Moments ago Secretary Blinken speaking about the horrifying photos he was shown by the Prime Minister in netanyahus office today of babies who were murdered and burned. Its hard to find the right words. Its beyond what anyone would ever want to imagine, much less actually see and god forbid experience. A baby, an infant riddled with bullets. Soldiers beheaded, young people burned alive in their cars or in their hideaway rooms. I could go on, but its simply depravity in the worst imaginable way. And the secretary confirming that in addition to traveling to jordan and meeting with palestinians there, the president of the Palestinian Authority and king of jordan, he will also travel to Qatar A Country that in the past has been able to influence hamas to the uae, to egypt and to saudi arabia. Its our determination and that of israel as well that there not be a second front or a third front, and we are working as hard as we can, working with other partners in the region to try to ensure that thats the case. Qatar and some of these other countries are also thought to have influence with hamas and they would be involved in israeli and u. S. Efforts to try to negotiate the release of american and other hostages. The number of hostages is now at least 150, including americans. An israeli Spokesman Says the location of some hostages has now been identified. And the stakes are rising even higher this hour and every hour that House Republicans are struggling to find a new speaker as Congress Faces questions over how to respond to the israeli, hamas war as well as ukraine, and other priorities. Right now lawmakers are huddling Behind Closed Doors attempting to find 217 votes for one of them to take the gavel. Joining us now from tel aviv, Josh Lederman whos been speaking with distraught israeli families, families of Hostage Victims and others. So glad youre there. Tell us what theyre telling you. Reporter well, andrea, this was expected to be a fairly brief meeting that Secretary Blinken would have with these families of americans who are now believed to be held hostage in gaza strip, but we are told that Secretary Blinken spent about 40 minutes with them. He heard one by one from them, their families stories about what they know about their loved ones. As he tried to explain with whatever level of detail he can right now what the u. S. Government is trying to do along with their israeli counterparts to bring them home. We heard from one woman, abby ahn who has five relatives held hostage in gaza. They were apparently captured by Hamas Terrorists, ranging from an 80yearold woman with a Heart Problem to a 13yearold with special needs. Almost to a tee, all of the americans that we heard from today said that they left this meeting convinced that the u. S. Is doing everything within its power, which is a limited power right now, of course, to try to bring them home. They said Secretary Blinken did not give them a whole lot of detail about whats taking place behind the scenes with the israelis, the egyptians, the qataris and others due to the sensitivity of that, but they came away very convinced that no stone is being left unturned. I want you to hear from one of these americans, ruby chen, his 19yearold son is serving in the Israeli Military, was serving on the israeli side of the border with the gaza strip now believed to be inside gaza, and he told me what he knows about where his son is right now and what blinken said about efforts to bring him home. Take a listen. After 90 hours of fighting in the state of israel, i think israel has found most of the citizens that were left in the field, so it could be reasonable work assumption that he is not in the state of israel as we speak. The Secretary Of State, of course, cannot go into details exactly what they are doing, but it sounds like they have been turning every corner and to find ways to make this end as soon as possible. Reporter and andrea, i also asked these families what their message is to israels government about whether it should carry on with potentially impending major Ground Incursion into the gaza strip while they have relative who is are ostensibly in gaza. They said this is a dilemma. They dont know exactly how the u. S. Government or the Israeli Government should approach that, but they want to see israel do everything it can to bring them home safely. Josh lederman, thank you so much. Back with us again this hour is ali velshi in ashkelon, israel, north of the gaza strip. What do we know about the leaflets that the Defense Forces are dropping in gaza . Are they telling people to get out . Reporter yeah, so theres two things going on. One is theres no electricity. Theres no internet, very sketchy internet. If you have power, to be able to power up the internet, so communications are largely down in gaza. For two reasons, one is for real humanitarian reasons to warn people theres bombing coming. This isnt at the Ground Incursion. This is about the air raids and missiles coming in from the sea, to warn people in those areas and in response to the fact that hamas had said if you fire on anyones home without warning, theyll kill one hostage for every home that is hit. It is believed that there are leaflets dropped by israeli jets into particular areas, written in arabic which are warning people that there is going to be an attack on the area and that they should try and get out. Right now about 300,000 people are outside of their homes, in some cases its because their homes have been hit or have been bombed. In other cases, its because theyre getting out in preparation or anticipation of their