressure Cooker. That Pressure Cooker is designed to try and slow things down so we can collect intelligence and so we can tire out this terror group. And a tired terrorist is a better terrorist whos holding innocent women and children. So, taking our time and doing the best we can to collect info, try and slow this thing down, opening up lanes for the brigade, which is equivalent to the u. S. Marines. Theyre the ones in charge of the southern command. And theyre the ones who have been into gaza previously in the last war in gaza. So, theyre opening up parting ways, if you will, so the israelis will be able to move in there as safely as possible to get to the terrorists. Is it safe to describe what we are seeing tonight and hearing tonight in the skies over gaza, as a prelude, potentially, to a Ground Invasion . Well, i can tell you that a Ground Invasion is imminent. When its going to happen, i couldnt tell you. I mean not im not going to speculate and i dont want to give any information that might be inaccurate. But the fact that 300,000 reservists have been mobilized, the fact that the brigade is down there, the seals are already operating on that coast, you can bet that theyre preparing for the inevitability of having to go in there. And the unfortunate part, like anderson said very gently and eloquently, its going to be vicious you can hear the you can hear the missile fire. You can hear them hitting the rubble. Theres going to be a lot of violence action. There will be a lot of death and trauma. But we believe there could be over 150 hostages in there. So, were looking at two multiple assaults. And aaron, i just want to emphasize for our viewers, if youve been joining us nightly, we do not always hear bombardment at this hour of this strength. This seems to be theres intense fighting thats happening right now. I hear Artillery Pieces that are going off. Again, thats to soften and open up the runways for those Infantry Units that will eventually go in. I hear the call to prayer right now also. And the other thing were hearing is that selective missile fire. Theres potentially Israelis Inside Gaza right now, special operations forces. Theyre doing everything they can to get intelligence, to prepare for the counteroffensive. And unfortunately, this is the price that israelis pay and that palestinians pay. Lets listen for just a moment. As you just said, this is the call to prayer. Watching. These are images of gaza city, as the bombs light up the night sky there. Were hearing what sounds like a call to prayer, even some sirens a few moments ago, as the bombs are dropping right now. This is the Population Center of gaza. Almost 600,000 people live here. And the intensity of the bombardment seems to have picked up just in the last couple of minutes, as weve been speaking to you and watching these images. Its a sign, according to my guest here, aaron cohen, that potentially this is picking up. And as he says, as youve said, aaron, perhaps a sign that this Ground Invasion could be imminent, as the Israeli Defense forces are moving more aggressively, it seems tonight, to prepare to soften this ground for the some 300,000 troops who are amassed along the border, get ready to go in. Thats right. Thats right. And gaza is an incredibly density populated area. Hamz has had years to keep building it up. This is one of the most dangerous places on earth. I just want to make it really clear. The israelis, as an idf soldier, as a veteran of the idf, we dont have an issue with the palestinians. And we want to do what we can to get hamas away from them. So, were going to use as much selectivity. The difference with the footage you were showing is that were not going to indiscriminately hurt anybody. However, lines have been crossed and decisions have been made. Leadership will roll. Intelligence heads will be gone. Were not focusing on that right now. But this is the most significant Hostage Siege in the history of modern warfare. Again, the hostages. Is it necessary for there to be surgical operations to try to find and free those hostages prior to any kind of more largescale Ground Invasion of the idf. Yes. Yes. It is critical to continue to soften as much of the hamas infrastructure within the villages in order to reduce the larger Infantry Units that are going to move into gaza in order to minimize getting killed. Urban warfare is incredibly complex. This is essentially asymmetrical or 90 degree angle fighting. Bringing down those buildings means less walls for terrorists to hide behind. I just want to see if we can look here, just to emphasize the density of what youre talking about. These are buildings, homes, apartments, all of that right now. Thats right, thats right. And within these structures here will be command and control assets that hamas uses. Typically mosques, schools, hospitals. Thats the modus operandi of hamas, and it makes it extremely difficult for us to be able to conduct warfare in those spaces, which is why we want to make sure that the intelligence that were gathering is accurate and actionable, with minimum striking onto civilians. We fly over a target, we see one person near that building, we call off the sorry. Aaron, stand by for us. The bombings are growing more intense by the minute, as youve just seen in these images youve been playing for you. This is cnns live special coverage of israel at war. Well be right back. Back now with our Breaking News coverage. You are looking here at live pictures over gaza city. Israel is right now striking gaza ahead of a possible Ground Operation against hamas. The bombings have picked up as each minute goes by. Lets go straight to cnns chief Global Affairs correspondent matthew chance. He is in telereceive. Matthew, what are you hearing about what might be occurring tonight . Reporter well, i mean, what weve been seeing tonight is what weve been seeing for the past several nights, which is the Israeli Air Force really pounding targets across the gaza strip ahead of a possible Land Invasion. Its been a really intensive campaign from the air since the weekend, when hamas, the palestinian military group, carried out those horrific attacks inside israel. Were seeing whole areas, whole regions of gaza city being laid to waste, turned into rubble, as israeli aircraft pound mosques, apartment buildings, streets, and really, you know, putti