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brianna keilar. anderson cooper is live in tel aviv. in gaza city people are digging through rubble searching for family members after the deadly explosion at the hospital. >> the u.s. government is saying it believes israel is not responsible for the blast. president biden citing multiple pieces of evidence. >> palestinian people are suffering greatly as well. we mourn the loss of innocent palestinian lives like the entire world. i was outraged and saddened by the enormous loss of life yesterday at the hospital in gaza. based on the information we've seen it appears that it was the result of an errant rocket fire in gaza. >> outrage has been pouring over in cities throughout the middle

east, renewing possibilities that the conflict could spread wider throughout the region. we want to begin with jeremy diamond with me now. let's talk about what the idf is saying. there was a press conference this morning at around 9:15. the head of public information was giving it. talk about what israel presented. >> they presented a number of pieces of evidence that the u.s. is backing. the u.s. has their own sources of intelligence as well. what israel is presenting, they claim they have intercepted conversations between militants inside gaza talking about the fact that it was a palestinian rocket that misfired. >> they say the pieces of the rocket left behind are consistent with rockets from hamas or islamic jihad, not from israel. >> that's right. then israel compiled its own evidence including surveillance from a drone after the impact happened that they say shows that it's not something that

would have occurred from an air force strike. one of the main pieces of evidence, one that we can verify the most easily, is the fact that there's no crater in these images that the idf presented. if a bomb was dropped from a fighter jet, there would be a large crater. they say -- i asked one of the questions -- all right, how do you explain so many people could have died from this, that the explosion was so massive? they said this rocket was at its initial stage of departure and had a lot of fuel that would have caused this massive fire ball. this is a question of credibility as well for the idf. there have been instances in the past where they've not been truthful or presented a different version of events and ultimately changed their mind. i asked the admiral that question. listen. >> reporter: jeremy diamond, cnn. i'm wondering if you can explain

how an islamic jihad rocket could have caused this much death and destruction? second, i would like you to address the question of credibility. frankly the idf has a less than perfect track record with the issue of credibility. the israeli government initially claimed it was armed palestinian militants who killed the journalist, which we know is not true. why should the world trust you now? >> because of the importance of credibility and in the past we had our -- ourselves were fast to go to conclusion. this is why in this event we took the time. took us more than five hours. we wanted to double check everything, make sure we were credible. again, we wanted to double check everything, make sure we're credible opposed to the other events you mentioned. >> the admiral came back to this

idea of credibility. it seemed to be an acknowledgment they've not always been credible. they're picking and choosing their moments when they provide explanations. we're still waiting for an explanation of the shelling in southern lebanon that appeared to have killed journalists. whether or not it was israeli shelling or not we have not yet confirmed. >> the national security council put out a statement in the united states saying that their own analysis of their intelligence backs up the conclusion that this was a misfire of an islamic jihad rocket. >> that's because, in addition to all the evidence i talked about, there's evidence of tracking the actual rockets that were fired, seeing the trajectory. there's some footage from various news channels that shows the rockets being fired. we've not independently verified this yet and palestinian officials are adamant it was an

israeli air strike. we're seeing countries like jordan that has blamed israel, they're not backing down that it was israel responsible for the strike. >> thanks, jeremy. now to natasha bertran. what can you tell us about the u.s. government's current assessment about the intelligence -- their own current assessment about this blast? >> reporter: anderson, you referenced the national security council statement. it said, while we continue to collect information our current assessment based on analysis over imagery, intercepts and open-source information is that israel is not responsible for the explosion in gaza. this statement did not say who they do believe is responsible, but president biden said in remarks this morning, quote, based on the information we've seen it appears the result of an rrorist group in gaza. a officials told us at cnn it

appears to have come from a rocket launched by palestinian islamic jihad. the u.s. has been examining a lot of intelligence that the israelis provided. that began as soon as the attack happened. the israelis started to collect information and shared it with the u.s. intelligence community who took that and examined that along u.s. intel assets including overhead satellite injury, blast analysis, looking at the crater or lack thereof, the radius of this explosion and all of this, we're told, is pointing to the conclusion that an israeli air strike was likely not the culprit of this. u.s. has examined the intercepted conversations that the israelis provided allegedly between two hamas militants discussing this errant rocket attack. this is all preliminary. the u.s. emphasized that this is

