gibbs okay. so i hope you're right about that. we'll find out in time. move onto this coming up on the 10:00 a.m. eastern time hour. watch. >> hamas is isis and just as isis was crushed so too will hamas. >> dana: declaring the baa beiges of hamas must -- barbarians of hamas must be crushed and thanks the u.s. for their support. a massive and prolonged survivor against the evil positive gainer its of terrorism. welcome to a brand new hour of america's news room. i'm dana perino. welcome. >> bill: good morning. dana. i'm bill hemmer, israel's military mobilizing ground forces along the border as artillery and air power pound militants in the hamas and

number of americans murdered risen to at least 25. many airlines canceling flights to israel and several countries including the uk mounting emergency flights to evacuate the own citizens and the u.s. is not one yet one of them. now we're hearing from syrian state media air strikes earlier and aleppo and damaged runways and service and using airports to smuggle weapons to hezbollah and eventually make their way into lebanon. >> dana: bob gates quarterback joining us in a moment. >> bill: first on the ground, trey yingst. if you want and feel comfortable, where are you and where are you going? reporter: i'll tell you more

about that location later today. it is certainly sensitive as it lies in the area where there is activity going on. this entire part of southern israel is bracing for days and days of fighting to come. just to give you a sense of what it's like here this morning, we saw earlier as a rocket came off the gaza strip. one rocket was intercepted by israel's missile defense system, the iron dome, and another slammed into the city of sderot right next to a center for medics. multiple people were injured in sderot and when we got to the scene, you could see a hole in the ground and shrapnel on the side of the a building and pieces of metal on the floor and blood. a pool of blood. someone was injure there had in moderate condition and taken to a local hospital. that's one scene of many. and those are attacks from the air. on the ground, a soldier just told us about an hour ago they were worried about infiltration attempt on the boarder and we know that earlier this morning hamas tried to fire antitank missile on the house in northern

gaza and southern israel. there's a lot ovactivity and movement here and israelis continue to prepare for eventual ground operation. i want short term orientation talk about that situation in sierra and first time since this war began and this massacre on saturday morning that we've seen the israelis strike in syria deep into syria and talking about airport in aleppo and damascus. some of the reporting i did a few years ago with my producer here and we spoke with western intelligence source that gave us information and they're guiding precision re-seem into the airport and massive airport in aleppo and take the weapons into lebanon and hezbollah and this week hezbollah is trying to get involved in the fight here in the south they're take on the northern boarder and fired rockets, fired antitank missile at group of soldiers and set off

air raid sirens in the northern part of the country. this is why israel is bracing for possibility of multi-front conflict. if the rocket fire continues from gaza and engaged on the ground here behind me and they're fight ago war with the lebanese militant group hezbollah with thousands of precision guided missiles smuggled from iran. it's a very, very serious situation and israel's defense capabilities are not that advance to handle that much fire at one time. bill and dana. >> bill: trey we'll be back with you when possible. thanks. >> dana: a closer look at iran's role as primary sponsor of hamas in gaza. we have rick gates here this morning and we try to sort it all out. we're talking specifically about what happens in gaza and if we zoom out for a moment, tell us a bit more as where we are in regards to geopolitical concerns

with the region, for example with iran. >> i think iran is involved in supporting, arming, and training hamas for this. i think iran's strategic interest is verne versing the trend toward reconciliation between israel and arab states in particular, the u.s. one thing they're in favor of strengthening the relationship with israel, the arab street is not. so i think the longer this goes on, the more likely you'll see protests in the streets of putting pressure on the arab governments and that's a win for iran.

>> bill: wow. council member out a bit further if you could. hamas connected to iran. iran is an alie of russia. publicly tin has a massive war in ukraine and we're the biggest supporters of ukraine on behalf of the european allies. is it possible that putin would be involved in this or at least give his tasks at approval to leaders in teheran? >> i think probably not. i sympathy that relationship has not advanced that far and there's no question that this is a gift to vladamir putin and for no other reason than it distracts american attention from ukraine and potential to divert resources and military weapons and supplies from israel and it's a reminder it's a nasty world and russia and ukraine and we've got the war in gaza between israel and the hamas and

