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IDF Announces Safe Passage From With Gaza, North of South; Jordan's FM: Our Top Priority Should Be Humanitarian Aid; Horrifying Video Shows The Moments At The Site Of Israel Music Festival; House Republicans In Disarray As Jim Jordan Hunts For Enough Votes To Be Speaker. Aired 8-9a ET

Aired October 14, 2023 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:38]

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome to CNN this morning. It is Saturday, October 14. I'm Victor Blackwell.

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: And I am Amara Walker, thank you so much for joining us as we continue to follow the war between Israel and Hamas. We are now in the final hour of Israel's six-hour safe passage window for people in northern Gaza who are being evacuated to the south. The Israeli military has ordered more than a million people to move now. Gaza's health care facilities in the north say, they will not be evacuating saying this warning is a death sentence for patients. The Israel Defense Forces is accusing Hamas of actively trying to stop people from leaving so that they can use them as quote human shields, but Hamas says that Israel is still carrying out airstrikes.

Now CNN has verified videos from the scene of a large explosion along an evacuation route south of Gaza City. We want to warn you this video is disturbing.

BLACKWELL: Yes. This was recorded Friday before the safe passage window was set up. Look closely here you see the plumes of smoke. The car is burning. Hamas says that 70 people were killed in this strike. 200 others were wounded.

CNN has reached out to the IDF for comment on any airstrikes in that area. And now the sudden sudden surge of people into southern Gaza has put a lot of pressure on the Rafah border crossing into Egypt, the only place to actually leave Gaza. Egypt says they have not closed it on their side. But a senior Jordanian official told CNN Thursday, it status is unclear because of the Israeli air strikes on Gaza on that side of the crossing. And we've just learned that the U.S. expects the Rafah crossing to be open sometime today for Americans in Gaza is an estimated 500 to 600 Palestinian Americans there in Gaza.

CNNs Becky Anderson is in Tel Aviv, and I know you've been monitoring the evacuations with the latest that you have.

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Yes. It's not clear what happens after 4:00 p.m. local time. It's three o'clock here now. So that's an hour from now after that advertised window of quote, "safe passage" closes. But what is clear is this is a race against time.

You've just shown some video there that CNN has authenticated, that's video showing the debris of what appears to have been explosions along the Gaza, evacuation routes. Those are roots of course, for civilians trying to get to the south from Gaza City, they are being warned to do so. And yet, clearly these videos and we've got others that show, sadly, many dead bodies I mean, amid a scene of extensive destruction. It's unclear what caused this devastation. Obviously, as you've rightly pointed out, we have reached out to authorities to try and get some response to whether this was an explosion as a result of any airstrikes.

But look, the U.N. is warning that the situation in Gaza is quote, "a matter of life and death" at this point, you know, not just for those who are trying to evacuate and risking their lives, it seems in what are these humanitarian corridors, but as 2 million people risk running out of water. The U.N. same any trucks full of fuel into Gaza now otherwise, they say that people will start dying as talks continue on extending these safe zones for those evacuating and opening that border crossing that you spoke to at the top of the show at Rafah, which is on the border with Egypt to get desperately needed aid, medical supplies and fuel into Gaza. And I know the UAE has got aid and medical supplies on the ground.

The WHO says its emergency supplies are on the Egyptian side of the border. They just need permission to get them in. And just as all of this is going on, and you can only imagine what is going on for the people of Gaza. And indeed, let's not forget the hostages who are being held by Hamas, some 100 to 150. This is -- this is such a potentially catastrophic situation at this point. I also want to underscore just how much concern there is around the region that this war could spread -- could spread significantly now to the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

[08:05:09]

We've already seen more than 50 deaths of Palestinians by settlers and Israeli police. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Healthy IDF warning settlers reportedly not to, quote interfere with counterterrorism efforts. The responsibility they say is with the Israeli forces. So that's the West Bank.

We were in East Jerusalem yesterday, there was a sort of tense, tense, calm, but at least two people were killed there yesterday and took a Lebanon's border to the north as a real concern. There have been several incidents that CNN has been reporting on over the past three deaths. Of course, my colleague, Ben Wedeman reporting on the, you know, the very, very, very sad death of a journalist on that border on the Lebanon side, a very dear friend of many, many of our CNN colleagues.