places getting bombed or the Ground Offensive. These leaflets are warnings about missile incoming missiles, not about the Ground Invasion. Obviously thats a very different story given the size of gaza. If the Ground Invasion comes in, im not sure how much use leaflets are going to be. Right now those people cant get anywhere. Secretary blinken was asked about a humanitarian corridor or things to do. His answer was indistinct. He said were working on that to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe but theres one unfolding right behind us, andrea. Very briefly, theres no place they can go. For many of them theres no exit, the Border Crossing has been up and down. Correct. Reporter theres some talk of Nebulous Negotiations with egypt about what to do, for the moment nobody can get out of gaza. Ali velshi, thanks so much. Joining us now retired admiral james stavridis. Secretary blinken made it clear this morning with netanyahu that the u. S. Is with israel no matter what happens, that they will be as long as america exists, he said, there will be an israel. That said, for all of the solidarity he also emphasized a different message, a message that the depravity, the savagery weve seen come from the hamas attack is warning that we have our moral center and to try to minimize i think the trancelation would be minimize the civilian casualties. How do you do that with the intensive bombing, with the Ground Assault in an urban setting to say nothing of rescuing the hostages. Lets pick up what ali and you were discussing a moment ago, which is wheres the exit . And right now none exists. I think a kind of rough comparison is syria during the civil war there. 21 Million People inside syria. Ultimately 7 Million People de it to an exit, and an awful lot of them ended up in turkey. I thinkgypt in the end is going to play theol of turkey here,nd there will be immense pressure on the egyptians. A lot of finance offering, probably from the saudis, uae, United States will help egypt deal with this flow. I think thats where this will go because a crucial step for the Israeli Military frankly is to get the civilians out of the way so they can deal with hamas. Until they can open an exit, that task is very hard. So lets hope we can see some progress in the negotiations with egypt. I bet thats front of mind for Secretary Blinken. And there are a lot of innocent palestinians in gaza who do not support hamas who have been terrorized by their own government, elected in 2006, 2007, no election since then, but israel says and ive heard their spokespeople saying, their military spokespeople from the idf saying were at war, when asked why are you laying siege, and the answer is were at war. Why would you give fuel to the enemy. Theyre not going to pass it on to their own people. The israelis and ive operated with them for many, many years. Theyre very toughminded when it comes to combat operations, and i think that kind of attitude is consistent with what ive seen from the israelis over the years. I think there will be growing International Pressure thats going to force them to bend on some aspects of that. And again, its tied to creating an exit so you can get the civilians out. Then that Siege Strategy starts to make more sense in terms of the conflict. Second point here, andrea, Worth Mentioning is what will happen when the israeli army comes crashing through, and there are active firefights in this region. That level of Collateral Damage to the civilians is going to be much higher, much more dangerous even than a lack of fuel, a lack of electricity. So its dark times ahead in gaza, frankly. All the more reason to come up with a coherent plan to get the civilians out of the place. Admiral stavridis, as always, thank you. You bet. And joining us now is democratic congresswoman Debbie Wasserman schultz who has just returned from visiting the region including israel. You were there, you were in saudi arabia i think when the fighting started and then were immediately in israel. What did you learn from your meetings with Prime Minister netanyahu and other leaders as to what their game plan is now that they have theyre slow in responding to a Surprise Attack of such tremendous dimensions. The most chilling thing that i learned from the Prime Minister, from other israeli leaders was, a, we have to remember that hamas hamass entire existence, even in their charter, is focused on the eradication of israel, and the elimination of the jewish people, and in this region, in israel, the comparison that has be made per capita to our 9 11 was emphasized. The equivalent population wise of as if 40,000 americans had died in 9 11 and 4,000 taken hostage. But more importantly, andrea, this was perpetrated by israels neighbors. They are right next to each other. The absolute necessity and the ever present danger and risk for israelis and their safety is constant, and so making sure that this is not about avenging death. This is about ensuring that hamas is eliminated, that the threat to the World Population and civilization really comes down to that is essential. What happens next . Theyve got the military power without regard to human life, palestinian life, if they want to, they have the power, those tanks can go in, and they can eliminate the hamas leadership. In our meetings with i should just point out that john kirby has Just Announced that now the death toll for americans is 27. Yeah, in our meetings both with idf, Israeli Military leaders and elected leaders, they were very clear that they will abide by the rules of war. And they are focused on rescuing hostages, on