we have chinese and taiwan and we better get our own house in order here at home so we're in a position to deal with all of these challenges that we're facing simultaneously. there's very broad support in the congress for israel. very broad support for taiwan. and a lot of support for taiwan. or for ukraine but not translated into getting things done like the defense budget and and having good order in the congress. >> dana: does that concern extend also to what we've had on our southern border, which is so many migrants coming across and this year-to-date, over 150 known people on the terrorism watch list apprehend sports grilled not counting the ones we didn't even find. >> years and years ago when i

was at cia, we were seeing people from dozens of different countries come across the border from mexico. it wasn't just people from central america or mexico and it's a real problem. and the only way to deal with it is a bipartisan collusion such as president bush put forward in 2006 that allows us to have some continuity and put in place policies that will last and get control of the border. >> bill: sir, i want to play a clip from the commander in chief. this is joe biden from this week on american support for israel. >> we're sending additional military assistance to israeli including interceptors to help the iron dome and move the carrier fleet to the med train sea and fighter jets to that region and made it clear.

>> you think joe biden has been wrong on every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades. do you stand by that quote there, sir? >> well, i do. i do think that the president and the administration have mostly gotten ukraine right. i think that the rallying of the allies to ukraine's support, the military support we've given to ukraine has all been on the mark. i do think that their approach to iran has had some problems frankly. these guys, you know, i first encountered the iranians six months, eight months of iranian revolution in the fall of 1979 and national security adviser

when he met with the new iranian revolutionary leaders and algierss, and and every single american president has tried to do business with iran and every single time under every sin l president the hand has been slapped away. this is a regime that's completely hostile to the united states. and the question is how do you contain them and how do you prevent them from spread the kind of violence we're seeing under hamas right now. >> dana: two questions about the region, one, egypt apparently is not going to alaw gazaens to flee into egypt. is there something then to be said about the americans being able to reach out saying we're trying to protect innocent life there. give them a chance in order to get out of the situation and the area before we see what the

israelis do what they have to do? >> what i've read is the egyptian government and the u.s. are in negotiations actually. the egyptians with the possibility of some kind of escape corridor and several hundred americans and others from international relief organizations and others that have been in gaza to escape into egypt and same token i think that president of egypt has no interest in having hundreds of thousands of gazaens on egyptian soil. they're a security problem and economic challenge and egypt is reeling economically right now so i suspect that egypt's interest in having significant numbers of civilians from gaza come into egypt is very, very low. >> dana: i'm sure they'd think it was suboptimal and let me ask you about qatar then because

some of the leaders of hamas live in luxury in qatar and i'm wondering if there should be a conversation there about either giving them umm or giving us a chance to get out. >> i definitely think there should be a conversation along those lines. you know, we had some issues with qatar in the bush administration and the obama administration kind of playing both sides of the street in iraq as well as elsewhere in the middle east. i think given the magnitude of what's happened in the attacks on israel that there needs to be pressure on qatar to give access or to turn over hamas leaders who may be in qatar. >> bill: two more questions for me, sir, and i appreciate your time today. thank you for coming on. this is really valuable for us and i hope it is for the audience at home as well. could you freeze that $6 millio,

to iran. could you do that now and what's the harm in doing it? if for nothing else, i mean, americans all over the place and in the middle east wondering why not freeze that money and second question i would have is like hamas is connected to iran so is hezbollah in the north. why don't you think hezbollah has made a move in the first week just yet. >> takerring the second question first, i think hezbollah will try to distract the israelis without getting involved in a full scale war with israel and the israelis have a lot of capacity, their military has not been significant and has not really been armed at all by the attacks that took place a few days ago. so israel has predominant military strength and his blah

will try to -- hezbollah will try to distract the israelis and if the war goes on in gaza for a o prolonged period, you may see both the west bank and hezbollah becoming more trouble some for the israelis but for now, hezbollah will hold its fire and try to distract the israelis with minor attacks or distract their attention if you will. be an all out attack by hezbollah would be a real challenge for israel simply because they have tens of thousands oval window missiles. i'm sorry, the first part of your question? >> bill: why not freeze the 6 billion now? >> i see no reason at all not to freeze the 6 billion. i'm one of those that believes money is fungible and $6 billion spent on humanitarian and