The U.S. President Joe Biden, of course, repeatedly warning other players in the region not to join the conflict. We know the U.S. has warships in the region varying, steadfast support for Israel. We've got the U.S. Secretary of State and a whistle-stop tour of the region. He's in Saudi Arabia and going on to the UAE today. He was in Jordan yesterday. And this is what the Jordanian Foreign Minister told me after he met with King Abdullah and -- and the Secretary of State yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AYMAN SAFADI, JORDANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: So the priority now get immediate humanitarian supplies. And when it comes to safe zone, we have to be very careful as well, it has to be within Gaza. We cannot have a population displacement. We cannot have population transfer. And we need to make sure that now, stop that escalation, get humanitarian supplies, work on a humanitarian corridor for supplies to come in, stop the fighting, and then start working for our big move as peace advocates.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: Advocating a de-escalation of this in order to avoid this spilling out from where this conflict is now, just to be quite clear, the Iranian foreign minister has been doing the rounds in Beirut with their Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Syria, and in Baghdad warning, all options, as far as Iran is concerned are possible if this war continues. That's the very latest from here and around the region. Back to you guys.

WALKER: All right, Becky Anderson, thank you. It's been also an active morning along Israel's northern border with Lebanon, Israel has conducted a number of airstrikes and drone attacks against Hezbollah target.

BLACKWELL: They say it's in response to an explosion at a security fence at the border. Hezbollah claimed responsibility for attacks on for Israeli locations. Our CNN's Ben Wedeman is in southern Lebanon and Ben, Hezbollah has not engaged here, certainly at the level at which it could. What do you see -- what's the latest on what we're seeing from Hezbollah?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hezbollah yesterday, as you mentioned, hit for Israeli positions in -- in response to the Israeli strikes, among one of which of course, killed our colleague, ICM, Abdullah cameraman for Reuters. Many of us know very well, in addition to six other journalists from AFP and Jazeera. Now, we saw one of those direct hits by Hezbollah on that position, but they don't at this point seem ready to fully engage their forces with the Israelis. In fact, the Becky was mentioning the Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian was in Beirut yesterday, and he told the Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati that one of his purposes of his visit was to ensure calm in Lebanon.

However, he did go on to say later when speaking to journalists in Beirut, that if the Israelis escalate in Gaza, then all scenarios are possible. But as I said, I was here in 2006. I saw the destruction caused by the war between Hezbollah and Israel, and certainly among the population in this part of the country. There isn't any enthusiasm for any sort of massive repeat of what we saw in 2006.

And yesterday, just anecdotally, I can tell you we drove for an hour going west, as we did that we encountered one rather bored Lebanese army checkpoint on the way back. We encountered multiple checkpoints and they're looking at every by these documents making sure that nobody is operating in the area who might cause trouble so to speak.

[08:10:10]

But nonetheless, obviously, yesterday afternoon there has been fire from the Lebanese side as well as from the Israeli side. And the Israelis are reporting that this morning in -- they killed infiltrators trying to get into Israel. So it's relatively calm. Certainly, you cannot compare what's going on here. What with what's going around in Gaza, but it's very, very tense. Victor, Amara.

WALKER: Very calm but very tense as you say. Ben Wedeman, thank you for your reporting. Bobby Ghosh is joining me now. He is an editor and foreign affairs columnist for Bloomberg.

Bobby, good to see you. An hour, less than an hour, 50 minutes before this window of safe passage set up by Israel closes for the civilians who have been called to evacuate from Northern Gaza to Southern Gaza. I'm sure you've heard the criticism regarding these calls for evacuation, the United Nations calling it impossible. The EU's top diplomat Joseph Burrell saying it's utterly unrealistic. What are your thoughts?

