two critical senate hearings are happening now on capitol hill. first up mayokas and f.b.i. director christopher wray are testifying on the threats to america that are now growing. open border will do that. they are pointing to an explosion of anti-semitism we're seeing as well since hamas terrorists tortured, raped, killed, israeli citizens on october 7th. the second hearing defense secretary austin and secretary of state antony blinken also facing questions today for their part on america's response so far to the 25 attacks on u.s. military men and women serving in the middle east. and testimony was just getting underway at that hearing when police had to remove disruptive protestors from the gallery. first it was a woman, just one, and then it was a crowd. >> stop funding this brutal massacre. >> israel's genocide is a terrible thing. >> pray for the children of gaza. >> cease-fire now. >> harris: they held up their hands covered in what we assume is fake blood, paint, something as they called for a cease-fire. it is day 25 of the fighting between the israeli military and hamas killers. i'm harris faulkner and you are in "the faulkner focus." israel's military is moving farther into the northern gaza strip and ground and air assaults are pounding the evil cowards taking cover behind families that they are using as human shields. the idf says one of those air strikes killed a hamas commander who is responsible for directing part of that october 7th massacre. israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu standing firm. >> i want to make clear israel's position regarding a cease-fire. just as the united states would not agree to a cease-fire after the bombing of pearl harbor or after the terrorist attack of 9/11. >> harris: idf commander with a message to his military. [speaking native language] >> harris: just one example of the sheer savagery of hamas killers, one of those more than 200 hostages taken by hamas was found dead. she was beheaded after terrorists paraded her body around on the back of a truck. israeli officials identified her remains, 23-year-old german/israeli citizen at the music festival on the morning of october 7th. imagine what her family has gone through was that her? god help them. in "focus" retired army lieutenant colonel. we begin with senior correspondent mike tobin in israel. mike. >> from our vantage point the fighting has been a little more quiet than it has been on previous nights. israeli forces are spending their fifth night inside of the fence in gaza where idf says the fighting has intense. what i get from palestinian sources fighting has been quite bloody particularly in the neighborhood of jabalia. the israelis claim they killed a commander of a neighborhood, a neighborhood to the northern end of the gaza strip saying he was one of the planners of the october 7th massacres. israel says they have taken out some anti-tank weapons. hamas personnel and video releases show soldiers engaged in urban combat going house to house and clearing the houses. you see like bulldozers clearing out streets making way for more israeli armor and personnel to enter gaza strip. it is going slow. urban combat is risky and the hostages. a former israeli intelligence chief. since the withdrawal of israelis from the settlements in 2005 is -- gaza is a complicated place. intelligence people when you don't have a good solution for this mess of gaza. >> israel did generate enough intelligence to find private mag dish and send in commandos to rescue her. she said she is unharmed. idf says she has a resilient memory and providing valuable intelligence to the israeli government now about other soldiers. to the far south of the country, surface to surface missile came up the red sea and taken out by the arrow missile intercept system. the first time that system has been used in this war. >> harris: mike tobin, thank you very much. as we always do. the sun is setting about now where you are. we'll check back with you during the hour as news warrants. thank you. israeli prime minister netanyahu with a brand-new op-ed titled the battle of civilization. he is arguing if hamas and iran win, you will be their next target. the barbarians are willing to fight us and their goal is clear, shatter that promising future, destroy all that we cherish, and usher in a world of fear and darkness. this is a turning point for leaders and nations. it is a time for all of us to decide if we're willing to fight for a future of hope and promise or surrender to tyranny and terror. in "focus" now a former blackhawk helicopter pilot and battalion commander and executive director of restore liberty. great to have you in focus. what leadership you have now, restore liberty. that's what netanyahu says we are going to have to do. >> good morning, harris. that's true and i think netanyahu recognizes the fact this is one of those times in israel's history when it is destroy hamas or be destroyed as a nation because it is more than just hamas. if they show weakness against this smaller organization of hamas in the gaza strip hezbollah will take notice and nations around israel will also take notice and the future will get darker for israel potentially. he knows they have to win now. >> harris: can you please compare fighting hezbollah to fighting hamas? >> yeah. hamas is actually the smaller of the two organizations. they are not as well funded and as well organized. hezbollah is a much bigger threat. where the hamas was able to launch 5,000 to 7,000 rockets against israel, hezbollah has upwards of 100,000 or more rockets. they have more people. they have a larger base to operate from with lebanon in general. so as israel is looking to their operations in gaza strip and rightly so, they definitely have at least one eye watching the border to the north very closely because they are concerned about that threat and it is significant. >> harris: just to reiterate. hezbollah is a smaller fighting force. did you mean hamas? >> yes, hamas is a smaller fighting force. >> harris: they've already seen some of those rockets and some of that firing and had to evacuate areas near the northern border on the israeli side to get citizens away from there. if it becomes a second front and now being talked about with almost not an if by when if iran gets into this even more. we're already at war with iran when it comes to protecting our troops. they've taken 25 shots at our bases. >> absolutely. in fact, i was talking to some of my sources in iraq this morning saying they haven't been attacked in iraq or syria for over 900 days and now becoming more of a daily routine at least