♪ ♪ tonight on all in -- >> i'm now very close. we could bring some of these hostages home. >> a potential deal for hostages. >> it's not going to be done until it's done. >> tonight, the delicate negotiation going on in israel, it will take some time to get some of the hamas hostages home. then, the latest on the gag order against the ex president as authoritarianism keeps spreading beyond trump. >> i will rain hell on washington, dc. plus, the reason why the polls are so tight and why inflation just ain't what it used to be. >> we went to go buy a turkey today. it was $90 for a turkey! when all in starts right now. ♪ ♪ ♪ good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. we are having some big news tonight. it has been 45 days since the october 7th hamas attack on israel, which precipitated the nearly constant bombardment of gaza by the israeli army and a nearly full scale ground invasion. and today at this hour there is a glimmer of hope that some of the over 200 hostages can be returned and the fighting can come to an end, at least temporarily. right now, as of this moment, the israeli government is convening late into the night over a potential deal brokered by the government with assistance from the united states, brokered with qatar, with assistance from the united states to three some 200 hostages who have been in hamas custody since the attack on october 7th. we should stress that things are still in flux. we do not know exactly what a deal will look like if and when it materializes, though many of the parties to it indicate it was close. there have been reports in the media the discussions involve hamas releasing about 50 israeli hostages, primarily women and children, in exchange for 150 palestinian political prisoners in israeli custody, also women and children. nbc news has also learned the deal might include permission for the red cross access to the remaining hostages in gaza, access they have so far been denied, though they -- socked it out. the deal may also involve what is really prime minister benjamin netanyahu calls a pause in the war, possibly for five days, to facilitate the prisoner and hostage swaps. again, nothing is confirmed until we hear directly from the parties. if a deal is reached reached, it is subject to review by the israeli supreme court. top of this deal and then mounting pressure on the government of netanyahu, including protests outside his home. there have also been mounting calls to get more humanitarian aid for palestinians into gaza, and scrutiny over the increasing civilian death toll there. civilian death tollso far, then 14,000 dead in gaza, including 5000 children. that is according to health officials there. although those health officials were unable to even keep that tally through part of that period. the past few weeks there have been reports on negotiations for a hostage deal falling apart at the last minute, including one indicating that netanyahu had rejected a deal for a cease-fire, a five-day cease-fire in exchange for a release of some of the hall hostages in the early days of the war. now, the politics here are not straightforward. they are complicated. some hard-line members of netanyahu's far-right government oppose the current deal as well. but from what we know tonight does not appear as though there is enough internal resistance to stop such a deal. again, we must stress this all remains in flux. we are watching minute by minute to see what happens, as i imagine so many folks in israel whose family members are held right now, in those in gaza are as well. netanyahu has made it clear the israeli military intends to resume its bombardment of gaza following a temporary pause that might be struck in a deal, noting he believes israel remains at war with hamas, and multiple members of the government has said the utter destruction of hamas is the only instate they will accept the end of this conflict. still, the release of any hostages, or even a brief pause in the bombardment of gaza for 45 days, is honestly probably the first real break of hope. there were a few hostages released earlier but the first break of hope and the possibility of something other than death and destruction in what has been an unremitting dark six weeks. noga tarnopolsky, independent journalist reporting from journalism -- jerusalem, including new york magazine. you've been covering this very closely, particularly the dynamics around family members of hostages and the government. there is a very late night convening of the cabinet to assess the deal. do you know anything about what is happening? >> yeah, good night from here, chris. we know that minutes ago the israeli government did vote to pass the deal and it was not unanimous and netanyahu's most extreme right ministers including i think one or two from his own party did not support it. but out of the 38 minister government it past comfortably. they are expected to be very limited appeals to the supreme court presented even tonight. right now, at 3:00, 4:00 in the morning, and those appeals will be against specific names of palestinian prisoners who are going to be published in the coming minutes,, those that will be exchanged. and family members of the victims, those people have the right to appeal specific names. ironically, the right-wing organizations who were hoping to appeal against this whole decision said it was illegitimate elevated for doing a law that netanyahu himself passed prewar. >> right. >> when he was trying to do his traditional overhaul. >> this is the times reporting on this on the possible palestinian prisoners who might be included in such a deal saying that negotiations the release of israeli women and children held hostage in gaza in exchange for palestinian women, the most recent arrests -- minors held in israeli prisons. many of the most recent arrests came during rates across the israeli west bank where protests and violence have surged including attacks and palestinians by israeli settlers. israel has said the rest are part of a carrier counterterrorism move, have warned that palestinian detainees are held without gazan or even subject to torture. it sounds like mostly would be women and children themselves. is there any additional reporting about the pause aspect of this, about there being some sort of cessation of hostilities for some period of time? >> there is. and as you said, we should underline how complicated this is. the understanding that i have here is that the initial batch of israeli hostages to be released counts, as you said, about 50, but they are not going to be released all on thursday. they're