BOBBY GHOSH, EDITOR AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS COLUMNIST, BLOOMBERG: Well, on the face of it, it is unrealistic. You couldn't empty a million people out of Manhattan in such short time in a time of peace, to do so from Gaza in a time of war where the infrastructure is severely lacking. There's no transportation. people are confused, frightened. There are bombs raining down from the air. It's impossible. It simply cannot be done. And -- and, you know, one hopes that with all the pressure and negotiations that international figures from the U.S. on down, are trying to impose on Israel, one hopes that they will be an extension. People are moving we can see that as you as your reporting shows, there are videos of people trying to make their best effort to get to what Israel has declared as safe zones.

But then there's the other factor which is Hamas. Hamas needs these people as human shields. That is the core of Hamas's survival strategy. So Hamas is not simply going to allow a million people to evacuate Gaza City. And if they do, guess who's going to go with those million people, Hamas. So there are all kinds of complications involved in trying to move so many people so fast. In a time of so much stress, and so much violence.

WALKER: There have been some explosions, at least one large explosion along an evacuation route for civilians south of Gaza City. CNN was able to authenticate these videos that we saw where they were dead bodies. This was before the safe passage window opened. And we are -- we did reach out to the idea for comment on any airstrikes in that same location. But do you expect with Hamas -- do you expect Hamas to target or attack the evacuation routes, then?

GHOSH: Well, we've already seen report saying that Hamas has told people through the mosques and other communications means told people to stay put that suits Hamas very well. Will Hamas shoot down people in the street as they as they evacuate? I wouldn't put it past them. These are people who have just demonstrated just what they're capable of doing in southern Israel.

If they -- if they can kill babies and slaughter people in their sleep, killing their own people is something they've done for a very long time, without any -- without any sense of -- of remorse, or guilt. So they're entirely possible. Also, this is a war. In a war, there's always the chance of ammunition going to the sort of bombs landing in the wrong places, there's always a chance of false flags.

So if you were in Gaza right now, with all these reports coming in, they've hit -- they've hit one of the roads going south. You're not necessarily going to pause to think when did they hit it? Did they hit it before the -- the warnings were given? Or did they hit it just now.

Remember, also, there's no electricity. There's no water. There's no food. So there's panic and pandemonium in the middle of which misinformation disinformation is bound to happen.

So anything is possible at this moment? And if you are in Gaza, if you're a Palestinian family in fear for your lives, you're not sure what exactly you believe.

WALKER: You wrote about this and I do want to touch on this before we go, you know, posing that question of why don't the Palestinians Just leave if we put up a map of Gaza, just to show you you know, how fortified this area is. You know, there is a border security wall that Israel erected years ago. It's a subterranean wall. We can see the red line. So on the east there's this, a physical wall. Then you do have two crossings where people could cross. You have the arrows crossing to the north which obviously is closed because that's shares a border with Israel. Then you have the Rafah crossing, which we understand will be open to Americans today, but the Rafah crossing shares a border with Egypt.

[08:15:21]

What happens, Bobby? Once I don't know how many people will make it safely to the southern part of Gaza. Will they be arriving to get humanitarian aid because there is aid, a medical aid that has arrived on an airplane from Jordan to Egypt? What happens from after this window closes, and once many of the civilians get south?

GHOSH: So you have a lot of people, 2 million plus people herded into half the territory of Gaza. It was already a very congested place with the full territory of this trip. You know half the territory, places where we are open fields, no water, no roads, no sanitation. So you have another separate kind of catastrophe in the making.

Will people try to get to Egypt? That's the big question. And then if they do, will that border be open, who's going to open the border? Hamas is close it on one side, Egypt is close it on one side. Hamas doesn't want these people to leave, Egypt doesn't want to have people in. So that's going to be a real choke point. And also remember, a lot of

these people don't necessarily want to just up and leave their homes. The only place they've known as home for their entire lives. Their fears are and this is not entirely ungrounded. Their fears are that if they leave now, they'll never be allowed to come back, just as many of them are never allowed go back to their -- the homes of their ancestors in what is now Israel.

So we're hoping that humanitarian aid can reach these people the world has shown in disaster areas in the past that it is capable of airlifting and providing humanitarian aid to vast numbers of people you think of earthquakes and tsunamis and, and natural disasters of that nature. This is a manmade disaster, but it requires the same level of international effort in order to provide succor to those people.

