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Israel Remembers 1,200 People Killed In October 7 Terror Attacks; White House: Will Push For Lebanon Ceasefire When The Moment Is Right; Israeli Military Issues Evacuation Orders In Southern Gaza After Ordering Residents To Evacuate The North; Milton Strengthens Into A Category 5 Hurricane. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired October 07, 2024 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[15:00:39]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: It's 8:00 p.m. in London, 10:30 p.m. in Tehran, 10:00 p.m. here in Tel Aviv.

I'm Jim Sciutto. Thanks so much for joining me today on CNN NEWSROOM. And let's get right to the news.

We begin today here in Israel, where the country is marking one painful year since the worst terror attack in its history, as well as one year into a devastating war in Gaza. Both of which have left indelible marks on the Middle East.

At 6:29 a.m., Israel lowered its flags to half-staff to mark the very moment Hamas terrorists unleashed sheer horror, slaughtering more than 1,200 people. Men, women and children, dragging Holocaust survivors through the streets, raping.

Pain, the grief and frustration are still raw as families remembered those lost, even returning to the site of the massacre.

Those are the moments of silence on the grounds of the Nova music festival. A memorial, a family and survivors disrupted by a bone chilling scream. That is Israel today.

Across the border in Gaza, the war has killed more than 41,000 Palestinians. It has prompted famine, an outbreak of polio, an unparalleled refugee crisis, one displaced Palestinian reflected on the year of war telling CNN, quote, we are bodies without souls.

And the war is now widening into Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, and Israel now weighing retaliation against Iran. International efforts for a ceasefire in Gaza led by the U.S., it failed time and time again, as did a U.S.-led effort for a ceasefire in Lebanon. Hamas, we should remind you, still holds more than 100 people hostage.

With me now to look back on October 7 and forward in this ongoing wars in an international diplomatic editor, Nic Robertson.

And, Nic, you went to that Nova festival site, which was one of in a day of horrors, one of the most shocking horrors -- all those young people, the hundreds of dead, those burned-out cars along the road leading to tell us what it was like as you interacted with families and survivors there today?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yeah. I think that idea that there were so many young people that we witnessed that today. So many parents, just emptying their pain and they were empty and they been empty for a year and you could see that there was at the site there you have these little stands and memorials for each individual person with the picture and there was one, there was a man standing by the picture and I can see from the face of the on the picture and his face, this was the father. Of course, he stood that red-eyed for two hours.

There was another father so broken, who came and showed us pictures of his son who was a police officer who'd come to try to help the people at the festival, but he died and he showed us eulogies about his son and he showed us it is a police station have been named after his son and the mother who was kissing the image of her daughter. And you just you got the sense that their lives are so ripped apart and in no way put back together.

And that was really the takeaway that so much grief and pain and other family members telling us we don't feel that we've moved on and that was -- yeah.

SCIUTTO: The sounds of the war interrupted that moment down there. Similarly, there was, there was a Nova memorial here in Tel Aviv as well, while we were there, there was an air raid siren, emptied out for a moment and saw the smoke trail of the interceptor missile rising above it and it's just a reminder that all these months later, this year later, and there they are leaving their hard to see as you look up into the sky. But there was a smoke trail there of an interceptor familiar sight here.

But all these months later, that the war still intervenes and the way the war is expanded.

ROBERTSON: And where we were at the Nova festival commemoration, there was an Apache gunship circling overhead all the time. There had been an increase in security at the border.

[15:05:01]

You can hear the Apache gunship opening up with its automatic, with its heavy machine gun fire into Gaza, a conflict is going on. You could hear a hellfire missile being fired from the Apache. You could hear the outgoing artillery.

And when those rockets were fired, the five rockets were fired by Hamas from Gaza to central Israel today, almost immediately, there were, there were fast jets in place, huge explosions, so that war is very much on. As you said, it's expanded into the north.

And I spoke to a couple of people there about not just their suffering, but the suffering in Gaza. And the other people, and they're very much isolated from it people only seem to see their own suffering and they don't seem to see the other side. And there's this real determination that these -- these Hezbollah, Hamas are enemies and the military needs to do their job this is what, this is where the country is politically and it's mired now deeper and deeper into the -- into these, into these battles.

SCIUTTO: And I think I sense the same thing. It's a greater and greater distance between the peoples, right? And an inability to see across that frontier to the folks on the other side and to sympathize in any way.