assistance is $6 billion they don't have to spend to allocate to military and other kinds of activities so i'd certainly put a freeze on that soon. >> dana: senator bob gates, thank you for your time. we appreciate you. >> thank you. >> bill: if you have an idea about the geography, that last question about lebanon and hezbollah works out of beirut and southern lebanon and a stones throw across the border into certain towns in the northern part of israel where they fought a war there for a good two months during really hot summer, 2006 along here. we'll watch this movement here this. is the gaza strip and a little area here in the southwest along the mediterranean and west bank that has been relatively speaking now, has been somewhat "and the problem for the israelis is that there's been an uprising in the west bank over the past several weeks and a lot of israeli soldiers that guard here down on

the gaza strip moved into the west bank and made israelis and southern israel even more vulnerable that past weekend on saturday morning. this is the israeli military clearing out tens of thousands of israeli out of kibbutz and local vailages and towns -- villages and towns to get them out of the area and runs about 36 miles on the border here. about 8 miles down here with the border we script. we were talking with -- egypt and talking with the secretary about this area. this is the town of rafah, okay. it is one of two crossings in all of gaza. one on the north end and one on the zone end. he's given work permits to come in and work a job.

this is all about the idea of hamas lining the grass and give israeli leadership the idea they have changed and clearly they've not based on action for the past week. rafah is a concern because the israelis hit it, hit the gate and border crossing going into the sinai peninsula into egypt and the egyptian government says you cannot come in here. watch this story in this town because if there is humanitarian aid and if there is a changes to perhaps even rescue hostages, rafah will come into the picture. that's a little area that was hit the other day here and it's a key crossing area for all gazaen into and out of the strip into egypt. just want to share this with you. more from dana now. >> dana: excellent map there. breaking news and alexis mcadams following that in the news room. >> hi, we're getting in new video and new information and alarming alert from former leader of hamas calling for day of jihad on friday telling muslims to take to the streets

across the world and protest against israel. also telling people of neighboring countries to join the fight against israel specifically, dana, asking qatar, jordan, syria, lib lebann and the egypt to stand up and fight back. he heads the space he's in qatar and posting a lot on the video tape in the past few days and telling people to head to the squares and streets of the arab and islamic world saying we declare friday, the friday of the flood as a day of general possiblyization rather and our arab and islamic worlds and among the free people of the words. that's his statement coming in just a short time ago saying it's a day to rally and support and offer aid to the people and participate actively. we see some of the areas here in new york city, day narcs with a large jewish population, largest outside of israel trying to harden up the soft targets like the synagogues and nypd going to be all coming in in full june um

tomorrow because of all the protests they're calling for. we'll have to see how it all plays out here, dana. >> dana: a high level of concern about it, alexis, thank you. >> bill: business leadeers are calling for harvard university to release the names of students whose organization signed a letter that blamed israel for the deadly attacks from hamas. some are withdrawing their signatures and withdrawing from groups that signed it. mollie is live from harvard today. reporter: good morning, bill. several harvard organizations looked to retract their involvement in that joint statement initially put out blaming israel for the horrific attacks perpetrated by hamas as business leaders contemplate blacklisting some of those group members that could potentially seek employment in the future. billionaire hedge fund founder and harvard alum bill ackman asked i've been asked by a

number of ceo f if harvard would release a list of the groups that signed the ledder for the heinous acts to israel so none of us inned a versus frequency taintly hire any of the members. one harvard member with family in israel described the statement as very, very hurtful and dis-avoixing the pro hamas protest. >> people are celebrating this as a victory and nothing victory yous about the beheading of children or kidnapping of young women or elderly people. there's nothing vic torous about that and it's sad and people celebrating this as resistance. let's be clear, this isn't resistance, this is terrorism. reporter: worth noting in the wake of anti-israel statements, pro israel sentiments are also very strong here on harvard's campus with posters displayed on the yard showing kidnapped israeli hostages both young and hold. hold old. this comes as protesting palestinian groups rallied on

multicampuses in support of hamas' attack on israel and some referring to infiltrators as martyrs and some colleges have spoken out against the most inflammatory statements of varying degrees and the national department of palestine organizers calling to action a day of resistance and we are monitoring potential protests on campuses across the nation. bill, back to you. >> bill: thank you, molly. molly line in cambridge, massachusetts. if you're one of the schools and you got to get it right now. if you put out the statement and let it linger for a week, can't pull it back. you have to do it now. accident in questioner barywise was on on tuesday. >> dana: which he was very alarmed and go to her work on the free press, that's where you can find t the point about what's happening at universities, she also has two columns today in the free press but this is what she said tuesday. >> if you go and look at instagram or twitter of many of the most prestigious and