Will the international community make that effort is question one. Will the Egyptian authorities allow that effort to be delivered to the Israel to the Palestinian people is question two.

WALKER: Right, and we got to go. But there's also the question of if the Rafah crossing is open on the Gaza side, right, because as I understand it, there was some kind of, I know that there is an underground tunnel for smuggling weapons and equipment was struck in the Rafah area. The IDF has not said that the border crossing was actually struck, so we don't even know if the roads that are passable on the Gaza side.

We'll leave it there Bobby Ghosh, really important conversation and perspective. Thank you. For more information about how you can help humanitarian efforts in Israel and Gaza, go to cnn.com/impact or use your mobile device to scan the QR code on your screen.

BLACKWELL: The White House is working feverishly to free Americans being held hostage by Hamas. So what we're hearing about President Biden's conversation with the families of those who are unaccounted for.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:22:15]

BLACKWELL: Just minutes ago, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken left Saudi Arabia. He's now headed to the UAE and he's been pressuring leaders to use any leverage available with Hamas to release hostages. The U.S. officials must strike a delicate balance here as they stress support for Israel.

WALKER: They are not telling Israel to back down on its bombardment of Gaza, but they are trying to prevent the war from spreading. Joining us right now is CNN is Jenny Hansler from Washington DC it is a delicate, delicate line a lot more do you know?

JENNIFER HANSLER, CNN STATE DEPARTMENT REPORTER: It absolutely is. The administration is trying to toe this really difficult line in supporting Israel full-throated Lee and its efforts in its upcoming incursion that we expect them to start imminently while also urging them to protect civilians. And this is something of course that they are extremely concerned about. This is evidenced by the extensive shuttle diplomacy we've seen over the past few days.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was in Israel yesterday. Secretary Blinken has been in Israel, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and as you mentioned, he is on his way, excuse me, to Abu Dhabi now. He is expected to stop in Egypt before returning to the United States tomorrow. And in his meetings first and foremost has been that support for Israel's offensive. He said these are not retaliatory these are defensive operations. But we have also increasingly heard him speak about the need for civilians in Gaza to be protected for there to be humanitarian access to Gaza as we are hearing increasingly of the death toll rising thereof resources running out this is a message he reiterated this morning, in a meeting with the Saudi foreign minister. Take a listen to what you said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: As Israel pursues its legitimate right, to defending its people and to try to ensure that this never happens again. It is vitally important that all of us look out for civilians. And we're working together to do exactly that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANSLER: And also, we know he is pressing Israeli officials to establish safe zones within Gaza. It is unclear when or where those safe zones will be established. And the other key message we are hearing from these meetings is that he is pushing partners who have sway over Hamas to bring that message to release all of the hostages that they are holding immediately. He is also pressing partners who have sway over actors like Iran and Hezbollah to tell them do not enter this conflict. We have heard them threaten to do so. And his message has been do not make this situation any worse. Amara, Victor.

BLACKWELL: Jenny Hansler in Washington for us. Thank you. President Biden spoke with the families of Americans who are unaccounted for in Israel during a group call on Friday at the White House. The President described So those conversations during a visit to Philadelphia here's what he said.

[08:25:05]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: They're going through agony not knowing what the status of their sons, daughters, husbands, wives children are. You know, it's gut-wrenching. I assured them my personal commitment to do everything possible. Everything possible return, every Michigan American to their families.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALKER: CNN Jasmine Wright joining us now from the White House. Jasmine, 14 Americans remain unaccounted for. What more can you tell us about the call?

JASMINE WRIGHT, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes, Amara. While on the call, President Biden promised to use the U.S. as full mate to try to do what it could to bring those family members back here to the country back to those who are -- who are really waiting for them here to come home. Now, we've talked to people who were on the call, sources that were involved with a call. And they said that it was an emotional one. It lasted for about 45 minutes. There were about 20 representatives of families on the call with President Biden, both folks in the U.S. and Israel to a larger format. And he described President Biden as somebody who really sat there and listened to folks talk about their personal relationships with those who are unaccounted for, and also talk about what they want the government to do.