ROBERTSON: Even deeper than one could have imagined a year ago. We're already you know, the sides are buried and their own views. But now, I mean --

SCIUTTO: It's a hardening.

ROBERTSON: Hardening.

SCIUTTO: Nic Robertson, thanks so much for sharing.

On this day in Israel, there are moments of reflection. There were also moments of protest.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

SCIUTTO: That's the sound of hostage families sounding a siren outside the home of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem. They are still demanding a deal to bring their loved ones home.

So, with me now is someone who knows that anguish so personally, Moshe Lavi. Hamas militants kidnapped Moshe's brother-in-law, Omri Miran, from his home in kibbutz Nahal Oz, one year ago today, in front of his wife and two young daughters. Moshe and his family have been tirelessly fighting for Omri's release ever sense.

Moshe, it's so good to have you here.

I -- when I speak to hostage families whose pain continues, I -- my heart goes out to you. Can you tell us how your family is doing on this just awful anniversary?

MOSHE LAVI, BROTHER-IN-LAW OMRI MIRAN BEING HELD BY HAMAS: Thank you, Jim. You know, let me quote my sister's post earlier this morning when she asked people not to ask how she's doing, not to ask how our girls are doing.

We are in a pretty -- we are frustrated and we're angry. We're sad because it's been a year and our loved ones since captive by Hamas terrorist organization because our government doesn't seem to prioritize bringing home the hostages over other objectives and international community keep tolerating Iran, Qatar, Turkey, who funded and sponsor Hamas and allow the October 7 atrocities to even happen in the first place.

So that's how we feel today and it all comes together, but will keep on fighting, keep on voicing our grief and our demands for justice and for our government to prioritize bringing the hostages above other objectives.

SCIUTTO: Moshe, immediately following October 7th, last year, the government said its priorities were defeating Hamas, but also getting the hostages home. Why do you believe -- why do you believe this government is not prioritizing that's second part, that second promise of getting those hostages back to safety.

LAVI: I think our legitimate security concerns that are not allowing progress in the negotiations. Those concerns relates to the day after the war with Hamas leadership insist to remain there, not going on exile to preserve their government operators that orchestrated the massacre, to hold the Philadelphi corridor and keep the Rafah crossing open under their supervision. So, there are legitimate security concerns, but at the same time, we don't get the sense from the government that they are committed to bring home the hostages, in the same way they work committed earlier in this war.

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And that sends stems from the fact that there seems to be illegitimate concerns or considerations -- political considerations or preserving the coalition government, personal considerations related to the legal entanglement that the prime minister found himself over the past few years and so there is a breach of trust and that breach of trust reach its height on October 7, that deadly day when the military has failed to come to the kibbutzim and to towns like my hometowns, Sderot. As soon as they were expected to come and the government was not able (AUDIO GAP) for weeks.

But that breach of trust reached even higher threshold now, a year into this war.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, I talked to -- I interviewed the father of one of the soldiers who died in the Nahal Oz military base and waited six hours for rescue that never came, sharing similar frustration to what you described there.

Omri and your sister, they have two daughters, of course, your nieces. So many memories robbed from them as they wait for their father to come home. I wonder, can you describe how they -- how are they handling all this time with their father away?

LAVI: And today, we actually shared on Instagram page, we set out for Omri, bring Omri home a video we created showing what running -- what this year meant for Roni and Alma (ph), how they grew, what they did starting kindergarten, celebrating their birthdays, third birthday for Roni, first birthday for Alma, for Alma making her first steps, uttering her first words. And then we tried to show how much was robbed from Omri, how much was robbed from them.

It's as if they're going in a world where their father is a poster. They go in a world where violence is tolerated, where we don't see an end to the current violence because of various kind of elements that are contributing to it, both under our control, but most definitely under the control of our enemies. And I hope it could bring Omri home so that they can have the father

they deserve to have, a father who dedicated so much time to raise them. He would spend so much time with girls because it my sister to the devote time to develop her career. He's an amazing father and Roni, she speaks to him everyday. She has a poster of him above their bed, talked to him, she wishes him good night, and she misses him so much, and much older than (INAUDIBLE).

SCIUTTO: As the war expands now, of course, not just in Gaza, but in Lebanon and now this expectation of strikes, further strikes on Iran is it hard to keep up hope for a ceasefire deal? Do you fear that as the war expands, it makes it less likely that there will be a hostage agreement?