celebrated so called institutes of higher education in this country, you'll see posts about sustainability week. you will not see posts about the greatest slaughter of jews since the hall customer. tells you something -- holocaust. tells you -- holocaust. tells you how deep the ideological rot is. >> dana: some ceos saying i want the names of all the people because i'm never going to hire them. permission to repeat something i said on the five? >> bill: you may? >> dana: i said last night, just came to me, i want their names because i don't want to have to pay off their student loans. don't ever ask me to do that or any taxpayer to pay off their student loans. >> bill: .y the history for this part of the world runs as deep as anywhere you'll find and the knee jerk reaction i feel permission to say something i did not say on the five. >> dana: sure. i just hate to repeat myself if

people are watching. >> bill: i think you have to take the time to study the region. >> dana: absolutely. >> bill: as a younger man, i backpacked all over the world. and i went into places that most people never go. and i was a young man and i didn't have a lot of inha inhibitions and i was ready and willing to do it. whether it was china before reemerging and vietnam after they started reconciling their economic situation there. whether it was india or nepal or russia or the former soviet union or the middle east, nowhere did i go that stopped me more than when i arrived in the old city of jerusalem. and i got a room at an arab hostile in the old city and sat for two d days and never left te room and was reading and trying to learn about what was important to whom and why. whether you're jew irk or christian or islam -- jewish or

christian on islam. the history is so deep and so rich to have a reaction that you've seen from students on campus, it's short sided and it's done without historical knowledge. >> dana: it's done with malice and going on in universities for a long time. they're not children. if the people at universities were in israel, they'd be suiting up and going to fight for their country. >> dana: that's right. with us now idf spokesperson lieutenant colonel peter learner. thank you for your time and i'm not sure of your location, but i want to ask you about that and i want to know that the shots are looking up a bit here and we'll try to get through as best aerodynamic can. can you tell us -- as we can. can you tell us whether or not israel knows where the hostages are located in gaza? >> good morning to you. i'm actually from tel aviv.

can you hear me? >> bill: sure can. >> okay, good. yeah, well during the gaza strip obviously and we're doing everything we can in order to bring them home, but i would say ultimately hamas are responsible for the well being of those people. we demand they be returned home and demand that now. israel is concerned of their welfare but we -- and we need to work in order for them to bring them home as as soon as possible. we are now currently in day six here in israel. it's just after 5:00 p.m. and we're continuing our assault against hamas and terrorist organization that launched a brutal attack against israel on saturday. we are targeting their activities, their operations. last 24 hours has been -- we've seen increase on our activities on the force, which is their special fo forces and commando-e unit that goes through special forces training and they were on the forefront of the breech of

our perimeter on saturday. they led the assault were trained and directed by their leadership to do s. we're hunting them down and killing them and we are identifying them because they're stupid enough to broadcast their atrocities on social media. so we are cross referencing the videos and faces and the individuals and we are identifying them and we will get to them. >> bill: yeah, your prime minister had gaza locked down and pulled out of the settlement in 2005, the people of gather s were left to figure out which government they wanted to have. they elected hamas to be their leaders. the last time the idf was inside gaza in a significant way was nine years ago, 2014. colonel, how significant has the

hamas defenses been developed over the past nine years? in other words what are your men in for? >> sorry this, is precisely the question of why didn't hamas develop the singapore of the middle east that rather chose to do this fortified stating ground for ataxoon israel and why the people of gaza are paying for it. the thing we need to be prepared for are of course the close combat and open areas, the tunnel capables we've seen and antitank guided missiles and drone activities that they have and we're confident that we have the ability if needs be in order to be prepared for all of those threats. if they go on the ground

assault, we'll deal with it. >> bill: peter, thank you for your time. lieutenant colonel idf out of tel aviv. >> dana: they've been so helpful to all of us. benjamin reunited with a medical team helping him reattack and build his life in ukraine. we see the miracles the doctors are performing in very tough conditions and how they prepare for a potential strike on u.s. soil. benjamin hall is live in san antonio, texas. hi, ben. >> dana, high. it was very emotional for me to see the doctors that patched me up and rebuilt me and took me back to my family and we're talking about whether or not military hospitals like where i was and they're ready for attack like we've seen in ziti ragaini el and ready for the mass social casualty events that have happened and yes, they are. once a year they plan for events such as this. they have attacks and just this

year atook part in events getting into and what the reaction would be and would the hospitals cope and are they ready? >> that's how we stay prepared as a region and system and when you're in a mass casualty incident, it's not you alone. you've got to work with your system around you and it's the same thing the military does the war is in afghanistan and iraq is over, perhaps the level of medicinal preparedness for larger scale injuries like the ones in conflict will perhaps that is falling off.

