-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com "outfront" next, israeli troops pushing deep into gaza. this as an israeli soldier is rescued. and hamas releases a new hostage video. we're going to speak to the family of one of the women in that video. plus, "outfront's" exclusive dispatches from gaza. tonight, an american doctor from colorado stuck there, tells us fights are breaking out, violence over food. also breaking this hour, the los angeles fire department releasing new details about what officials found when they arrived at matthew perry's home as the cast of "friends" breaks its silence this hour. and good evening. i am erin burnett. "outfront" tonight, the breaking news. this is the time for war. those are the exact words tonight from the prime minister of israel benjamin netanyahu as israeli troops and tanks advance deeper into gaza. there is more gunfire, more explosions. our reporting team hearing tonight, longtime israeli reporter of "axios" telling "outfront" that more than 10,000 troops have now crossed into the tiny 25-mile-long gaza strip. this is a major advance now putting israel's troops on the outskirts of gaza city, which is home to half a million people. israel claims it's not only killed dozens of hamas fighters over the past 24 hours but also managed to rescue one of its own soldiers. they say the private ori megidish was freed earlier today. but the other 238 hostages, the fate of how they are tonight held by hamas, we do not know. we simply do not know. we do know that there was video of three of them. they appeared in a short video that hamas released. we are choosing not to air it. but one of the women in it is ramon kirsch. and in a moment i'm going to speak to her sister-in-law who did watch that video and is now terrified about her safety. because, of course, the world has seen the horrific brutality that hamas unleashed. just today israel confirming that they have now found the remains of 23-year-old shawnee luke who was at the music festival when hamas attacked. her body was later seen in the back of the truck so her family had hoped she was a hostage. a dna sample taken from a fragment of a skull shows that that skull fragment was luke's. a fragment of a skull is all they have to even contemplate what that means is a crushing blow to their family. they had, of course, been holding out hope that she was actually a hostage in fwz. gaza right now, though, is being bombarded by israeli forces and all the hostages are there as well, according to the world health organization, there have been 82 attacks on fwz health facilities since this war began. at least 16 medical workers have been killed. we do not know how many innocent people have been killed in all of those strikes. but they are adding to a growing humanitarian crisis. today, cnn counted 59 trucks waiting to cross into southern gaza at the rafah border crossing. keep in mind, 59 waiting, not getting in. 455 trucks is what usually would go into gaza every single day. that's why you have people fighting over food, literally fighting over food. we're going to tell you more about that in a moment. our journalist ibrahim dahman has sent us new video about life right now inside the strip and his fears about dying. [ speaking in a global language ] we're going to have more from ibrahim coming up this hour. but first nic robertson is "outfront" live along the israel/gaza border. what is the latest that you're hearing on the ground tonight? >> reporter: yeah. we're hearing from israeli prime minister laying out why the country is at war, why the world should stand behind israel, why he won't have a ceasefire. the strikes into gaza have been very heavy in the last few hours. but this glimmer of hope that we're seeing further potential for more hostages to be released from captivity rescued from captivity. that hope really came alive today for the first time. >> reporter: for a moment they feared might never come. private ori megidish hugs her grandmother, reunited with her family, rescued by the idf after more than three weeks held hostage by hamas. a moment of hope, too, for families of other hostages. >> in some way, they are listening to us right now. please, please stay strong. >> reporter: but even as she met her family, hamas propaganda's three hostages they still hold seen here before their capture. the hamas video cnn has decided not to air, shows the women under apparent duress, blaming the prime minister for not calling a ceasefire to help get them released. netanyahu unrelenting in refusing hamas' pressure. >> just as the united states would not agree to a ceasefire after the bombing of pearl harbor or after the terrorist attack of 9/11, israel will not agree to a cessation of hostilities with hamas. >> reporter: inside gaza, israeli forces reinforcing that message, extending their incursion deeper into the enclave's densely populated neighborhoods. ground troops, according to the idf, calling in airstrikes on hamas strongholds. aircraft also dropping flyers, warning civilians their neighborhood's now a battlefield and to evacuate south. this civilian-looking vehicle didn't manage to escape, taking a direct hit from a tank. the idf say impossible to know if it contains civilians or terrorists. the mounting civilian death toll and deteriorating humanitarian conditions fueling international pressure on israel to call a ceasefire. netanyahu insisting his is a just war. >> it means making a moral distinction between the deliberate murder of the innocent and the unintentional casualties that accompany every legitimate war. >> reporter: as night falling, more and more of gaza's residents on the move, many in makeshift camps. all of them just hoping they'll see sun rise. and what the prime minister was telling and what the idf has been telling the people of gaza to do is to move south. and the prime minister indicating that there is an area designated a humanitarian corridor designated in the south of the country, in the south of gaza, rather, right next to the sea. but the question a lot of people are having right now, erin, is just how do they get here, what roads are the safe roads. they don't know what perils they are going to meet. the ground troops are on the ground now. and as that car found out today, a wrong turn can be deadly. >> absolutely. and, nic, obviously hearing those explosions impacts behind you, how would you say tonight is different, or, as we know, this is expanding as we speak. can you tell that from what you hear right now? >> reporter: earlier in the day, it was fighter jets dropping guided munitions on these pin-point