LAVI: I think we are farter away from the agreement now compared to a few months ago because as I said, there are different contributing factors to that. I think the axis powers in this in our present day, led by Iran and its proxies miscalculated. They misunderstood what this strategy would lead Israel but to what extent it will lead Israel's determination into war.

And I think Iran needs to understand it loses its assets and will continue to lose its assets as long as Hamas regime in Gaza is prolonged, but it doesn't seem like they do. I think they're not operating in a rational, neorealist way, but rather through an ideological radical lens.

And I tried to emphasize that to decision-makers two weeks ago, I was here in New York with the UNGA 79 out and I met some relevant regional and other countries and we told them back to the Iranians, understand your interests are at stake because you keep -- we're not willing to push Sinwar to a deal, speaks to the Qataris. They're not doing enough.

And at the same time, they need to press Prime Minister Netanyahu to understand he's risking our social contract that bind us as a society and he is prioritizing interests that should not be part of the equation.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. Well, Moshe Lavi, thanks much for joining and we hope that sometime soon you get good news about your brother-in-law, Omri. Thanks for joining.

LAVI: Thank you so much.

SCIUTTO: Well, the organization United Hatzalah, a volunteer emergency medical service, says it received more than 4,700 calls from both soldiers and civilians following the October 7 attacks.

[15:15:12]

The group's president and CEO, Eli Beer, took its first emergency call that day and so many others. He joins me now.

Thank you for joining us, Eli. You say you got the first emergency call at 6:30 in the morning. Of course, at 6:29 that the attack began. Tell us about that call and your reaction to it.

ELI BEER, PRESIDENT & CEO, UNITED HATZALAH: Well, we got the first calls really, really, really just as it started hundreds of missiles. In the first 30 minutes of the attack, we had in Israel, 1,500 missiles launched towards the citizens living everywhere and people started calling her from everywhere about their hearing bomb falling next to the homes. They hear glass breaking in their homes. And then we heard a call from one of our volunteers, still love you who would like to live in a kibbutz called Nir Oz, beautiful, calm kibbutz, beautiful people and he ran out to save his next-door neighbors were injured.

This is the Bibas family, the red haired children, who everyone knows now and pray for every day there were kidnapped to live went out to save lives with this jacket wearing, wearing a bulletproof vest and a helmet. And he told his wife those stay in the shelter because they live in a tiny kibbutz and he just wanted to make sure she's fine while he's going to save peoples lives and he was a paramedic, a volunteer and he never came back home. His wife came about a game for three months later with their third child.

And this is only one incident that started our day. We tried calling him on the walkie-talkie, but he wasn't answering it. Then we saw his walkie-talkie in Gaza. So we thought he was kidnapped.

We had that day the worst day of our lives thinking about all we wanted to go is help people and save people but three of our volunteers, unfortunately, while they were saving lives were killed. One of them was an Arab volunteer, a Muslim, and this was a tragedy there just started the early in the morning, around 6:30 and still going on today, this is October 7 now. And it's 10:00 p.m. at night, and we're still going through this. Now with Lebanon or from the Yemen, from the Houthis, or from Iran, which is the head of the snake.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, it's only expanding, the fighting. We understand there was more than just the physical wounds that you had to treat that day. Tell us about the work your organization did then and does now to try to get ahead of the clear and lasting psychological trauma.

BEER: Well, you know, many years were going through these terrorist attacks. For 35 years in my life, I'm putting in, I went into the biggest the worst terrorist attacks in Israel and I put everything together 35 years and activity of saving people in United Hatzalah, nothing gets closer to October 7. We got early in the years, many years ago, we started creating a first response, not only of paramedics but of psycho-trauma volunteers, which is unbelievable.

I think it's one of the only EMS organizations in the world. And when we get a call for our national command center of someone in trouble we try thinking of who could help physically and who could help mentally. We have a psycho-trauma time of professional of October 7, we had thousands of calls that weren't medical related, but mental-related, Holocaust survivors who thought this is the last day of their life. They are going through another holocaust now in Israel, 2020. And so we send professional psychologists to their homes to help them go through this.

All of Israel, we treated 12,500 people in the first 24 hours and these lot of them were just emotionally helps. One of them was eight years, 9-years-old, Mikhail called us. He was hiding in a closet in Kfar Aza, with his sister, shoe closet, tiny little shoe closets, smaller than the closet behind me. And he was hiding and he calls us for help and we couldn't get to him because that 300 terrorists in the kibbutz, 300 terrorists were trying to kill every Jew there.