not a final assessment and the statement made clear the u.s. is continuing to gather information about this. one thing that's tough about this is you can't have independent investigators on the ground to examine this because of the situation in gaza. the information remains ongoing. the preliminary assessment said it was not an israeli air strike. >> i want to point out that we get used to hearing air raid sirens here and seeing the iron dome intercept rockets being fired. the rockets being fired from gaza are being fired from civilian areas, buildings in residential communities. they're being moved around and fired from the city itself. if, in fact, islamic jihad had a barrage of rockets going over the hospital, it gives you an indication of if, in fact, that is the case and it was an errant rocket that fell, the sickening

nature of the conflict here that they would use that -- not accept any form of responsibility and use that to enflame populations all throughout the region. i want to go to ben wedeman in southern lebanon. ben, let's talk about this outrage we've seen over the last 12, 18 hours in the middle east. the u.s. embassy in beirut advised americans to avoid the embassy. what have you been seeing? >> reporter: anderson, in the last 24 hours there have been fairly large protests at the bottom of the hill leading to the american embassy which is about half a mile up the hill. they were throwing rocks and fireworks at lebanese's security forces. they were responding with tear gas and water canons. they didn't manage to break through the barrier that's

always in place at the bottom of the hill to prevent exactly this sort of eventuality. the u.s. embassy in beirut is highly fortified and employees of the embassy -- american staff in the embassy can't simply walk outside. they're under very strict restrictions when it comes to moving and beirut. the mounting tensions in lebanon and across the region are starting to have an impact. the state department has told families of embassy employees and nonemergency personnel they can leave the country on a case by case basis. saudi arabia today advised all its nationals in lebanon to leave the country immediately. france and the uk told their nationals don't come to lebanon unless you absolutely have to because the worry is not only of tensions in the street, but, of course, the possibility of an outbreak of a war on the border

between israel and lebanon. anderson? >> let's talk about what's going on at the border between israel and lebanon. has there been any uptick today? >> reporter: yes. we've counted so far six strikes by hezbollah on israeli military positions. mid afternoon for about two hours, from what we could hear, there was a pretty constant exchange. we could hear volleys of rockets being fired out of lebanon and israeli artillery we assume being fired back. it's important to note that hezbollah is very specific in its targets on the border. they're focusing on israeli military locations, in particular on observation towers and surveillance equipment. in many areas they've used

rifles to take out the cameras that the israelis have installed on the fence and in some areas the wall. those cameras peering into lebanon. anderson? >> ben wedeman, thanks so much. president biden warning the government and people of israel to not be consumed, his words, by rage in the aftermath of the attacks of hamas. he talked about the u.s.' experience in the wake of 9/11 and mistakes made. up next, how his trip is being received in israel and throughout the region.

president biden had a daunting task with today's wartime visit to israel. he aimed to show america's unwavering support for israel and also to help this from spreading to other countries. he delivered that message by drawing on america's experience after 9/11. >> justice must be done, but i caution while you feel that rage, don't be consumed by it. after 9/11, we were enraged in the united states. while we sought justice and got justice, we also made mistakes.

the vast majority of palestinians are not hamas. hamas does not represent the palestinian people. >> the president's urgency was clear. when a devastating hospital explosion killed hundreds shortly before the president headed off to the middle east, this incident sparked anger and confusion across the region and caused arab leaders to cancel their meeting with president biden. let's discuss this with former obama campaign foreign policy adviser. thank you for being with us. after president biden's visit, israeli officials confirmed they wouldn't block humanitarian aid to gaza. how can the u.s. verify it will

get there and what can the u.s. do to get u.s. civilians out of gaza? >> i think we're having an audio d issue. >> is that question to me? >> yes. >> president biden was right to go to israel. it was an important visit. we see the risks of going to a crisis situation in the midst of a crisis that's changing quickly because he committed to the trip when the hospital attack happened. that caused the arab leaders he was supposed to meet on this trip, including the leader of egypt and jordan, to cancel making it a bit awkward. however, i don't think this trip will be remembered for the hospital attack. there's growing news and support for the fact that palestinian militants were responsible, not the israelis. what i think it will be known for is if biden helps israel to

allow more humanitarian aid into gaza, if he helps convince them to work with egyptians to allow aid to go through, if they permit some palestinian refugees leave through rafa and at the same time delivering the message that the secretary of state and the secretary of defense delivered before him, which is unwavering support for israel's right to attack hamas militants and get justice from hamas militants, but also delivering the message they should be cautious about injuring civilians. >> we have dan back with us. dan, you have leaders of the egypt, jordan, the palestinian authority canceling meetings with biden in the wake of this attack. they seem to, you know, try to be saving some face and not making it necessarily as if that's the reason, that they're trying to save this for another

occasion since the president of egypt had to go back and deal with the situation. if president biden can't get those meetings that are so key especially with the egyptians and jordanians, does this trip fail? >> part of it. the trip was supposed to show some balance. joe biden has been clearly on israel's side since the massacre on october 7th. israel is determined to roll into gaza. joe biden is telling israel as a friend, don't cause too much damage, don't cause too many civilian deaths. then joe biden wanted to go to jordan and meet with those three arab leaders of the egypt, jordan and the palestinians. they didn't want to meet him because of the horrible tragedy that happened at the gaza hospital. now president biden announced that u.s. intelligence believes that, in fact, israel was not responsible for all the deaths at that gaza hospital.