The President really tapped into that empathizer-in-chief role that we know that he has frequented over the last few years in office. Now, something that President Biden also did was reiterate his affirmation in trying to do exactly everything that he could to try to bring their loved ones home, something that he also relayed in the 60 Minutes interview that was taped on Thursday, a day before that call happened. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: I say we're gonna do everything in our power to find them. Everything on our power. And I'm not going to go into the detail of that. But we're working like in line (ph) because I think they have to know that the President of United States of America cares deeply about what's happening, deeply. We have to communicate to the world this is critical. It is not even human behavior. It's pure barbarism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WRIGHT: Now that message that we just heard from the President as one that we know that the focus of the fall really got called really got from the President, really his commitment to doing more to try to get their loved ones returned. Also, of course, a diplomatic details that the President said he didn't want to talk about in that interview. We just heard Jenny talk about it a lot. We know for a fact that Secretary of State Antony Blinken was on the ground in Israel, Qatar, other places that we know are involved in these diplomatic conversations trying to get these hostages released, as well as we know that the U.S. has FBI officials and others on the ground, really trying to make sure that they are really a mountain basically a full court press trying to bring these potential hostages, these people who are unaccounted for home that 14 folks are unaccounted for a handful in a CSM, that they believe they're held hostage by Hamas.

So really trying to make sure that those who are missing their loved ones know that the U.S. is really putting their full mind to it. But of course, it's going to take a few days and then potentially longer than that to see how this all unfolds. But that is really the stance here from the White House. Amara, Victor.

WALKER: All right, Jasmine Wright at the White House. Thank you. Up next it was one of the deadliest sites of the Hamas attack on Israel. CNN goes to the scene of that music festival that Hamas terrorists targeted.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:32:10]

WALKER: This next story may be difficult to watch. CNN is learning more details about the deadly Hamas attack on a music festival that ended with 260 people massacred.

BLACKWELL: And so this was the single deadliest attack by Hamas during their infiltration into Israel last Saturday. CNN's Anderson Cooper goes to the side of that music festival and the signs of terror are still obvious there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR (voiceover): The music was playing the dance floor packed with the rockets began just 3.3 miles from the border with Gaza. It didn't take long before Hamas gunmen arrived. Some partygoers were able to get to their cars, but many were killed before they could get away.

REAR ADMIRAL DANIEL HAGARI, ISRAEL DEFENSE FORCE: They were reading here with a machine gun.

COOPER: Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, soldier all his life has never seen anything like it.

HAGARI: This is a massacre sin. I don't have any other recall of memory in the history of Israel since it was established for this kind of event.

COOPER: The bodies and body parts of the dead had been removed, but people's possessions are strewn all around. The carnage is clear, burned out cars bullet holes bloodstains on seats. From some cars the IDF has retrieved dashcam videos that show Hamas gunmen roaming the site for hours shooting freely.

This one shows a bloodied hostage being led away than under the car you can see another man hiding. He moves slightly than stops. A gunman runs right up to him and shoots him point blank in the head or upper body.

HAGARI: I don't know how people can explain this. I cannot -- I don't have the words to explain it and then running away with on motorcycles with girls to Gaza.

COOPER: Fleeing east across open fields was the only way out for many, but they were easy targets. Others sought safety in nearby bomb shelters. This is dashcam video of a Hamas gunmen tossing a grenade into a shelter. When a man runs out trying to escape they fire on him repeatedly.

In another shelter a few miles north of the festival site. About 30 people tried to hide, a man named Noam Cohen recorded inside. You can hear the panic in their voices asking what's going on. Are there Israeli soldiers nearby? We aren't going to show you what happened next. Cohen says Hamas gunmen repeatedly toss grenades into the shelter. People inside were blown apart.

It's one of the most gruesome videos we've ever seen. This is some of the aftermath.

[08:35:00]

Noam Cohen survived hiding under body parts. That's him terrified, but alive.

We found the shelter in the town of El Amin. Yesterday evening, someone had put a curtain up over the doorway, but nothing could hide the smell as you enter. My cameraman Neil Holdsworth, who's experienced a lot of war began to retch and had to step outside.