And we had to spend -- we didn't know how to get the kid out. He was hiding with her sister and he said his parents were just murdered. He saw his parents getting killed and assist her of the guile disappeared. And he thinks that she was killed as well. And we had a psychologist, Tamar, on the phone with Mikhail and Amalija is 6-year- old sister for 12 hour straight from morning until 8:00 at night.

[15:20:06]

And this is part of the work we were doing that day. I think the heroes of Israel, the heroes of United Hatzalah, unbelievable what we went through then and what we still going through today, actually these moments.

SCIUTTO: No question. You still see -- I certainly still see the pain when I encounter survivors from that day.

Eli Beer, thanks so much for the work that you do, and thanks so much for joining us.

BEER: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Well, one year later, hard questions remain unanswered about warnings the military and intelligence ignored, really a catastrophic -- catastrophic failure of intelligence. Why was Hamas able to carry out this horrific attack? I'll give you one vision of that here.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO (voice-over): One year after October 7 visiting the Nahal Oz base in southern Israel brings Eyal Eshel both a chance to honor his daughter, Roni, and the most painful memories.

EYAL ESHEL, FATHER OF OCTOBER 7 ATTACK VICTIM: From here, they came in the October 7.

SCIUTTO: This is where they entered the --

ESHEL: Yeah, this is the way they came from Gaza.

SCIUTTO: Roni was one of more than a dozen IDF soldiers in an all female observer unit who raised the alarm as Hamas terrorists cross just into Israel that morning, after warning for months of an impending attack. RONI ESHEL, IDF OBSERVATION SOLDIER: Four people are running towards the fence, confirm received. I see two armed people running towards the fence, confirm received.

SCIUTTO: As Hamas fighters overran the base, even filming themselves as they did it, Roni and her fellow observers waited six hours for a rescue that never came. They were killed along with more than 30 other Israeli soldiers at the base while several others were taken hostage.

For Ayel today, each location inside the base brings pain.

ESHEL: Here is the table that the girls was sitting and eating and smiling and laughing.

SCIUTTO: Just what they were doing the very night before the October 7 attack in this video recorded by Roni's fellow soldier. This week in the destroyed operations room, Ayel lit a candle to mark the Jewish new year at the very same spot where Roni issued those ominous warnings and close to where she died.

ESHEL: We don't have any holidays. We hate holidays. She's not here. She's not with us.

SCIUTTO: This is where the observer unit was based. This is where they were issuing those warnings prior to the attack that something was coming and sadly, on the morning of October 7, this is where many of them were killed.

The IDF's failure, not just to heed the observers warning, but also to come to their rescue, remain crucial questions a full year since October 7, part of a much broader security failure that day. It was on these now burned up computer screens that Roni and her colleagues told their parents they'd seen worrying signs from Hamas, including accounts of fighters testing the fence line.

The Israeli military ignored other warning signs as well, including these training videos Hamas posted openly online in the months before, and earlier intelligence sense uncovered by Israeli media about Hamas's intent to attack Israeli communities and even take multiple hostages.

Retired Brigadier General Amir Avivi is former deputy commander of the IDF's Gaza division.

AMIR AVIVI, FORMER DEPUTY COMMANDER, IDF GAZA DIVISION: They thought that Hamas is mostly worried about stability inside Gaza and the economy.

SCIUTTO: So you're saying it was a misreading of Hamas rather than not listening to internal warnings.

AVIVI: Generally speaking, yes. But I think that also at a certain point where the observers said again and again and again that I think things that are out of usual, at a certain point that were commanded and said, okay, that's it. We don't want to hear about this anymore. SCIUTTO: The IDF and Israeli government have insisted a full investigation into what went wrong that day cannot take place while the country is fighting a war on multiple fronts now.

ESHEL: We put the picture of the whole girls today --

SCIUTTO: Ayel and the other families have built a memorial for their loss daughters overlooking Nahal Oz base.

ESHEL: Here is Roni.

SCIUTTO: But they're still waiting for what he wants most now, accountability.

Has anyone from the army or the government ever said to you, I take responsibility?

ESHEL: No one, no one.

SCIUTTO: Has anyone ever said I'm sorry?

ESHEL: No one. I need answers and I need the responsibility.

[15:25:04]

And I need the truth.