frankly arab countries don't believe it. i've been hearing so much anger still from muslim and arab countries. the u.s. has a real problem, but for now has clearly decided to be on israel's side, but arrange those humanitarian corridors which can help people. >> david, to dan's point about anger in arab nations, biden's visit was to deter other actors in the region, whether hezbollah or iran from getting involved in the conflict. how effective do you think he acted as president of the united states going in and warning off any potential attack from other actors there? >> well, i think it's really important that he went for that reason.

it's also important that he's already sent one aircraft carrier to the region and he's sending another one to the region. that increased military presence by the u.s. is not for gaza. it's really to send a warning to iran and to send a warning to hezbollah that if they attack and open up a northern front in israel, that the u.s. might have to get involved. that's one of the only ways the u.s. would get involved militarily in this situation is if hezbollah attacks and it would likely be appropriate for the u.s. to do air strikes against hezbollah and that's a consideration. of course, there are behind the scenes talks between president biden and netanyahu about planning for every contingency including that and other actions by iran that iran might take in order to enflame passions in the region. i would also mention simmering under the fact of all this is

that iran is still trying to get nuclear weapons and the u.s. is trying to make sure iran doesn't get those nuclear weapons. >> dan, we heard the president warning about making mistakes, something the u.s. did in the wake of 9/11. they made mistakes. biden supports israel. he's voicing american support for israel. at a certain point does the number of civilians killed in gaza become untenable and what is his message on this? >> well, this is very different for israel than previous -- what i call mini wars between israel and gaza. on occasion israel has reluctantly rolled into gaza. a lot of israeli troops were killed. israel is dependent on the iron dome to shoot down rogts from gaza so there wouldn't have to be a ground invasion. this time a ground invasion is absolutely planned. israel is determined to get rid

of hamas, that means to overthrow the government of gaza city. that's what the u.s. did after 9/11. they went into afghanistan in search of al qaeda and osama bin laden. in iraq they went in and toppled saddam hussein. so joe biden is saying don't let the rage take over. the rage not just over the killings, the rapes, but now 199 hostages, israelis being held in gaza. israel wants to rescue them. maybe they should let negotiations get folks released. i don't know if israel will allow for that and delay the ground invasion. >> dan and david, we have to leave the conversation there. thank you for your perspective. >> thank you. stay with news central.

in just moments we'll take you back to israel to get an update with a spokesperson for israeli defense forces on that hospital blast in gaza. we're back in just a moment.

says its war with hamas, quote, will not be short. the chief told israeli armed forces if other enemies get involved israel will have to expand its fight. joining me now is the colonel of the idf. colonel, appreciate you being with us. a u.n. spokesman is declining to

acknowledge israel's demand that the chief declare palestinian terrorists are responsible for the gaza hospital blast. i'm wondering your reaction to that. >> i think the whole fake story by hamas is sad and dangerous. i think how it was reported and amplified in much, not all, but much of international and arabic media is very dangerous and reckless. we've seen the consequences of it. it could have gotten much worse had we not gotten evidence out to debunk it. i think now is the time for moral clarity for organizations that claim to be humanitarian and claim to be on the good side, to be on the good side and stop providing diplomatic and international cover for hamas and their atrocities.

>> the current u.s. assessment is the u.s. does not believe israel is responsible for the deadly blast at the hospital. officials have said to cnn they do believe it was an errant missile from islamic jihad. can you say if the u.s. provided the israeli military or the other way around any intelligence that led them to make the conclusion? i know israel shared -- there was reporting that israel shared its intelligence with the u.s. do you know how much extra intelligence the u.s. had and did they share that with israel? >> i'm not aware, no. i know we shared our intelligence which is obvious because we're the ones in battle. we're the ones focusing our censors on this area of the world and focusing on those enemies. i think it's natural that the basis is on israeli's intelligence. i'm not aware of additional

