At least its a Beautiful Day here in washington. See you again here. Thank you so much for joining us. The news continues on cnn news central. Good afternoon, im Brianna Keilar with Boris Sanchez here in washington. We are following breaking developments in the middle east. Today the Israel Defense forces say that the majority of hostages captured by hamas are still alive. The terror group claims that it will free them if there is a pause in fighting. The red cross has been in touch with hamas, seeking access to those captives, and russia says kremlin officials have communicated with hamas about haj hostage releases. On the military front the idf says it is prepared for a broader conflict and as the world braces for the next phase of its operations,enally a move into gaza, the carnage continues there. The latest, a Greek Orthodox church compound leveled by an idf air strike. Youre looking at video of it now. Cnn cant independently confirm the number of casualties, but the Health Ministry in gaza says that 17 people were killed. In the meantime, trucks with food, water and medicine are still idling at the rafah Border Crossing between egypt and gaza in the south. Days after gazans were first promised that aid would arrive. The u. N. Secretary general was there pleading for movement as protests broke out across the arab world. Lets start with cnns nic robertson, he is in did he remember rot, israel. The idf is staging for what looks like a Ground Invasion as several agencies are in contact with hamas. Actually, tell us whats going on where you are, it appears that there may be some missiles incoming. Reporter there were missiles fired out of gaza, i saw a salvo about seven or eight missiles fi what we were showing you were the officer septs from the iron dome that was fired to intercept these, missiles that appeared to be sort of heading northeast out of gaza and im hearing a heavy detonation, a fighter jet came on station right after we heard those those and saw those rockets coming out of gaza. It was very, very clear. Sometimes you just see the Tail Afterglow of the rockets coming out of gaza, but you could see these very clear streaks of Amber Light Flashing through the sky, disappearing as at the arced up and they are the intercepts with the iron dome. Its been a relatively quiet day, in fact, a very quiet day until this moment. This is the first outgoing that weve seen perhaps in six or seven hours. There were a few salvos earlier in the day but there have been really almost no artillery and no israeli missile strikes going into gaza today. Very, very quiet, which really gave the impression that behind the scenes talks about humanitarian aid going into gaza, talks about possible hostage release, it all seemed to create an atmosphere that there were talks of some nature going on because that was the only thing or perhaps a likely thing that might have contributed to why the situation fell to little quiet. An anyway, that quiet was broken with that salvo of missiles fired out of gaza that have now been intercepted. Nic, back to the question of hostages. Several entities are now in contact with hamas about getting them released. Bring us up to speed on where that stands now. Reporter yeah, its been an effort by many different interlocutors or many Different Countries to try to find Inte Interlock could you torse. Hamas doesnt have all the hostages, Palestinian Islamic jihad also has some, they sent fighters across in that attack almost two weeks ago now. So israeli officials, the idf, Government Officials know that the majority of the hostages are alive. One of the principal Inte Interlocutors to get the hostages released has been the Political Office in doha for hamas, so it has a political a direct political facetoface connection with hamass political leaders who are not inside of gaza. So it has a mechanism and it is believed that the qataris have been one of the principal interlocutors but part of the difficulty is establishing what hamas will settle for in terms of the hostage release, what conditions they want imposed first on what they want in exchange, what israel is willing to accept as well. It has appeared the u. N. Secretary general yesterday when he was speak being this spoke about it in these terms, that if there was a humanitarian pause and humanitarian aid going into gaza, he seemed to imply in an unrestricted way that that would satisfy a part of a negotiation that would trigger hamas potentially releasing hostages. But its not easy. We know that the International Committee for the red cross, which is the Global International body that deals with prisoners in Different Countries, hostages, that negotiates with governments, the icrc, the International Committee for the red cross is the sort of committee that can deal with groups like the taliban in afghanistan. They have said that they have not been able to see or be in touch with the hostages so far because hamas has not allowed them to do that. So i think theres a huge amount of about the hostages we dont know, but i think the world turns to qatar at this moment in time to see what they can do. All right. We will be looking for that. Nic robertson, thank you so much. Please stay safe where you are. And across the middle east and also north africa, jordan, lebanon, libya, yemen, turkey, egypt, so many locations were seeing mass demonstrations in support of palestinians that are packing public squares. We want to take you now to amman jordan where nada bashir has been speaking