SCIUTTO: A father's simple demand after the worst loss imaginable.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: We will have much more ahead live from Tel Aviv as Israel marks one year since the October 7 attacks. And we're also live on the ground in Lebanon where much of Israel's focus has now shifted as it tries to take on Hezbollah there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

A long year of war here has haunted the Biden administration, which has spearheaded hostage and ceasefire negotiations that have yet to materialize.

Today, President Biden let a yahrzeit candle at the White House remembering those lost on October 7. In the coming hour, Vice President Kamala Harris and the second gentleman, Doug Emhoff, will plant a pomegranate tree which represents hope and righteousness and Judaism. This will be at the vice president's official residence.

CNN senior White House correspondent MJ Lee joins me now.

I wonder, MJ, where does the White House believe negotiations, efforts stand right now for a ceasefire proposal for Lebanon, where of course, Israel's war is expanding right now. MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE: Yeah, Jim. You know, not only is

there no end in sight for the Gaza conflict, we are entirely uncertain where things are headed as far as the hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah are concerned across the Israel-Lebanon border, you'll recall that some days ago, last month, the U.S. and a number of its allies put out a 21-day ceasefire proposal for that conflict and that appears to be going nowhere.

And I'm actually just coming out of the White House press briefing where the press secretary made quite clear that that is not being actively pushed right now. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We're going to be having regular consultations with the Israelis, with the Lebanese and others regarding the right moment two to press for such an agreement.

But ultimately, that's where we need to be, in order for both sides, both civilians on both sides to return home.

REPORTER: Will you say you're looking for the right moment to make a push for that proposal. Are you saying that moment is not now?

JEAN-PIERRE: We're going to have to those conversations. And we're certainly -- when the right to press for such an agreement, we will do so. But the conversation, those discussions continue.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEE: And, Jim, I just want to remind everyone when this proposal was first announced last month, U.S. officials strongly suggested that Israel and Hezbollah were going to sign onto it that basically this was a done deal.

Of course, we now know where things stand as far as that proposal is concerned. Benjamin Netanyahu came out hours after the announcement, essentially rejecting the idea altogether. Certainly not the first time, Jim, as you know, very well, where President Biden the prime minister, have appear to be on totally different pages publicly when speaking about different events in the Middle East. So this is a tough moment for the administration, not only on this run and of course, on the Gaza front as well -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, yeah. He had those comments and yahoo then, of course, there was the strike that killed Hezbollah leader, as well. MJ Lee at the White House, thanks so much.

Well, the 366 days since October 7 have brought death, destruction, and despair in incredible numbers to the people of Gaza. More than 41,000 people killed. That's perhaps a conservative estimate as thousands remain buried under the rubble, more than half of those are women and children, approximately 90 percent of the population of Gaza has been displaced many forced to move repeatedly.

Today is Israel issued more evacuation orders as it launches a new ground offensive inside Gaza. It struck the Jabalia refugee camp as well as a hospital in central Gaza. Israel is also intensifying attacks on Lebanon to the north, striking Beirut some of the most intense bombing since its war against Hezbollah began.

The IDF issued evacuation orders for southern Lebanon as well telling residents there not to return until further notice.

As Israel fights on multiple fronts, tensions are escalating as well in the occupied West Bank during a military incursion into a refugee camp on Monday morning. Israeli forces killed 12-year-old boy there.

CNN's Jomana Karadsheh is in Beirut.

Jomana, we're seeing these evacuation orders to residents of southern Lebanon. Beirut continues to be under heavy, heavy bombing.

Where do people have to go that they're confident that it's safe there?

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, look at the numbers, 1.2 million people estimated to have been displaced within two weeks. So you've got a government here that has been trying to set up shelters, to try and cope with the largest ever displacement crisis in the history of this country.

But they just simply can't keep up with the numbers. They have a few hundred shelters but then you end up with people having you need to go and stay with family and relatives and we've seen here in Beirut so many people on the streets still in parks, and they've been out there for days now and when you talk about the south, you see people moving up north -- moving towards what they would see as safer areas, whether it's the city of Sidon, whether it's here in Beirut, whether up to the mountains, but you also have people Syrians and Lebanese who have been crossing the border into Syria in search of safety. And that really says a lot about the situation.