being alerted something could be incoming. we have a lot of questions we need to answer about our purpose in the middle east and why we really need to be there and expose our forces to this level of risk given this changing situation. >> harris: that's interesting. colonel davis told me something similar yesterday saying we should have pulled them out when former president trump was ready to do that a couple years ago and certainly we would want to do that now. what happens if we pull our forces back now to protect them? >> most certainly there be will a public relations campaigning talking about from hamas or hezbollah or other organizations in the middle east and maybe nations saying they drove us away. but i would argue the fact that we really never needed to be there in the first place. syria, we're there, we're not congressionally authorized to be there. we are not there at the invitation of the syrian government. iraq we're at the invitation at the iraqi government but yet to see a true strategy or purpose to our constant presence through both of those two countries. right now when our soldiers are at risk at the small air fields and outposts time we reassess why we're really there and accomplishing what we say we're accomplishing. >> harris: we say you fight the war over there so you don't have to fight it here. we may need them here. i want to talk about the hits and targeting they are doing of u.s. military women in iraq. a pair of drones targeted a base where americans are stationed. no injuries or damages reporting so far. 25 attacks on u.s. forces in iraq and syria since october 17th. since october 17th they've hit us that many times. 24 service members injured and one american contractor has been killed. defense secretary lloyd austin with this just last hour. let's watch. >> we've taken a number of steps to make sure we increase our force protection posture. we've deployed a number of assets into the region as well. we've been clear, president has been clear and i have been clear, vice chair, that if that -- if this doesn't stop, then we'll respond and so we remain -- we maintain the right to respond. we have the capability to do that and we'll respond at a time and place of our choosing. >> harris: do you have confidence in that? >> i don't because like you said, 25 attacks since the 17th. and we sent a couple fighters to drop a couple bombs in two locations in syria and went home. that's it so far. i fear that our lack of true response sends a big message and will continue to emotion bolden all those who want to attack our 19 outposts throughout the middle east right now. i don't see the value in us being there and risking our soldiers given this change in the situation. >> harris: it's interesting. i know i grew up military so i see the world through that lens somewhat. but the job of the commander-in-chief is also military related. i wonder how much this white house is listening to its generals and its colonels tell him some of the same things i've had two colonels in a row tell me. leadership in the military would understand the dangers of that. i just can't make sense of why, when you mention the word value, that maybe it's not attached in the same way to our military fighting men and women to the president. at least he is not acting congruently to that. f.b.i. director christopher wray with this warning just a few minutes ago. >> on top of the home grown violent extremists we cannot do not discount the possibility that hamas or another foreign terrorist organization may exploit the current conflict to conduct attacks here on our own soil. >> harris: colonel. your reaction. >> my first reaction is that we are in a four front war. the biggest front we have that's the greatest risk now is our southern border. we can talk about israel, ukraine, china, taiwan, but if we don't secure our homeland first, nothing else will matter. we've left our borders open for years now and millions of people have flooded across. numerous chinese national, single male fighting age have come across that border and moved throughout the united states. if we don't consider ourselves under attack in some way from what i call an immigration invasion, we could wake up to some very bad things happening within our own borders. we need to focus there first and again bring some of these people back from the middle east and make sure our homeland is secure. >> harris: america first has some have said and run for office and won. one last question. we have a movement afoot in this country that seems to be supporting the terrorists of hamas. how concerned are you about it? >> i'm concerned about it because i think it goes, one, it goes back to the lack of education in many areas about what the palestinians are, what hamas is and the relationship to israel and general knowledge about what the middle east means. i think a lot of these folks are being used as storm troopers and protestors you could say. my concern turns, i guess, focused more on the fact that as these people continue this kind of protests, i suspect they could quickly turn violent and that's going to -- they could potentially target specifically the jewish population of the united states and that's the real extremism we need to identify. >> harris: you are hearing it and seeing it on the signs. they don't pull punches on that. lieutenant colonel, thank you very much for being in "focus" always. >> thank you, harris. >> harris: want to keep the hostages in focus. more than 230 men and women, children, grandmothers, you know, are still being held by the hamas hostage taking serial killers as i call them. here are a few of their faces. their posters are hanging in many cities across america and the world. when you see them, stop for a moment, take just a short while to make sure that they are secured wherever they are hanging that you see them. and say a prayer. people have been taking them down. the activists, artists behind this effort are asking for your help. i had the two artists on this program in the last week. download and print from their website and post images in your own community, kidnapped from israel. a moment to tell you their names. god bless them all. >> there will convenient multiple anti-israel rallies saying death to jews. >> they trapped jewish students in the library. this is 2023, not 1942. this is new york, not nazi europe. >> in order to be safe on campus you see berkeley, i need to hide my jewish identity. >> when i see my fellow students turning a blind eye to the blatant anti-semitism on campus i do not feel safe. >> harris: this is new york city, not nazi europe. it's