to protesters. What is it like there . What are you hearing from them . Reporter well, you can see behind me this crowd is enormous, theyve been shouting chanting that they want freedom for the palestinian people, they are expressing their solidarity with the palestinian people. It is very loud, very crowded so im going to keep this microphone quite close to my mouth so you can hear me. Just take a look. The scale of this protest is huge and this is something that we have been seeing pretty much every night here in amman, jordan. As you mentioned, this is taking place across the middle east and even further afield. Weve seen protests in london, washington, d. C. , new york, across europe, but of course in the middle east and particularly here in jordan this is a cause, an issue that is deeply close to many peoples hearts. This is a country where more than half of the population are either palestinian or of palestinian descent. What weve seen is an outpouring of solidarity for the palestinian people, for palestinians in particular in the gaza strip, but also outrage, deepseated anger being directed towards israel over the continued air strikes and the siege on the gaza strip, but also anger towards israels Western Allies and the United States. Now, we were at a march earlier this morning which took place after friday prayers, thousands of people taking part in that march through downtown amman, including families, young children, all wearing the traditional palestinian scarf, waving palestinian flags. This is a huge cause in this country and as we continue to see these air strikes ramping up, as the siege continues, these protests are only getting stronger. They are not letting up. Where we are right now is where a lot of the focus has been towards were quite close to the Israeli Embassy and that is where many of these demonstrators have focused their attention, but you can hear they are deeply passionate about this issue and that is the same looks like were having some issues with nada bashirs signal. There is Breaking News back here at home. Thats right. Lets go straight to catalin polantz. As we understand the attorney for Kenneth Chesbro, a trump attorney who just took a plea deal in georgia was just speaking. What can you tell us . Reporter theres not going to be a trial until donald trump is set to go to trial as far as we know now in georgia. There was supposed to be the trial of ken chesbro and Sidney Powell starting today in Fulton County. That is canceled because both of those codefendants of donald trump who wanted to go first and were daring the prosecutors to try their case, they both are pleading guilty to various crimes that they are charged with in georgia related to the 2020 election. Chesbro in court this morning or this afternoon, just after noon, taking this guilty plea deal, agreeing to cooperate, and also as part of this deal implicating donald trump. Essentially he is admitting that he was coordinating with the Trump Campaign to organize fake electors in the state of georgia and elsewhere, get them together so that there could be an effort to overturn the election or stall the certification, the transfer of power of the presidency in washington, d. C. In january of 2021. Here is what a prosecutor outlined today as all of the mention that ken chesbro is agreeing that he did after the 2020 election as part of a felony plea deal. The defendant created and distributed false Electoral College documents to individuals in georgia and other states in coordination with Donald John Trump for president , inc. Also known as the Trump Campaign. The defendant provided detailed instructions to coconspirators in georgia and other states for creating and distributing these false documents. Three, coconspirator Donald John Trust and john eastman solicited the director of the Republican National committee to assist in Recruiting Persons to serve as fake electors in georgia as well as in other states. Cocon spear source Rudolph Giuliani solicited persons to serve as false electors and provided strategic instructions to cocon spear course including exhibition of conspiracy in multiple states. David james shaffer, john steel and cal least lakeum and others met in Fulton County, georgia, on december 14, 2020, created false Electoral College documents that falsely stated that the coconspirator Donald John Trump had received all of georgias Electoral College votes. The coconspirators also attempted to deliver a copy of the false documents to the Northern District of georgia for the purposes of filing, entering and recording those documents in that court, having reason to know that those documents contained materially false statements that the coconspirators were the electors of the state of georgia. The defendant was also personally present on the grounds of the United States capitol during the disruption and delay of the joint session of congress on january 6th. So, boris and brianna, the headline there is that what scott grubman, the attorney for ken chesbro has agreed to as part of this plea deal that ken chesbro is admitting to is that hes pleading to one charge, a conspiracy to file false documents in the state of georgia, those fake electors sirs, and that conspiracy part of this charge thats very important because that means that ken chesbro, the attorney who was working with donald trump and the campaign, Rudy Giuliani, john eastman and others, the other people charged in this case, hes admitting to being part of that group, taking the