making sure that they can target hamas and focus on their eradication, but unfortunately as has been said many times, hamas uses their own people as human shields. They take hostages intentionally so that more loss of life is they risk peoples lives so that they can further perpetrate their goal of killing jews and eliminating israel. And so when youre dealing with that, israel has a much more complicated, much more concentrated situation, but they have to remain focused on eliminating the threat that hamas poses to their people and their very existence. Do they have any real hope of getting the hostages out from your conversations there . Of course theres always hope and theres no you know, theres no intelligence entity better than israels aligned with ours, obviously there were failures here and those like in the aftermath of 9 11 are for another day, but they will have to focus on trying to get the hostages out while at the same time eliminating the threat that hamas poses. Thank you so much, congresswoman. Thank you. Were going to go to the white house now and john kirbys briefing. And were going to try the best we can to meet it. I would encourage any american citizen in the need of assistance to please complete the intake form that you can find on travel. State. Gov. Its very simple. Go right to that site. There is an as best i can form. Fill it out. It helps the State Department process these requests. It also helps us get a sense of what the scope of the need is, and i would refer you to state on that. Im sure you guys are going to ask me that. I dont have hard figures handy with me now. We do know there are certain american citizens that want to go. Its all available through the State Departments website, and id encourage them to go look at that. Thanks for taking my question. Gazas main power plant has run out of fuel, the humanitarian situation there is becoming quite dire. Im wondering if there have been any communications about allowing shipments of food, fuel, electricity to help lessen civilian casualties and suffering there . Yes, there have been ongoing conversations with our israeli counterpart the about the need for humanitarian assistance. I have a couple of questions on american hostages. Is it still the case that the administration doesnt know anything about the condition of the american hostages and is the number still believed to be less than a handful . Yes and yes. And i know youve been pretty open about the fact that information about the hostages is very hard to ascertain at this moment. The limited information that you do have, is that coming mainly from the israelis and the qataris or is there another source of information . The families too. I mean, as i mentioned yesterday, some of these families actually saw their loved ones being abducted and taken away. So they have been a significant source of information as well. Just one other quick thing. The assumption that the hostages may not necessarily be in one place, was there specific intelligence to point the administration to not make that assumption, or is that based on Something Else . I wont speak about specific intelligence matters, but it is a common tactic in the hamas playbook to break up hostages and move them in rounds sometimes in small groups. We have nothing to indicate to us that they would follow a different set of protocols, but i cant stand here before you and prove to you that is exactly whats happening. We have to in order to think about our policy options, you have to make some assumptions, and we cant rule that out as a possibility. Thank you. John, what is the status of the 6 billion that iran was set to have access to . Its still sitting in the qatari bank, all of it. Every dime of it. Is an agreement now to in essence withhold it from iran should they come asking for it . None of that money has been spent, and i have no updates to provide today. Was a decision to reach a quiet understanding about whether or not it would be accessed by iran made because of the attack or political pressure . Im not going to talk about diplomatic conversations One Way Or Another, ed. What i can tell you is every single dime of that money is sitting in a qatari bank. And also remind because in certain audiences, inconvenient facts are easy to forget. The regime was never going to see a dime of that money, and this account although its moved from South Korea To Qatar was set up by the Previous Administration for this exact purpose. I think it was back in 2018 the former Secretary Of State mike pompeo actually talked in quite some detail about how this money and these accounts could only be used for humanitarian purposes and that there was going to be oversight. Weve done nothing different. It is the same process. All weve done is move that funds from south korea where for some technical reasons it wasnt accessible, to qatar where it is more accessible. All that said, none of it has been accessed by iranian by iran at all, and even if they had accessed it, it wouldnt go to the regime. It would go to approved vendors that we approved to go buy food, medicine, and medical equipment, agricultural products, and ship it into iran directly to the benefit of the iranian people. Let me ask you one other, has the United States independently verified the photos released by the israeli Prime Ministers twitter account today showing the images of dead children. I dont think were going to be in the business of having to validate or approve those images. Theyre coming from the Prime Minister of israel, and we have absolutely no reason to doubt their authenticity. Followup on