happening in america. we said we wouldn't let this happen again. jewish students are some of america's premier university students and they are living in fear. anti-semitic hate sweeping across college campuses in our nation. the list of schools holding anti-israel protests grows every day. more than 100 columbia university professors have now signed a letter defending students who voice their support for the hamas terrorists. at yale the campus newspaper is accused of censoring a pro-israel editorial. apparently removing it for what it called, quote, unsubstantiated claims that hamas terrorists had raped women and beheaded men. you have to see the videos. the killers were wearing gopros, so they captured those images themselves. at cornell university the f.b.i. investigating multiple threats made against the school's jewish community, campus police locking down the center for jewish living and the biden white house stopped short of calling any of this extremism. >> does president biden think the anti-israel protestors in this country are extremists? >> we've been clear when it comes to anti-semitism. there is no place. >> does president biden look at these protests on college campuses and think it's nice to see that the country's youth are so involved or does he think the next generation is doomed? >> here is the thing. there is no place for hate in america. no, no, no, i'm telling you. there is no place for hate in america. >> harris: whenever she says here's the thing, brace yourself. griff jenkins. she couldn't just answer that question with yes we're against it. it had to have a paragraph of whatever that was. >> she has to acknowledge, as she did that anti-semitism is exploding at college campuses across the country especially at ivy league schools like yale, harvard, columbia and cornell. can you imagine paying $60,000 a year to go to cornell where jewish students are being threatened with social media postings like this? jewish people need to be killed. if you see a jewish person on campus, follow them home and slit their throats. governor hochul had to go to the cornell campus yesterday to deliver this message to those making the threats. >> if you are going to engage in these harmful actions, hate crimes, breaking our laws, you will be caught and you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. >> it comes after the cornell professor called the october 7th hamas massacre exhilarating. one student said she appreciates governor hochul's efforts but still feels threatened. >> even with police it is still frightening. we're trying to go about our daily lives and continue to be proud and stay strong as our jewish selves but it is still scary. >> remarkable at yale the campus newspaper censoring a pro-israel students by removing factually accurate sections about the hamas actions. the white house is directly engaging but they are including anti-semitism with islamaphobia. we'll see also one last thing governor hochul is speaking to new yorkers to say and see if she has more to say about protecting jewish students. >> harris: we are going to work to bring some of what governor hochul just said moments ago. you are right to point that out. it has just started now. griff jenkins, thank you very much. i want to show everybody a little bit more of peter doocy continuing to press the white house press secretary karine jean-pierre on the reluctance to call anti-semitism extremism. when the biden white house does not hesitate to use that label for what it calls maga republicans. just watch. >> we hear you guys don't talk about extremists all the time usually about maga extremists, what about the protestors making jewish students feel unsafe on college campuses. are they extreme? >> i've been very clear we are calling out any form of hate. any form of hate. it is not acceptable. >> harris: well, check this out. >> extreme maga members of the republican caucus. thieves are members who have promoted violent members. maga house republicans. extreme house republicans they are marching us toward a reckless and damaging government shutdown. what we have seen from extreme republicans actions does not help. >> harris: wow. joining me now republican congressman mike gallagher of the great state of wisconsin, member of the house intelligence and armed services committees and iraq war veteran. thank you for being with me. what is your reaction to the white house press secretary there? >> well, the standard seems to be that if you vote republican you are an extremist. but if you are a pro-hamas protestor, you are just a social justice warrior in service of a noble cause. this is very dangerous. i do think increasingly we will see members of the far left or the democratic base try to pressure the biden administration into reducing its support for israel. it's important for us to understand that while israel may be our closest ally in the middle east, hamas has allies here in america and they seem to be concentrated on college campuses. the same campuses who deny conservative speakers are organizing pro-terrorist movements. the faculty members who profess to be our moral superiors are encouraging it. the tragedy of it. we paid colleges to prop gainedize our children against our values and allowed the social justice virus to incubate and it's spilling over to the rest of society. at a minimum university presidents should speak out in defense of their jewish students. they cannot allow this form of anti-semitism to take hold. at a federal level we should be taking common sense steps to expose the hypocrisy. so, for example, the same university faculty and students who are talking about israel as a colonizer have no qualms about the universities investing in china, for example. the dichotomy of the oppressor and expressed does not expend to the victims of far left regimes like china. you don't see any campus radicals marching for uighurs subject to a genocide in china. >> harris: that's really important to point out. the muslims in china, the uighurs, who we know are tortured. women raped, so that they are forced to have the babies outside of their own belief system and race. to make them succumb to be different and the men are forced, from what i've read to watch that happen. i want to give you a last word on that and we have breaking news and i want your reaction to as well. >> it's horrific and listen, my daughters are only 3 and 1. i don't have to think about college for a long time now. a lot of parents are asking themselves why they are paying, 20, 30, 50, 60 grand a year for something like this. it dilutes from higher education. we need our col