Its good to be with you, im ana cabrera in for katy tur, and we are covering two major stories unfolding right now. Hamas says it has agreed to a cease fire and Hostage Deal Proposal from egypt and qatar. Though an israeli official tells nbc news that the framework is not what they had agreed upon with mediators. Well lay out what we know so far and what the white house is saying. But we begin this hour at the courthouse in manhattan, from a crime witness on the stand last week to Balance Sheets and ledger reports this afternoon, and Donald TrumpsHush Money Trial has taken a clear pivot today. Right now, Deborah Tarasoff is on the stand, the first Current TrumpOrganization Employee to testify. This morning, former Trump Organization controller Jeffrey Mcconney testified before the court and his crossexamination on the stand just wrapped a short time ago. What he revealed about the strange paper trail that followed the alleged Hush Money Payments to Stormy Daniels, and how much of it, if anything implicates donald trump directly. Theres a whole lot of drama in the courtroom before mcconney was sworn in. How close is donald trump to being put behind bars for his ongoing gag order violations. Well explain the most expolice explicit warning after donald trump was found in criminal contempt again today. Lets get into the testimony happening right now. And joining us from outside the courthouse is nbc News National correspondent, yasmin vossoughian. So bring us up to speed on whats happening right now in the courtroom . Reporter so, you just mentioned her, Deborah Tarasoff, she is a supervisor for accounts payable. She has been working for the Trump Organization since 2000. So 24 years. By the way, she is the first current employee for the Trump Organization to take the stand and testify. She still works for the Trump Organization. The way im seeing this, ana, is completing the circle with the whole process. Were talking about a lot of the paperwork being submitted for evidence, and how they came to make the payoff. We heard from another witness talking about the moneys, the 420,000, which im going to break down in a moment. Deborah tarasoff was responsible for cutting the checks, the subsequent checks paid out to Michael Cohen over one years time in january of 2017. She was the one that was responsible for getting that money, making sure the checks were then transferred to donald trump for signing. Either they went up to rhona graff, or they were fedexd to the white house, in Which Madeline would pick them up and have donald trump sign them. Only the accounts that were specifically for donald trump, ie, his personal accounts while he was in the white house were the checks that were sent to him to be subsequently signed off on. What is really interesting so far about the testimony is she talks about limit to which they needed Donald Trumps signature for checks. And what i mean by that is before 2016 and 2017, the limit was 2,500. Anything up to 2,500, donald trump needed to sign off on. Now she was saying in 2017, that number went up to 10,000. If a check was over 10,000, it needed to be signed off on by donald trump himself and or his sons, eric trump or don trump jr. If you remember from early testimony, the checks made out to Michael Cohen in 2017 were 35,000 a month. Much more than the 10,000 limit. The questions being answered by the Witnesses Today and the current testimony happening right now is did donald trump know who the money was going to. And did he understand the falsification of the records . What i mean by that is did he think they were legal expenses, in fact, a legal retainer, lets remember from earlier testimony, no retainer had been seen. Did donald trump think that this was, in fact, outstanding questions, but one thing to keep in mind here, once that retainer was up, once that 35,000 a month was up by the end of 2017, he no longer was paying Michael Cohen in 2017. That was a one year period in which he was paying him 35,000 a month. Thank you, well check back with you in a short time. Keep us posted on the highlights from the courtroom. Joining us is Criminal Defense Attorney and msnbc legal analyst, danny cevallos, and Criminal Defense Attorney and former senior staff at the manhattan d. A. s office, duncan levin. The first time they have seen the checks that were the reimbursements to Michael Cohen. They saw a check for 70,000. That was to pay him back for the months of january and february, those first installments of the reimbursement, so to speak. Im curious as to, first, ill start with you, duncan, how you see this latest witness, and how she fits into the big puzzle. Well, you know, we have spent the first half of this trial really focused on this conspiracy to violate the federal election laws. Thats what the first part of the trial was about. Now were moving into falsification of Business Records. You would expect it to be sort of the more boring phase. Thats what the charges are about. And it hasnt been. Its anything but. We are Hearing Testimony about checks being sent to the white house and him signing these things in the oval office. While its a little dry, the