The latest figures we're getting from the United Nations refugee agency, they say that since September 24, a quarter of a million people have crossed the border into Syria and you know, if you look at what is going on this intensification in bombardment that we have seen, whether its in the south, weather here in the southern suburbs of Beirut and in the east of the country. This is only exacerbating this crisis that they are dealing, you know, here in Beirut's over the weekend, we saw some of the most intense airstrikes on the southern suburbs.

Now a lot of people have left the southern suburbs. But then you also have a very dire situation, Jim, in the south of the countries you mentioned more evacuation orders issued today, more than 100 villagers now, under these evacuation orders, and people just don't know when or if they'll ever return to their homes.

[15:35:09]

People that we've spoken to say that they just don't know.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, no sign of the war certainly abating.

Jomana Karadsheh in Beirut, thanks so much.

Joining me now is Major General Amos Yadlin. He's former chief of Israeli military intelligence.

Thanks so much for taking the time. We appreciate you joining.

MAJ. GEN. AMOS YADLIN (RET.), FORMER CHIEF OF ISRAEL MILITARY INTELLIGENCE: Pleasure, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Of course, as you know, there's a great deal of intention -- of attention in this country, as well as elsewhere as to Israel's intention to retaliate against Iran for those missile strikes that we saw days ago.

I wonder if you could describe your view of what the goal of such retaliatory action would be. Would it be simply to send a message, perhaps inflict some damage? Or do you expect that it will be an attempt to perhaps incur a decisive blow against Iran?

YADLIN: Yeah, before we go to Iran, let me refer to your previous conversation. We are one year into the war and we have to remember all the time who have started it and who refuse to terminate. Sinwar attacked Israel on the 7 of October. Nasrallah attacked Israel on the 8 of October, a year ago, and both of them refuse to stop the war.

So everybody who has complaints -- everybody in Lebanon want to have a safe place have to remove himself from any Hezbollah position in Lebanon, and all these people used to live near Hezbollah, used to give their homes to missiles and rockets and all Hezbollah terror military. So the fact that Israel finally decided to destroy Hezbollah should not surprise anybody because you have to remember who is holding hostages and refuse to release them for reaching notices for the end of the war. This what we want to achieve.

And now to Iran -- yes, Israel has to decide what is the strategic goal of its operation against Iran, because Iran fired twice hundreds of ballistic missile. No country suffered from such an attack in one night in April and the second night in October 1st.

So our singling again to Iran that it is vulnerable as we did in April, all its now a real retaliation but retaliations that need to achieve deterrence, that the Iranians will not think again about doing it. All, we prepare the battlefield for going against the head of the octopus because Elon used to help forces, Hezbollah, the Shia militia in Iraq, the Shia militia in Syria, the Houthis, against Israel.

Maybe it is time and this is exactly what Israel is now contemplating upon, to go to the head of the octopus and reach the dismantling of the axis of evil that Iran have done in the Middle East.

SCIUTTO: I understand there's been an effort to get U.S. support for Israel's plans. If the two sides do not come to an agreement or if they disagree on the scope of Israel's attack, will Israel proceed on its own without U.S. support or approval? YADLIN: I think it is the interest of the U.S. to show its allies in

the Middle East, more than Israel, the Saudis, the UAE that were attacked by Iran, directly in 2019 and 2022, it is a time that the U.S. will join with the Sunni Arab countries in the Gulf and Israel against Iran.

If Israel will be left them alone, Israeli know what to do. We have four families of targets. We have the military targets, the Iranians claiming that they fire only at military bases and Mossad base.

[15:40:04]

So we can operate in the same manner, tit for tat, and attacking their missile bases, production line of missiles, air defense. We can go to a regime targets. We can go to the oil industry, which is the main economy with sources of Iran, very much like what the IDF has done in Hudaydah in Yemen, and Israel can take advantage of the nuclear program.

I think the U.S. will very much not like the nuclear targets and the oil targets, but I hope that will join to Israel and they support Israel in going against the military power of Iran and the regime.

SCIUTTO: When you say go after -- and I've heard this phrase frequently -- go after the head of the octopus, is it your view that the intent is to damage the head as it were or attempt to remove it, attempt to remove that leadership? Is regime change a potential goal?

YADLIN: See, Israel has no war with the Iranian people. The Iranian people used to be our friend. And most of them hate the regime.

When I'm saying go after the head of the octopus, I'm saying that Iran developed two very formidable military tools against Israel. One is Hezbollah in Lebanon, with hundreds of thousands of missiles and rockets and drones. And the second missile that they -- missile force, ballistic missile force that they fired against Israel. Israel destroys Hezbollah in last September. Hezbollah is not the kind of strategic sweats that will destroy Israel that Iran planned.