going to be released at about the pace of ten a day over four or five days. what hamas is promising is that if israel then extend the pause, it will search for more children in particular. it will search for more. israel has about 240 hostages. so the release of 50 would still leave 190 israelis or, i want to emphasize this, foreigners captured in israel, tourists, agricultural workers, aid workers, you name it. these people are not -- israel his said any non-israeli citizens are not counted in exchange for the palestinian prisoners. but these are all counted as israeli hostages taken from israeli territory. so i think that if the deal goes ahead and it proceeds well, what we are seeing is at least five days of a truce that i think will include also the cessation of israelis by drone activities over gaza, which leads to a lot of questions about what hamas is planning to do during that time and the plans to dangle this possibility of further hostage releases over several days, ideally for it to try and change this truce into a permanent cease-fire. >> let me just say that, you just had this one not only views anything they don't know, but nbc news now confirming in reporting that the israeli cabinet as, as noga was just saying, past the -- 38 ministers, a majority approve this deal. again, the contours of the deal are not public or written down anywhere. so we are still sort of figuring it out based on reporting. but the deal has been approved, it was not unanimous unanimous. some of the more far-right members of that government, including some members of netanyahu's likud party as well. the prime minister's office, the israeli government in the meetings just ended. this is the prime minister's office. the decision on the outline of the hostage deal passed by a majority of votes. that's what we have. we have approval, it seems. we have understanding of the basic contours of this deal, particularly about the sort of attenuated release of hostages in exchange for cessation of hostilities. i guess my final question, what political discourse around this has been like? obviously i can imagine right now family members of the hostages in this unbelievable intense and difficult period right now of wondering, is their loved one going to be one of the ones? >> that's right. the word for this is heartbreaking. it's heartbreaking. there have been aspects that have been disgraceful with some of netanyahu's ministers attacking his family, screaming you don't have a non-monopoly on pain, in this sort of thing. i have to tell you that, again, assuming this deal goes through, as you say, assuming you go through smoothly, what we're talking about is the israeli government and very few days finding itself in a squeeze organized by hamas in which either its spends military operations for longer or it has to look at close to 100 israeli families in the face and say yeah, your loved ones are still in gaza, and we're starting to bomb again. >> all right, noga tarnopolsky, always fantastic to get your perspective. i appreciate you staying up to this ungodly hour. thank you very much. >> thank you, chris. david remnick, of course, the editor of the new yorker. he's been writing about the -- and ayman mohyeldin has been the host -- and has lived in gaza especially during the 2014 war. they join me now. ayman, let me just start with you, your reaction. obviously the deal itself, and it's contours have been reported in the last few days didn't does look like the israeli government has proved it. nothing is done until it's done but it looks like it might happen. >> yeah, and i think for those of us who have been reporting on the negotiations, this started on october 8th, to be quite frank. so the truth is that the contours of the agreement have been ebbed and flowed, depending on who was gonna be released. at one point it's was gonna be the foreigners, all the israeli civilians, or non israeli, soldiers i should say. so the idea that the negotiation has been on the table for weeks now, it is very safe to say, this did not come out of anywhere and i think the real question going forward is what is changing in the calculation of the israeli cabinet? what is changing from the israeli military leaders who said it is not time how these are negotiations? a couple of weeks ago before the ground offensive, a similar proposal was put forward to the israeli cabinet, i should say to the israeli prime minister from the qatar mediators, and their position was not yet. they felt that hamas had not been genuine or sincere, but the release of the hostages but they also felt the pressure in the price that hamas had paid for what it did on october 7th was not adequate. it begs the question now, as we begin to understand the calculation of the prime minister, why he decided to accept this, so as noga well, saying the internal dynamic dynamics, it's what happening in gaza. >> david, in your reporting from israel and the west's with the west bank that you published in the new yorker, one of the things it's been so clear since the atrocity on october 7th and everything that has happened, is just the sort of brutal dark and implacable logic of reprisal in violence. seeing no off ramp. this parade of war and more death and destruction. this does, if it happens, at least signify the first opening for some kind of path that isn't just that. >> well, as noga can't tell you, with even greater experience and depth, the basic truth here is no one's going anywhere, no matter how this finally ends, there will be israelis, there will be gazans, there will be palestinians. and then what? so the question is, in short term and in the long term, what will prevail? will hatred prevail? will the urge for higher walls and bigger armies and create a rage prevail as politics in the middle east? or will there be some politics, both in gaza, if that's even possible in the term, and in the west bank and throughout the middle east, that finds some glimmer forward a reconciliation. today the new york times ran a piece about, was piece over possible in 2008 camp david and rent yet again, yet again through the details, narratives, and counter narratives of what happened then. but even greater and more complex problem is, what will happen the day after all this comes to an end? and that is the darkest, of deepest complexity, i would think. >> i want to follow up on that with you, ayman. but first, david, i want to just ask you about a contributor to your magazine who lives in gaza. i have been reading his stuff, vie in the new yorker and also just a remarkable guy, a poet, gradually syracuse university. he