math here is really whats important. This document, these witnesses are actually more important for the document that just got in this morning than what theyre saying about the flow of funds. The math here is really important. There was 130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, 50,000 to a firm called red finch, which is really a company that the Trump Campaign hired to rig online votes, the polls before he was elected and ran for president. So thats 180,000. And theres handwriting, this document that was introduced today through the corporate controller has Allen Weisselbergs handwriting all over it, the former cfo of the Trump Organization, and he writes in it that it was gross ed up for taxes which means they doubled it. Thats damming for donald trump. What it shows is these were false. This was absolutely not a reimbursement for legal expenses. You would never gross up a reimbursement because it was coming as income, and so Michael Cohen presumably would have to pay income taxes on it. They doubled it. He lives in new york city, they said presumably youre going to have to double it for taxes. When you pay taxes, youre left with the money, 180,000. They threw in another 60,000 bonus for him, and thats how youre getting to the 420,000 number, divided by 12 month, youre at 35,000 a month. The falsification of the Business Records is apart from the math, and that is what the d. A. s office is going to argue. You got into a lot of the testimony we heard before the latest witness who took the stand. Its Deborah Tarasoff whos on the stand right now. Earlier we heard from jeff mcconney, the controller of the Trump Organization during the time that these payments were made to Michael Cohen, and he was the one who Allen Weisselberg was saying, you need to reimburse him for this amount, and he was passing down that message, and it was Deborah Tarasoff who was handling these checks. How important is her testimony to corroborate the bigger story . This is a witness who is not a marquee name but quietly is a very important witness. Look, this is classic white collar case. Youre going to have a lot of testimony thats dry. Not every witness is going to be fireworks. In fact, in these heavy document cases, the more documents you have, the more humans you need to authenticate documents and verify they are what they are, and that can be really really dry testimony. Were marching through that. Yet, this is somebody whos not only authenticating documents but describing a really chaotic world at the Trump Organization when it comes to signing checks and getting approvals. By the way, the process of getting approvals over a certain amount. Thats not too strange. What struck me as just a side issue is when trump was in the white house, hes getting fedex checks to approve. That seems like, i guess, as a citizen, i would rather he spend his time as president focusing on being president. Its a side issue. What this is appearing to show is as this case moves on, it appears doubtful that the prosecution is going to have much in the way of direct evidence where someone takes the stand and says donald trump told me to gross up these payments, falsify the Business Records, and he said it was because of the campaign. Thats not a problem for the prosecution. The prosecution uses Circumstantial Evidence and the jury can draw inferences from that evidence. Thats exactly what theyre doing here. Theyre not going to have that kind of direct evidence. Thats the way donald trump did business. He insulated himself. But the defense is pointing out on cross as you would expect them to that just because he may have signed documents, doesnt mean he was staring at them or scrutinizing them or that he was intensely involved. In fact, it was Allen Weisselberg you dealt with most of the time, yes, it was. These are end roads to show is that donald trump might have been the boss but he wasnt the Micro Manager as the prosecution is making him out to be. If it was donald trump who gave the stamp of approval by signing the checks, can you draw the direct line that he too was tied to the falsification of the Business Records . I think what the prosecution is trying to do is parallel two different cases. They have two cases in one. One is this conspiracy, david pecker, the national enquirer, Michael Cohen and donald trump, to show that donald trump had knowledge of it. Michael cohen wasnt acting alone, and now as they get into this phase of the trial, theyre just using inferences to show that donald trump knew about the falsification in the Business Records, he was signing the checks, knew it was 35,000, hes the kind of guy who wasnt just signing checks. He wants the checks to be coming to him. Presumably he had other things going on. He was spending time to sign 35,000 checks. He yearly knew what it was about. He had the knowledge of falsification by virtue of the fact he was signing the 35,000. The signing of the check was like the ultimate approval of an invoice, if he didnt want to sign the check, he didnt want to approve the invoice, he could write void on the check, and it seems like that is our understanding he