COOPER (on camera): There's bloody handprints on the wall. There's blood smeared on the walls. See, probably these are either bullet holes or from the grenades that were thrown in here.

COOPER (voiceover): Body parts have already been collected from here, but bloods, clothes and shoes remain.

COOPER (on camera): This looks to be a bloody handprints. The shelter is no more than 15 feet long, maybe five and a half, six feet wide. The idea of so many people packed in here standing shoulder to shoulder terrified, screaming. It's incredible that anybody was able to survive.

COOPER (voiceover): There are other shelters like this other tragedies still to be discovered. The full horror of what happened here is just starting to come to light. Anderson Cooper, Al-Amin (ph), Israel

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALKERL: Let's take a break after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:41:00]

BLACKWELL: The House of Representatives has gotten more than 10 days without a speaker. The GOP picked a new nominee for the job, Jim Jordan, but they appear to have the same numbers problem. More than 50 Republicans voted against supporting Jordan on the House floor. So the Ohio Congressman does not seem to have the votes to get the position to speaker.

We're joined now by congressional reporter for POLITICO, Nicholas Wu. Nicholas, good morning to you. So, the 55 or so Republicans who in conference voted against Jim Jordan, they might not necessarily vote against a nomination on the floor. But are there five absolute nos for Jim Jordan, which means if all the Democrats vote for Hakeem Jeffries, he won't get the gavel?

NICHOLAS WU, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, POLITICO: There are absolutely five if not more hard-nos on Jim Jordan. The thing being there's quite a few moderate House Republicans who represent districts one by President Biden, who really are hesitant to vote for someone like Jim Jordan, the reason being Democrats are threatening to turn Jim Jordan into a political foil and into a potentially potent attack against these lawmakers who represent these frontline, these purple districts.

And so this could come up for a vote on the floor next week. But everyone I'm talking to, you seems to think that this vote will still fail.

BLACKWELL: With no speaker, the House cannot pass not only not aid for Israel, but not even a resolution of support. Is that motivating the conference at all?

WU: It's something that has some lawmakers scrambling for some kind of any kind of escape, they escape hatch for this crisis. Yesterday, we saw a group of centrist Democrats pitching ideas for Republicans to basically find a way to share power to empower the temporary speaker, Patrick McHenry, so that the House would be able to conduct its ordinary business so that they could pass the Ukraine bill or an Israel aid bill.

Yesterday, there were top lawmakers who went to the White House for a classified briefing on the crisis in Israel. And I asked the top Democrat on the foreign affairs committee, Greg Meeks, how this briefing went down, he said that basically the White House was very concerned about the lack of a speaker and what this meant for the outcome for Israel aid.

So right now, without a speaker, there's not a lot the House can do. And so this, you know, folks aren't quite at a level of desperation yet to beat me in a pull the escape hatch and, and find a way to work with Democrats and empower her, but that could come soon.

BLACKWELL: So if I'm hearing your right, this idea of power sharing, to try to come to some consensus nominee that can get enough votes, some Democratic votes. They're not any closer to that today than they were 10 days ago.

WU: Right now, they're not. I mean, Republicans are just so loath right now to vote for a Democrat. I mean, the margins are small enough in the House that yes, Democrat, a lot of Democrats point to the math. If only a handful of Republicans came over and voted for Hakeem Jeffries. Yes, you could have speaker Jeffries.

But that's almost certainly never going to happen. And so right now, you have any number of different names being floated as a consensus speaker. But this runs into the same problem that we've seen with every single one of these speaker nominees so far. They don't have enough support in the GOP conference for that to happen.

BLACKWELL: All right, Nicolas Wu, thank you.

WALKER: All right. Let's take you back now to the Middle East and our CNN Ben Wedeman is in southern Lebanon. You're hearing artillery and rocket fire what's happening there been? BEN WEDEMAN: For the last 25 minutes, Amara, we've heard the heavy artillery and outgoing rocket fire to the east of here. We don't have a specific details. We've seen some video on social media that we obviously can't confirm but it does seem to be in this area to the east of here.

[08:45:04]

This is the first really major -- this is the longest, most prolonged and heavy shelling we have heard since we've been here. The details aren't clear, but certainly does not bode well. Amara.