intelligence. i wasn't part of the conversation. i'm not refuting it. >> i think -- you and i talked about misfires by missiles before. i think you said that it's -- the percentage is roughly 30%. correct me if i'm wrong on that. that's what you say missiles coming from gaza, about 30% of them fall into gaza itself. in your experience has islamic jihad or hamas ever expressed responsibility for a misfire that's killed people? >> not only have they not accepted responsibility ever for the killing of palestinian civilians, i remember personally an event almost two years ago and there are many other documented instances that have been caught on camera including el jezeera cameras showing

rockets that went wayward and went into gaza. then the cameraman was told to point the camera upwards because the rocket landed in the sea, which is code word for you're showing what hamas is doing. they actively undermine international reporting of it. they try to obfuscate and hide that so many of their rockets fall short. that i can understand because they're a terrorist organization with no morals. what i fail to understand is how are they not held accountable? how is this not the most important report, but why isn't it vocal when it comes to speaking of lives of palestinians, many people who care they're humanitarians and care for palestinians. i haven't seen statements of hamas, you're firing rockets

from build-up areas and some of your rockets fall short, which is bad. what are you doing about it? i haven't seen anything about that either. >> the intelligence that israel has put forward shows rocket trajectories from -- i believe it was a cemetery in gaza or from a location relatively close to the hospital arcing over the hospital or very nearby the hospital, some of the other rocket trajectories. i assume the u.s. having satellite capabilities had similar rocket trajectories which i assume led to their conclusion that israel is right in their assessment of who is responsible for this. if that is the case, it is a sign just of how extremely irresponsible and dangerous the firing of rockets is from any civilian population. i've been in gaza city and seen

rockets fired near locations from where i was. they're fired from buildings in residential areas. >> yes, they are. that is where hamas operates. that is the infrastructure that they use. the rockets, they are launched from civilian areas. they get there -- the rockets are brought there by a tunnel system under the civilian areas. once they're fired, of course, that area is exposed to threat because we'll try to retaliate so they won't be able to fire again. that puts civilians at risk. that's typical hamas operations. it is extremely regrettable that they choose these tactics to constantly put at risk their own civilians, the palestinians who live there, in order to fight against us and it is, of course, in contradiction to international law. you're supposed to have your

weapons away from civilians and by military only. we, the military, are a legitimate target. our civilians are not. they're constantly threatened. the last air raid siren was maybe an hour ago in tel aviv and there have been rockets fired at southern israel a few times today already. it's just the reality. when people ask themselves and when pictures of the unfortunate situation in gaza are shown, that needs to be explained. that's part of the context. when we fight an enemy heavily embedded in civilian areas and fire rockets from there, that's where we have to retaliate. it's an unfortunate situation. in so much reporting, that piece of context is missing. >> colonel, thank you. we'll be right back. stay with us.

speakerless. congressman jim jordan coming up short in his second bid for the gavel. he lost more support this time around. a spokesman for the ohio republican says he will keep going. joining me now is georgia congressman austin scott who lost the conference nomination to jordan last week, but is now behind jim jordan. sir, thank you for being with us. should he keep going? should jim jordan continue as his aides say he will? >> yeah, i think he's going to continue. if you remember what happened last time, it took kevin mccarthy around 14 rounds.

we shouldn't be in this situation. 208 democrats voted with -- >> sir, let me ask you this -- >> i'm sorry? >> mccarthy was never going to hold as -- >> speaker mccarthy was elected. he was the speaker of the house. he was the largest republican fundraiser ever as house republicans. the democrats knew what they were doing when they put up 208 votes to put him out of the speakership. that's what created the current situation. >> they didn't take him out of the speakership. you guys are the majority. >> sure they did. >> you guys are the majority, right? >> 96% of the votes came from demo democrats, breonna. there were 208 democrats. >> sir, who's in the majority? >> well, the democrats were the majority of that vote. >> no. who's in the majority in the house of representatives?

>> the republicans are in the majority, but the democrats provided the majority of the votes to take kevin mccarthy out of the speakership. >> but republicans -- republicans provided the key votes. they're in the majority. they can provide enough votes to put a republican speaker in place. >> the democrats provided 96% of the votes. 208 democrats voted to remove the republican speaker of the house. 8 republicans voted to remove the speaker of the house . 96% of the votes come from -- >> i find it -- it's some interesting verbal gymnastics. i'll give you that. i want to talk about the future here. >> what do you mean gymnastics? 208 democrats voted. they were the vast majority of the vote. >> i'm talking about how it works. that's that the majority in the house of representatives, your party, is responsible for le electing a speaker.