>> wee need to pull it back in or make sure it never leaves. the system is hemorrhaging badly of people that were very experienced in this. reporter: so, yes, look, they're training all the time for mass casualty events here and a concern among mel tear medicine and leave of experience they've gained over last 20 years and it's disappears and look at ways of people out of crew yanis and israel and keeping level of performance up and in case sadly something else, a war did again break out. someday that. >> dana: one thing we're doing at fox news, the corporation has, fox has given a million dollars to an organization to help with aid and one of the things that is included in that is aid for first responders for example who might have trauma after seeing some of the things they've seen and that's happening in israel. i know that you all witness that had in ukraine as well. could you speak to that in terms of how help. something like that can be for somebody who has

gone through that. we have it on our screen now, it's ujafedny.org. there's where you can go to donate. state of america some of the ptsd and -- >> i'm speaking to patients in home gameses here and it's the community keeping them strong and aid has to come in different ways and it comes in that first initial one but then it has to follow on the way and fox is being there and there's go to be help needed for a long time to come. >> dana: great to see you, bench press ming, take care and have fun reconnecting with the folks. >> thank you. >> bill: benjamin netanyahu says hamas is isis. the seens in israel proves him right. we learn more about the hostages

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release of 150 people being held by hamas and islamic jihad. he met with the u.s. counter parts, u.s. special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, steven gillan today. as that happens, the idf is outlining more of the targets they're hitting inside of the gaza strip including the personnel they're hitting. commandos hit a target, mohammad and they've secured a number of naval weapons and gear for underground operations that hamas spent years digging tunnels underneath the gaza strip and list a number of other notables from hamas and islamic jihad hilt and killed by the israeli forces, defense forces in the last several days.

muhammad ab sham. >> they should be spit out from the community of nations. no leader should meet them, no country should harbor them and those that do should be sanctioned. reporter: we continue to watch the israeli forces mass up and down the gaza strip. israeli armor, personnel carriers and artillery and tanks all along the gaza strip as idf hints at next phase of this operation could begin at any time and we're hearing from syrian state immediate >> that israeli air force planes struck two airports in damascus and aleppo in syria. when israel does this kind of thing, the air force and army

will strike targets to prevent iran-backed militants from resupplying. >> dana: thank you so much. in the last hour secretary of state antony blinken in israel met with survivors of these attacks. and he's also meeting right now in tel aviv with families of american hostaging being held by hamas terrorists and hersch is one of the hostages and his father is joining us now. your wife is in the meeting is and what do you think she'll get out of the meeting with secretary blinken? >> i don't know what she'll get out of the meeting with secretary blinken. we have been saying that we actually feel really held up and supported by the response from the u.s. government. we've been hearing from elected officials, senators, congress people, and others, the talk has been the right talk and we would

like to see some action now and if it's from the u.s. government, we'll take it. if it's from the u.s. government influencing other governments that could be players in the situation, we'll take it. from somebody getting help from humanitarian aid organizations, we'll take it. we need action. we need confirmation that our loved one who we know is wounded critically is okay. >> dana: jon, there's a picture of your son hersh on the screen and everybody can see that and what a beautiful smile this young man has. obviously you're not smiling. it's been six days. for people that aren't familiar with the story of what happened to him, do you mind retelling it here. >> yeah. the basic version is we were together as a family on friday night. the jewish sabbath and holiday. in synagogue together and at a great family dinner with two other families afterwards. we kissed him good-bye at 11:00 p.m. friday night. he was off with a backpack to go meet his best friend and we knew