has done in the past. Thank you both. Stay with us as we continue to follow whats happening in the courtroom. In this Hush Money Trial. But we also want to get an update on the Cease Fire Proposal that hamas says it agreed to and why israel says its not the same deal they agreed to. Were back in just 90 seconds. S. React to fastmoving markets with dynamic charting and a Futures Ladder that lets you place, flatten, or reverse orders so you wont miss an opportunity. E trade from Morgan Stanley nothing dims my light like a migraine. With nurtec odt, i found relief. The only Migraine Medication that helps treat and prevent, all in one. To those with migraine, i see you. For the acute treatment of migraine with or without aura and the preventive treatment of Episodic Migraine in adults. Dont take if allergic to nurtec odt. Allergic reactions can occur, even days after using. Most common side effects were nausea, indigestion, and stomach pain. Its time we all shine. Talk to a Healthcare Provider about nurtec odt from pfizer. vo if you have graves disease. Talk to a Healthcare Provider. And itchy eyes, the truth may be even more uncomfortable. People with graves could also get thyroid eye disease, or ted, which may need a different doctor. Find a ted Eye Specialist at isitted. Com. Were back with Breaking News out of The Middle East now, and hamas says they have tentatively agreed to a Cease Fire Proposal brokered by egypt and qatar. An official tells nbc news this is not the framework agreed upon by mediators. Israels war cabinet will meet tonight to discuss this proposal, and this announcement came hours after israel ordered 100,000 palestinians to evacuate rafah. Thats the southern part of gaza, signaling a Ground Invasion there could be imminent. Joining us now, Nbc News International correspondent raf sanchez. What do we know about the details of this possible deal . So the proposal that hamas says it agreed to would be a threephase deal. Each phase, 42 days. In that first phase, hamas would release 33 hostages from the so called humanitarian category. So that is women, children, the elderly, people with serious medical conditions, and israel would release around a thousand Palestinian Prisoners in exchange. Now, we should be really clear, ana, that is what hamas has agreed to. We dont at this point understand the scale of the discrepancy between what israel says it agreed to and what hamas says it agreed to. In just the last couple of minutes, we have had a statement from the Prime Ministers Office here in israel. They are saying while hamass proposal is far from israels necessary requirements, israel has agreed to send a delegation of negotiators. That suggests that the gaps here are not considered unbridgeable by israel. While there are discrepancy, there is something worth negotiating, Worth Continuing to try to get to a deal. At the same time, israel says the war cabinet has agreed unanimously to continue the Military Operation in rafah. Israel is saying it was simultaneously negotiating and fighting. Israel has been very clear that it sees the offensive in rafah, not just as a way of destroying hamass battalions but putting pressure on hamas in the cease fire negotiations. Earlier on today, israeli aircraft dropping leaflets over an area of eastern rafah, telling Palestinian Civilians get out. Israel is preparing to attack this area. That message intended for around 100,000 Palestinian Civilians, so this is not all of rafah where there are more than a Million People sheltering. At this point, Israeli Forces have not begun a Ground Offensive into rafah. An israeli official tells me they are waiting for the order to move in. They are also waiting to see how long it takes for the Palestinian Civilians to evacuate from the east of the city. It is possible, ana, if a deal can be reached, if these two proposals can be bridged, that would delay at least an Israeli Offensive on rafah, and the white house is clear, it sees a deal like that as the best way to head off an attack. Were talking about the rafah incursion, potential Cease Fire Deal and these are developing as we speak right now. Raf sanchez, come back to us as you get new information. Joining us is Msnbc National Security and Intelligence Analyst john brennan. Hamas says it has agreed to the deal. Israel is saying this isnt the deal we agreed to. What do you make of this dissonance . Its not surprising that there are some discrepancy here as we get closer and closer to a final deal for a cease fire, but theres a fair amount of brinksmanship and gamesmanship going on. This is complex. There are different components to a Cease Fire Deal, the military cease fire, the duration, what constitutes a violation, then theres the exchange of hostages for Palestinian Prisoners. When that will take place, how it will take place, and then the humanitarian assistance thats supposed to flow also while these other components are being implemented. I wouldnt be surprised if hamas took the last israeli proposal and made adjustments and announced they were accepting a proposal, trying to actually make it happen on their terms as opposed to the israeli t