efforts together. Thats quite a significant step forward for not just the district attorney, fani willis, but the entire shape of this case. While chesbro was expected to go to trial today by himself, after his codefendant Sidney Powell pleaded guilty yesterday, that trial is not happening and now this case is left with donald trump and several others including Rudy Giuliani, john eastman, mark meadows, many boldfaced names, other lawyers that were working at that same level as ken chesbro, Sidney Powell and others, they all will now be going to trial at a later date together. So there wasnt going to be now a trial where ken chesbro would be trying his case as the only defendant that the jury would be looking at and maybe pointing to donald trump or prosecutors having to speak about donald trump with donald trump not in the room. Katelyn polantz, thanks for the update. Lets get legal perspective from renato marrimariotti. Here Kenneth Chesbro essentially acknowledges that he conspired with donald trump, john eastman, Rudy Giuliani and others. What does that mean for the Fulton County das case Going Forward . It certainly helps. Look, the way that this was set up, these attorneys were going to have their trial first, i think they went out in front and tried to do that because they recognized at a joint trial with donald trump and john eastman and others, ultimately what was going to happen is donald trump and others were going to be pointing fingers at the attorneys and saying the attorneys put them up to it, the attorneys blessed this and said it was okay. Now instead of having that dynamic where the defendants are pointing fingers at each other, now the attorneys are going to say, we committed crimes and these people were part of it. And i think that makes the das case stronger and i also think it creates problems for some of the other defendants including some of the other attorneys. Is he a stronger witness than Sidney Powell . Its not possible to be a weaker witness than Sidney Powell. I suppose Rudy Giuliani is up there on the weak witness category as well, but Sidney Powell has told so many untruths that i think its hard to take her seriously. Kenneth chesbro is a more serious person, although he has some problems himself, after all, you know, he was the one in emails talking about this as a fake electors scheme. And, look, anybody who is a convicted felon, anyone who has cut a deal with the government is subject to criticism, but now the da has two witnesses and one advantage of i would say a Shotgun Approach where youre charging a lot of different people with a lot of different crimes. When you fire a shotgun into a crowd youre going to hit somebody. Shes bagged a couple targets and more potentially. And notably powell and chesbro in their agreements, they have also agreed to testify in future trials including jack smiths federal election subversion case. If you are part of Donald Trumps defense team none of this is good. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. I mean, theres certainly a wall that is breaking down for donald trump here and, you know, part of that is an advantage that the da had and charging attorneys. Attorneys have a lot of downside, it is very challenging and i think for people in their position, the idea of spending time in a State Penitentiary in georgia is not a particularly feeling proposition. So, you know, they tried an aggressive move by seeking an early trial. I do think it had some value for them because i think it encouraged the da to offer them a deal because she didnt want to preview all of her evidence before she was going to be going up against trump in a subsequent trial, but ultimately at the end of the day they had to plead guilty of times, Kenneth Chesbro the more serious plea, obviously he pled guilty to, you know, a plea of felony, but, you know, ultimately at the end of the day, you know, they were you know, they have ultimately turned to the government team, the prosecution team. All right. Renato, thank you so much. We do appreciate your insights on a very big news story today. Kenneth chesbro also taking a plea deal here in the georgia case. Yeah, we do want to bring you some Breaking News, though, right now. Cnns Alex Marquardt has that for us. Alex, this has to do with the hostages that were being held in gaza by hamas. Reporter yeah, boris and brianna, we understand that two of the american hostages who have been held by hamas are on their way out of the gaza strip. Weve just learned this from a person who is familiar with the discussions as well as a diplomatic source, we have spoken to my colleague katelyn collins. As we know from the israelis there have been 200 hostages held by hamas since the horrific attacks inside israel on october 7th. What we understand from these two sources is that the two americans are a mother and a daughter, they are currently were told with the red cross and heading south in the gaza strip. There are two crossings in southern gaza, one that goes into egypt, the other that goes into israel. So right now were not sure about which country they will be going into. Were also unclear on the identities of this mother and child, but we are told that they are being released on humanitarian grounds. Thats according to a source that i spoke with because the mother is not in good health. Now, boris and brianna, this has also been announced by hamas. A spokesman for the militant group said that the mother and daughter are also being released, they say, on