they were going somewhere. didn't know where. and saturday morning i went to synagogue and there were already some booms happening in the distance and once i got there, the first air raid siren sounded and those of us in synagogue were in and out of the bomb shelter. after about an hour, we called it off and i went home and i walked in at about 9:30 saturday morning to my wife and daughters. they showed me two messages that had come in from our son hesh at 8:11 a.m. and the first one said i love you. the second one said i'm sorry. we didn't even know where he was. we sprung into action and my daughter found out there was this music festival. hersh posted on there and his friend he was with and a third friend away in greece and we contacted him and that third friend confirmed that they were at the festival. and we sprung into action. the rest of the day saturday we knew nothing. we were calling hospitals, we were doing everything we could

and over the coming days, we pieced together the story from eyewitnesses that we now know were with him in a bomb shelter. and the basic story that we know is at about 9:00 a.m. on saturday under heavy grenade and gunfire, hesrh was one of a handful of people taken out by -- under gunpoint from this bomb shelter. his left arm was blown off by a grenade or gunfire, we don't know. he fashioned for himself witnesses tell us some sort of a tourniquet and he was put on a pickup truck and driven off at 9:00 a.m. and has not been seen since. >> dana: i know that you have the most -- as you said the support of your family and friends and isr isr israelis the around you, you have our support, and we see that beautiful young man and we can't imagine how much you love him. we hope that your wife, rachel

goldberg meeting with secretary antony blinken right now, while we speak, has some comfort from that meeting and as you said, you're looking for some action next. jon polin, we'd love to stay in touch with you as we're with you in hoping for the best here. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> dana: bill. >> bill: that's tough. the biden administration now facing a lot of pressure now to take action on iran. the american hostages as you hear are being held at the hand of hamas terrorists. hhugh dugan is former acting affairs of hostages and united delegate to the united nations. thank you r being here, hugh. 1989-2015, that's 26 years by by math, and that's a long time. >> dana: saw a lot during those years. >> bill: saw and lot and survived too by the way. >> thank you. i >> bill: what are we up against and what should the administration do with iran and how do you link the $6 billion

with what's happening today? >> in our massive military complex, the one weapon of war that we least study and understand is the taking of american hostages. whenever it happens, we're awoken in the middle of the night and can't find our slippers, our lights, or glasses and we're stumbling arnold. we need to study and understand the phenomena and be prepared when these things happen to us. currently there are americans endangered in gaza and could be as many as 600 living in the region that could be at risk. our principle task now is to make sure their captors understand they're goes to be worth more to them alive than dead. >> dana: how do we do that? >> establish consequences and don't wait for them to tell us what the terms are. we don't say, okay, what's this going to cost us then go to mall and stop at atm on the way. we don't have $6 billion every day to throw at these problems and we have to develop the consequences up front and say this is too expensive for you,

you can't afford this and can't afford the time to understand just what the consequences will be on you. >> bill: doesn't appear that message has been transferred to them. >> i'm hoping they're taking it seriously and that consequences depend upon action. we need to implement action and i'm not going to say what that may or may not b. i'm not in the administration now and i carry no information. i don't want to mislead viewers whatsoever. but to look at hostage phenomena, one has to establish consequences and deliver upon them. >> dana: one of the things that dan and "the wall street journal" wrote about today is that the planning to go after innocent people was made by men sitting around a conference table figuring out what they were going to do. this was a strategic target. we might see more of this. but you're also talking about possible urban warfare. which we also know is very, very difficult and could put everybody in harm's way including the rescuers. >> absolutely.

trying to go into a rescue situation especially when terrorists are holding hostages has had very, very mixed results over time and odds are maybe even and we're bound to venture into very dangerous territory if we don't go in a way that's pact criminal and effective in the end, which saves lives and makes the point that we stand by our peoplement taking of americans s is no less serious than a declaration of war against our country. each hostage case is not a battle. each case is its own war and we need to manage that effectively and need more resources in washington and there's a special presidential envoy for hostage affairs and it's a small office and it's a one man pentagon. we need to build up that capacity and as a public understand that when americans are taken. it's an act of war and we need to be ready with maximal response as soon as we get that indication. >> bill: i was trying to draw a connection here. you're very eloquent at this. from 1979, the american embassy in teheran to what's happening right now in gaza and in between that time, we've got evan

gershkovich from "the wall street journal" and they treat him as a prisoner. i would day care he's a hostage under putin and i mean, now you have this, i mean, do you have a common thread between all this? >> well, the use of hostage taking and arise since the 70s and cannot tolerate that and iran has been on the forefront of establishing this horrible practice. this could be president auditors hostage headache. >> what a great guest to have today and stay in touch with you. thank you. accident in questioner will the white house take action as the war rages on?