>> we are. >> do you think there's going to be another vote today? we're uncertain on that. >> i absolutely believe there will be another vote today. i don't know what time that will be, but i'm not sure what i'm missing here with you. 208 democrats voted with 8 republicans to take the largest republican fundraiser out of the speakership. this was a pretty calculated decision by the democrats. >> it was a -- here's why, sir, because it was a republican who filed the motion to vacate. >> it was. it was a republican that had very personal differences with kevin mccarthy. >> all right. so jordan lost 22 republicans. that at this point is next. he's lost 3 more. he gained 1 from the vote before. what's your message to the 22 still against him? >> it's time to get a republican speaker. we have work to do. we need to seat a republican

speaker. nobody is going to get -- everybody's not going to get the person they want. we have people voting for kevin. we have people voting for steve. we have people voting for people other than the republican nominee. what got us into this position is people who did not abide by the rules of the republican conference. those eight people that voted with the 208 democrats to create the current scenario were not following the rules of the conference. our rules are that you should abide by whoever wins the conference. that didn't happen this past week. now we're in this situation that we're in. let's not forget 208 democrats voted to vacate the speaker's chair. >> yes, as you've said. how would you describe this -- as you mentioned in the party they're not following how they normally do things. what is going on? how do you describe this? do you worry it's going to cost your party the majority?

>> i absolutely worry it's going to cost us the majority. it is -- part of this has to do with outside groups raising tremendous sums off the chaos. part of it has to do with a lack of journalism. if someone goes to fox news, they'll see one thing. if they go to cnn, they see something opposite of that. so part of it is symbolic of the times we're living in. part of it is symbolic of how the districts are drawn. we have people in districts that trump won by 20 points that want people in districts that biden won to vote the same way they do. part of this is just democracy and democracy's messy, but it's better than anything else out there. >> i want to ask you separately about israel. you're on house intel. you got a classified briefing today on israel. i know you can't talk about the specifics. very pressing right now.

there are many americans in the region. i want to ask you specifically about palestinian americans who are stuck in southern gaza because time may be of the essence for this group, trying to get them out. any word on how the u.s. government is helping them? >> we should be doing anything and everything we can to help every american citizen without regard for religion or race or any other stereo typical criteria. if they're an american citizen, we need to do everything they can to get them out of there. this terrorist attack has killed a tremendous number of people, a tremendous number of innocent people lost their lives. right now we want to do everything we can to get americans out of war zone. we want to do everything we can to help israel with the intelligence and the weapons they need to carry out the mission against hamas. we want to help israel stamp out hamas and at the same time make sure they're getting the

intelligence to handle and prepare for any other threats that may be coming their way. i'm hopeful we're able to isolate this to hamas. i think that the worst thing that could happen would be if iran and hezbollah openly came into the conflict. i'm not naive to the fact that iran is trained to support. we need to on behalf of the people in israel and the people in that region, the best thing is to -- >> are you confident the u.s. government can get those palestinian americans out? >> i'm telling you the united states government is very good at what they do. we're very good at this. they're doing everything they can, i believe in a tough situation, to make sure american citizens are respected and they get them out of there. >> congressman, we appreciate your time.

we'll be right back.

so while hamas is banned by almost every social media network, its social media following telegram. >> in the days since the terror group attacked israel, its followers have tripled on the platform. cnn correspondent donnie o'sullivan is tracking the story. what have you learned? >> telegram for the people here in the united states might never have heard of telegram, but it is a huge app elsewhere in the

world. more than 800 million people use this app. so it's pretty big, but it is, right now the home of hamas on the internet, and i want to show you some of these graphs here just to show you how big their followers increased in the days after the attack. you will see there, october 7th, the day of the attack went from 200,000 all of the way up to 700,000 and other accounts with similar growth. so what we're seeing here is this is where hamas is getting all of their messaging out, their propaganda out and this is also the same platform that isis used about a decade ago. you mentioned the russian entrepreneur who founded this company, he is very committed to quote, unquote, free speech. he did, in the past, however, take some action against isis, so there is pressure mounting that he might take action against hamas here. i will just say, however, that despite being on this platform in terms of families who have hostages who have loved ones who are being held hostage and

things like that, that is where we're getting the videos about the hostageses and that sort of information is still coming through that channel, so, although there are a lot of calls for that to be taken down, some people would argue there is a value there in being able to still hear from this group despite the propaganda. >> and other social media apps? >> and other social media platforms and even on elon musk's twitter or now called x, hamas is officially banned and of course, you know, as are other terror groups here in the u.s. hamas is a designated foreign terroris so for the most part the big tech platforms have them kicked off. i will say new recent internet lows in the european union could hold the let forms liable if hamas sneaks on to their platforms. >> donie, thank you so much. >> stay with cnn news central. we're back in moments.