And its also prove that its can stand 200 of ballistic missiles without a serious strategic (INAUDIBLE). So maybe its the time to show the Iranians that bigger plan to encircle Israel with a fire from all over the borders and to collapse Israel from every direction is now over.

SCIUTTO: Major General Amos Yadlin, we appreciate you taking the time and sharing your views.

YADLIN: The pleasure being with CNN.

SCIUTTO: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:46:19] SCIUTTO: The Supreme Court is back in session today with cases covering guns, pornography and transgender medical care. The justices might also have to settle a range of last minute election fights that could potentially face a contested election outcome between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, which could thrust the court further into the center of political controversy. Polls show current trust in the Supreme Court is near record lows. The new term runs in the next summer.

Coming up, preparations are underway in Florida now as hurricane Milton makes its way toward the state's west coast. It is now a major category five storm. Is expected to weaken possibly will weaken possibly before making landfall. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:13]

SCIUTTO: Hurricane Milton has rapidly intensified into a powerful category five storm, as it makes its way through the Gulf of Mexico. Milton is expected to make landfall in Florida Wednesday evening where it could potentially weakened to a category three but still bringing with it dangerous storm surge, heavy rain, high winds, and flooding. Florida residents are preparing for their second hurricane less than two weeks. Evacuation orders are in place already in some counties.

Meteorologist Elisa Raffa has been tracking it for us at the CNN weather center.

It looks bad on the radar. Tell us what -- how bad it's going to be.

ELISA RAFFA, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It's been so hard to watch this intensifying all day. We've been watching it intensify with our jaws to the floor. I mean, look at this satellite, it as that perfectly symmetrical eye that buzzsaw shape, that donut. It is textbook the way it looks on satellite right now, with 175 mile per hour winds sitting us south and west, about 700 miles of Tampa.

The intensification today has been one for the record books. This was a tropical storm yesterday, I went to sleep. It was a category one hurricane, and we're up to 175 miles per hour. The winds have come up 100 miles per hour in just 24 hours. It is just incredible the way this has intensified.

It will scrape the Yucatan peninsula as that massive category five storm. Then it heads towards Florida. We are expecting it to weaken some as it gets there because we have dry air, we have some wind shear that can chip away at its intensity, where were still looking at a massive category three or four hurricane that will also by the way, get wider.

So the impacts could span for more miles. Pink is the hurricane watch and were worried about this along the Gulf Coast where we could be looking at winds over 110 miles per hour from Tampa down towards Fort Myers, tropical-storm-force and hurricane-force winds across its the peninsula. We're very closely watching the storm surge forecast if it gets to eight to 12 feet or more in Tampa Bay, that would be the most surge that they've ever seen.

They broke their records just a couple of weeks ago with Helene and this could be even worse than that, especially if that eye goes to the north of Tampa, that will funnel in all that storm surge into the bay. We'll be looking at storm surge on the entire west coast of Florida, up to 10 feet, even down to Fort Myers. This could really be something that the Tampa area hasn't seen before.

They haven't had a major hurricane pass this close since 1921 -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Goodness. Let's hope they're getting out soon. Elisa Raffa, thanks so much.

And we will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: The days after October 7, the war in Gaza, expanding war in this region have all become political issues and the upcoming U.S. presidential race. It is less than a month before election day and today the candidates paid tribute to the victims of October 7, among them, some 46 Americans killed, 12 taken hostage, seven still in captivity.

Former president Donald Trump attended a memorial in Queens, New York, at the Ohel gravesite flanked by Jewish faith leaders as well as the conservative podcaster, Ben Shapiro.

[15:55:05]

His running mate, J.D. Vance, met with hostage families in Washington, also attended a demonstration where he delivered a forceful rebuke of the Biden-Harris policy, accusing them of inaction on a hostage deal.

Across the country, in Los Angeles, Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz toured the Nova exhibition that is an art installation honoring those massacred at the Nova music festival. Statements from Walz and Vice President Harris who holds a commemorative tree planting in the next hour, reaffirmed the Biden administration's commitment to a ceasefire and hostage deal, as well as America's ongoing support for Israel.

Well, thanks so much for joining me today on this anniversary of October 7th. I'm Jim Sciutto reporting live from Tel Aviv.

"QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" is up next.