runs, the only english language library in gaza. he is a father of three. he was detained by israeli defense forces. you lost contact with him. >> here's what i know. >> please tell me. >> when i was in israel, thereafter, i was in contact with him, a 30-year-old poet with three children, a wife, and then extended family in gaza. he has lived all his life in gaza except when he was in the united states at syracuse university. it remarkable person, and he and his family who lived in northern gaza were headed towards the south, hoping to leave, hoping to go to rafah, which is at the southern end of the gaza strip. and along the way, he was apprehended by the israeli military for no seaming reason, and taken into custody with dozens of other palestinians. and according to my information, taken out of israel, taken to a military out spore outpost in negative, in the southern israel. he was there for two days, interrogated, and there are reports that he was beaten. i have not been able to speak with him. but my information, and i think this is absolutely true. he said he's been released and he is back in gaza, thank god, with his family. but, again, this is one very gifted poet. and there is relief in this. but of course, there are thousands and thousands of people who have been killed. thousands -- 1200 people have been killed in the most brutal way in israel. and so, the killing, the suffering is general. i hope the best for him and his family. that is one story in a much larger tragic picture. and, again, i think we have to start thinking about where this is going in terms of u.s. policy as well as israeli politics and palestinian politics as well. >> to talk to david's point, about the day after question, in some ways it's premature precisely for the reasons you articulated, i think almost unanimously across the board. almost all of israeli politics, with some exceptions, and particularly the unity government, they have said the destruction of hamas's and state that we will seek in this war. if there is a pause here, and it looks like there will be, that will be short of that. but then the question becomes do you continue that as the goal? is it an achievable goal? and if you achieve, it what comes after? >> so many good questions. those are enormous questions to sift through. but i will say this. i think this is why this one is so important. we are having a conversation. if you just listen to the story of musab and david talking about him, these are the stories the palestinians have lived with every single day under occupation. they don't get the international media attention. they're getting it now because of the warm because what is happening there. i think for us who have tried to answer what happened, to david's point, it requires an honest conversation about all of the parties involved in the conditions of life. what is, as you were saying, what happens the day after israel resumes military operations once that 200 plus hostages are released. >> hamas is not gonna do that precisely for the reasons you have enunciated. >> exactly. >> they are smart enough to know how this works. >> they're gonna they know how this works, they've been through this many times before. they're in games to be able to put the spotlight on the israeli government as a result of these are negotiations, and put them in a different corner to make about when this is gonna resume. but also, if you applied the logic of what has happened right now over the course of the past seven weeks, 46% of residential buildings and gaza have been destroyed. 50,000 people are killed. 5000 of them are children. what is the endgame? to what extent? are you prepared to kill 2.2 million palestinians to eradicate hamas? that is the fundamental question. because if there is no end in sight, there has to be some limit. and that's the problem why they're comments coming out of the american administration would say there are no red lines, that has become extremely problematic. >> to the final point to you, david -- >> i agree, i agree. but israel could not be expected to go on. first of all, there was a great delusion that somehow you could quote unquote shrink the conflict. that was the phrase used in israel, not only by netanyahu, but by naftali bennett and others. you shrink the conflict, empower hamas, quote unquote, privileges to work in israel and it will go away. and then you concentrate on the west bank. that was what is weakening the palestinian authority. and we just get from one year to the next, well, that was a delusion, a gigantic delusion. and this was netanyahu thought himself as the great winston churchill of israel. now that has been shattered. but also israel cannot be expected to live on its border with the threat is the experienced on a tour seventh either. so how do you, again, we're back to the original question, how can israel live in security, and how can the palestinians be given their dignity and eventually their statehood and their own security and their own personhood? and that has to occur because neither of these people are going anywhere. and they both deserve to live decent, secure lives, and have decent and secure politics. and that is a question of immense complexity. >> yeah and the only way, the only way that you get there is one step at a time. and it does seem like perhaps a first little step in the direction away from more violence and more death, and some good news for parties across this conflict. we are still waiting on the details from tonight, exactly what is in the hostage deal. we are gonna bring you those details as we have them available. but i want to thank david remnick and my friend and colleague ayman mohyeldin. thank you both. we'll be right back. ht back. in order for small businesses to thrive, they need to be smart, efficient, savvy. making the most of every opportunity. that's why comcast business is introducing the small business bonus. for a limited time you can get up to a $1000 prepaid card with qualifying internet. yep, $1000. so switch to business internet from the company with the largest fastest reliable network and that powers more businesses than anyone else. learn how you can get $1000 back for your business today. comcast business. powering possibilities. we are following that breaking news out of israel this hour. and we put at the top of the hour, the israeli government has approved a deal to secure the release of some hostages in custody. notably, a deal is not final. until the israeli supreme court signs off on it. and as our previous guest noga tarnopolsky was saying, that review is limited, somewhat ironical