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he says the united states has israel's back. he's been meeting with government officials including prime minster benjamin netanyahu throughout the day. the u.s. says blinken and israel have been really working on trying to find ways to get those hostages back. those americans that hamas is hold. the secretary revealed the 25 americans are now confirmed dead in the terrorist attack. blinken says the u.s. is and will continue to provide military equipment in support for israel. >> the message that i bring to israel is this. you might be strong enough on your own to defend yourself, as long as america exists, you will never have to. >> reporter: blinken traveled to a donation center to speak with volunteers including the young american israeli dual citizen. she and her boyfriend survivorred the hamas attack at a concert in israel saturday morning. they are volunteering to help other survivors. >> we lost lot of our close

friends, lots of family members. there are lot of people that we know that are kidnapped and now in gaza. we went through horror. i'm just like 24. i never imagined something like this would happen. >> reporter: senior state department officials say blinken will fly to jordan and make other stops. they are focused on getting american hostages released and pressing governments to keep other groups from joining the fight. officials say the united states is working on arrange private flights to get american citizens out of israel. >> >> dana: thank you. >> i want to show some of the military assets in the eastern mediterranean how they may help with this whole operation. the uss gerald ford strike group in eastern mediterranean. anywhere between half dozen to 10 different maritime assets in

the strike group. you've got back in norfolk, virginia, uss eisenhower will deploy. take about two weeks to arrive in eastern mediterranean. that is the plan right now on behalf of u.s. military. why is this happening? with us now commander dave sears, retired navy seal, he's author of a book. my question will be, what signal does this send to hamas or hezbollah or iran? would we get involved? >> i think absolutely. we should get involved. the taking of the u.s. hostages is the driving line. your last guest says this is an ax of war -- act of war united states in those efforts, you want to

pre-position, different navy strike groups to you're prepared to act when necessary. >> what might that look like, commander? >> that's the tough one. we always avoid the tactical what it looks like. i can tell you that urban environments are very challenging and require a lot of people. you're going to see some sort of -- it can be in coordination with, idf. there's some coordination. how that comes about depends on where they are. can you locate them? how deep in the city are they? ideally, we just hamas to give them up and turn them over to us. >> think about this, raid in gaza whenever it begins, assuming that it does, you know the israelis have extensive experience with this. what hamas have shown, they have an imagination that able to

penetrate that fence. who knows what hamas has built inside these tunnels and inside these buildings in gaza. commander, what will be your concern if you lead a group in there? >> well, you've essentially have -- the last time the israelis went was in 2014, operation protective edge. that was like three division, 75,000 reservists. it was 50-day battle. hamas has had ten years to also learn from that, four to five places they've been digging tunnels. to put it in perspective is isis had two years to dig doubles. that took 100,000 iraqi troops time months and they effectively destroyed the entire city. urban combat requires three times as much ammunition.

the streets in gaza are extremely narrow. it's really challenging. hundreds of miles of tunnels for all we know under there. >> we also know there was an intelligence failure. as we learn more about that. at this point, you have to assume that perhaps hamas terrorist knows something that the israelis don't. however, i want to get your last take on this. david hardin in the "new york times" says, israel could be walking into a trap in gaza. do you think that's possible? >> absolutely possible. you want to have -- i see israel doing more siege warfare and proceeding very sort of slowly. i don't see them charging in. as you're seeing with the airstrikes, artillery bombardments, mechanickized

tanks. we will bombard that city and get as much intelligence as they can. you can see them secure those perimeters and that fence line so that hamas cannot leak out and cause any more damage other than via rockets. it could be a trap. you do not want to get sucked in that without a plan. >> thank you for your time, commander. appreciate it. >> i think we'll need to talk to him again in the coming days. >> we shall. we got number of things still to come throughout the day here. we'll on it. >> including remarks from the secretary of state antony blinken possibly within the next hour. >> i thought when he stepped to the microphone early, really powerful comments. >> harris faulkner will take you through the next hour. thank you for being with us. "the faulkner focus" is next. >> harris: we begin with breaking news. the united states secretary of state antony blinken is on the ground in israel today showing solidarity with ou