targets that the soldiers are identifying on the ground. later this evening we saw what we believed were helicopters firing sort of more precision rockets, smaller explosives down onto targets right below them in gaza. now there's heavy artillery has just been rumbling away. sometimes one round every 20 seconds or so. but the detonations coming from a deep, deep penetrating detonations that are rumbling through here. it is clear that the military pressure is continuing on the people of gaza. and as all of this is going into northern gaza, it's really creating and pushing the people to try to move further south. erin? >> all right, nic, thank you very much in sderot right along that gaza border tonight. i want to go now to a foreign policy reporter, longtime israeli diplomatic reporter as well. we hear those artillery explosions. you heard nic talking about precision munitions dropped by helicopter as well. i know you've got new information on the operation in gaza. troop levels. what are you learning? >> good evening, erin. i think that right now the situation in gaza is that the israeli ground operation, you know, we heard in the last few days that it's expanding. i think it is sort of reached its height. meaning i'm not sure hamas already knows how many israeli soldiers are there. they're hiding in their bunkers. but i think that right now we are looking at much more than 10,000 israeli soldiers inside gaza. i would, my assessment, my estimate is that it's more than double that number. and i think we saw the israelis coming in from the north, both on the gaza beach but also more to the east. but now i think there are also israeli ground troops also coming to gaza from the center of the gaza strip. basically what the israelis are doing right now is they're encircling gaza city, they're stealing the outskirts of the dense urban areas. but i think in the next few days we will start seeing this much more dramatic incursion into gaza city. this is when this thing is going to get much more difficult. >> and, just to be clear, if you're saying that there's more than 20,000 troops, they're staying there, right? i mean, they're not -- it's not sort of like a wave in and out. this is a staying and adding? >> yes. this is not a raid, meaning, it's not that the forces will go out and, i don't know, 24 hours or 48 hours. this is going to take weeks. they're there to stay. they're there to stay for quite some time in order to start going into gaza city, into hamas strongholds. until now in the last few days since this ground operation started, there was not -- there were a few fire fights between israel and between the idf and hamas operatives. but, again, it wasn't a massive fight. we are in the next few days, we will go into the massive fight. this is the money time. this is the real difficult part. >> you did see the new video today of the three israeli civilian hostages together. we're not showing it, but we've seen, you've seen, i know. it also comes as the idf was able to rescue an idf soldier today. do you know anything about that? what are you able to tell us? >> i think that this is -- if you ask israeli officials right now about this operation, they will tell you one thing. they will tell you that this wouldn't have been possible without the ground operation. because now they have a lot of forces on the ground, they have much more intel that they can use within minutes to send troops here, to send troops to somewhere else. everything is on a very short order. and this is how they managed to do this operation. they got the hint, they got the clue, they got the lead. they sent soldiers and they managed to do it. >> barak, thank you very much. i appreciate it, sharing all of that new reporting. more than 20,000 israeli soldiers in gaza tonight with his reporting. and the three women in that new hostage video are daniel aloney, ramon kirsch, and elena trupenof. we have the sister-in-law of ramon kirsch. and she joins me now. i know you did watch this video. what is your reaction to it? >> you know, this video is another cause of heartbreak for me. because, on one hand, i can see my sister-in-law in that video. i can see she is alive in that video. but, on the other hand, that video was released by a terror organization that kidnapped my sister and her husband from their home, from their beds. and, so, i know that she was alive for that moment. i don't know if that video was edited. i don't know what's her status. i could see that in the video, she was not wearing glasses. so i know that she was probably not able to see in the past three weeks. she also looked very skinny. i've never seen her that thin. so i'm really concerned about her health. i also know that she takes daily medication, which i'm sure she's not getting because the red cross has not been allowed to visit the hostages and tell us about their well-being. so i'm really concerned for her health. i think she looks bad, and i really worry about her sitting there in some underground tunnel in gaza for who knows how long being held at gunpoint. >> i know you said you are aware when this was filmed, she would have been alive, and it gives you one moment of time. you don't know how she is now. but obviously you haven't had any proof of life until now. as the frground assault gets bigger and bigger, what are you feeling right snow? >> all i can say is that i hope that everyone who's making any type of decisions about what to do, what to do with the army, the people, what is the strategy, is seeing the pictures of our loved ones, the hostages, and that they are thinking about the hostages and thinking about what they can do to bring them back home as soon as possible. >> i know that there were some very forceful statements made against the prime minister benjamin netanyahu in this video. the woman who speaks that is addressing netanyahu directly. and i guess the word to describe it is with fury, with increasing fury she says you promised to release us all, free us all. then she begins screaming into the camera, now, now, now. it is important to say we do not know how willingly she is giving these remarks. we don't know how much of her statement may have been dictated by hamas. and obviously, the person saying -- you know, these aren't the words of your sister-in-law. what do you make of these statements, though, when you watch this part? >> you know, erin, just like you just said, we don't know who's making them say what they're saying. and the only thing that i know for certain is that there is a terror organization holding our loved ones at gunpoint. and so whatever it is that they release, whatever footage is released, i don't think it's credible, and i can't put my trust into whatever it is. i know that my loved ones who used to be free people, peaceful people, are being held captive and are being forced to be pawns in a game of war played by hamas. and, so, i see them use this propaganda for hamas. that's all i can see in that video. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. and, next, new details about u.s. forces under attack in the middle east, increasingly targeted by iranian-backed groups. is the u.s. going to respond? plus, exclusive dispatches from inside gaza from the people we follow closely that you now know including an aide worker. >> one simple rocket, just one rocket that hit a neighbor's home without warning. trump tearing into his former attorney general just hours after a judge reinstated his gag ororder. his s former whihite house lawyy cocobb is s my guest.. new tonight, targeting the united states. tonight, top u.s. officials are warning of an elevated risk of a bigger war. u.s. forces in iraq and syria have been attacked. they now say by iranian-backed groups at least 23 times since the hamas terror attack in israel october 7th. oren liebermann is "outfront" at the pentagon tonight. we hear about more of these every single day. how likely is it that the united states then has to respond, has to retaliate after nearly two dozen attacks? >> reporter: erin, the biden administration has certainly left that possibility on the table, although they're not going to predict how or if they will respond or in what matter. that part is up to them. but it's clear that these attacks have continued. 23 now since october 17th against u.s. forces in iraq and syria. you can see that map shows you the various locations. worth noting that some of those locations have been attacked multiple times. now, what's also important to note is that the u.s. struck two facilities in eastern syria to try to send a message to these groups not to continue attacking. and, yet, we've seen a half a dozen attacks since then. so that message of deterrence clearly not getting through in the way the u.s. would like it to. and that means the u.s. has to consider the possibility of another strike against these groups. but they have to weigh that against the possibility of a broader escalation in iraq and syria, which is very much something they're trying to avoid. the u.s. has tried to keep the conflict in gaza separate from what it's doing in other parts of the middle east, trying to draw a line there. but that line clearly not visible to other actors in the middle east who see it all as connected. >> oren liebermann, thank you very much. it's a sobering reality here. we have an israeli journalist who's reported extensively on hamas, the author of "getting to know hamas." he spoke with a senior hamas commander on the day of the terror attacks, and is familiar now to everyone who watches this show. shlomi, the israeli ambassador played these 45 minutes of to aror and slaughter that was all recorded on the camera of hamas operatives. and they recorded the israeli ambassador saying very specifically because they thought it would be a great recruiting tool. they want it played. they think it will help recruiting. is it? >> yes. i think israel knows that if they show the video that was taken by the terrorist camera, it will show the cruelty of the hamas, of the people of gaza that just came to the -- in israeli settlements. but i think that one more thing that we have to take for consideration, that hamas was surprised the success they had on october 7th. and now they are planning on how to get out from this mess. and by releasing the videos, the videos of the hostages. we talked about it last week. the hostages kept by hamas, by jihad islam. and we have hostages kept a hold by families in gaza strip. the israeli soldiers, the idf and the shin bet succeeded to release yesterday it's a proof that there are more than one soldier kept by the families in gaza, inside gaza. the problem now is the negotiation with hamas and jihad islamic. and this is the tough negotiation. >> so, we knew there was a video released today of the three women. and they don't look well' cording to the sister-in-law of one of them with whom i just spoke. she said her sister-in-law does not look well. we're not airing the video. but you have a woman in it pleading, screaming for their release. this is what's on it. israel, obviously, has rejected a ceasefire in exchange for any hostages. we know that. what does hamas do if videos like this don't work as they see it? what do they do, then? >> well, this is only the beginning of videos. it seems to me that hamas is under pressure, but not desperate because they have a weapon, a weapon against the israeli tanks and the israeli airplane. they have more than 200 hostages. and the video of hostages, now it's kind of telling, blaming or begging to netanyahu, release us. and the other video will be more cruel. i'm sure that as far as they feel the pressure, they can use the hostages to pressure the israeli government. and this is the biggest dilemma, the worst dilemma that any prime minister in israel had to take since israel established. it's an israeli history to decide the priority, war on hamas, destroying hamas, or releasing the hostages? every city must know, we are trapped between a stone and a hard place. this is the main dilemma. >> all right. and of course, now, obviously, the choice appears to be war. but they are hoping they can get out of that rock and a hard place. shlomi, thank you very much. and, next, exclusive dispachls from gaza. an american doctor from colorado stuck in gaza tells "outfront" that there is now violence, fights breaking out over food. and we'll also hear from our cnn colleague ibrahim dahman. plus, breaking news. we are learning how firefighghts found d matthew peperry when th arrived d at his homome. tonight, fights breaking out over food. that is what's happening outside a u.n. compound in southern gaza' cording to the husband of an american doctor who is inside that compound. dr. barbara wind and is still in gaza, still trapped there, but no longer at the u.n. facility. her husband says that she had to leave due to increased violence outside the u.n. facility as other displaced people were fighting for food. and he doesn't know where his wife is going now but he says the situation is desperate and increasingly dangerous just to even think about that because people are fighting over food. it comes as the aid worker we've been speaking to sent "outfront" a dispatch from northern gaza wher