WALKER: All right. We can hear the explosions there in the background, Ben. Appreciate it. Thank you very much. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALKER: This morning Israel is ordering more than a million people in northern Gaza to get out. Israel Defense Forces are telling people to pack up and flee as quickly as possible for their own safety.

BLACKWELL: They've given them a six-hour safe passage window to move south and that window closes in 10 minutes. Meanwhile, IDF says that Hamas is trying to prevent people from leaving Gaza.

[08:50:00]

The situation there is now so desperate. But a doctor tells CNN his hospital is using ice cream trucks as morgues as the hospital mortuary fills up.

WALKER: And as we were talking about last hour, there's a lot of families who are concerned about their loved ones in Gaza who are trying to make that way down. But of course, with cell phone towers, and things that are now destroyed. It's hard to get an update on whether or not they're making it out there safely.

BLACKWELL: Listen, for the people here in the U.S. who have relatives there, also for people who are just watching the images out of Israel and Gaza, it's incredibly disturbing. The war shows no sign of ending anytime soon.

WALKER: As a result, it is taking a toll on people's mental health around the world. Joining us now is psychiatrist and host of the How Can I Help podcast, Dr. Gail Saltz. Doctor, thank you so much for joining us.

You know, even if you don't have family members, or people, you know, who are impacted by what's happening in Israel, I think people are just shocked at the level of carnage. How would you advise the general public in terms of how much they should be consuming, and when they should know when to take a break?

DR. GAIL SALTZ, PSYCHOLOGIST AND PSYCHOANALYST: I think you have to know yourself. So for people who know they tend to be anxious, they tend to struggle with mood, they have a history of trauma of some sort any really any sort or history of probable problems in terms of mental health, they're more at risk. People as you pointed out who are connected to this in any sort of way, they're more at risk.

But I would say to you that actually, all of us are somewhat at risk, because we have never had this level of graphic image coming to us on such a constant basis. So it's not only on the news, it's on everybody's social media feeds. And today, children, adolescents, adults, were receiving these images and images tend to stick in your mind in a very intrusive way, making it difficult to concentrate, feeling like it's repeating all the time making it difficult sleep. And those things will further impact your mental health.

So, I would say a little bit to all of us, we have to really limit how much we are seeing, and possibly even take a break and take your news in via reading it or listening to it. But picking a source and limiting how much of the day you actually expose yourself. So maybe like 30 minutes, and not doing it close to bedtime, we are likely to be even more stirred up and therefore have difficulty sleeping.

BLACKWELL: There's a point at which we have to turn it off. And then there's a point at which for some people, they need some help.

WALKER: Yeah.

BLACKWELL: How do you know when you've gotten to that second level, that second degree there where you need to talk to a professional about what you've watching and what you're experiencing?

SALTZ: Well, I think first of all, most, a lot of people can do things for themselves before they get there. They can add some coping tools that help with anxiety during the day, deep breathing, aerobic exercise, talking to people around them that make them feel better, stay away from doomsday people can catastrophizing people that will make you actually feel worse. But talking to people can also really be helpful.

But beyond that, if your anxiety and concern about this are disturbing you such that you can't concentrate at work, you can't get things done the way you normally would, you can't sleep well at night. It's affecting your relationships.

Basically, if it's intruding into and affecting your day, for more than a few days, this might be the time that you want to say, hey, I need to get an evaluation something a process may have started here that I have to really look into and think about whether I need a little extra help with.

WALKER: I can't stop thinking about, you know, so many of the people that we and our CNN colleagues have interviewed they're out in this war zone, the family members who have seen the horror happen before their eyes, people losing their children, people being on the phone while the abduction and the screaming was happening in the background, how do we begin to help them recover from the trauma?

SALTZ: So obviously, the closer that you are, as I said to this event, the more likely you are to have what's called an acute stress reaction, which is a whole collection of symptoms of the intrusive thoughts of the event repetitively, of feeling like you have to avoid anything that reminds you of the event of trouble sleeping and concentrating and taking pleasure in anything and trouble with your appetite.

But again, the closer you are to this, the more likely you are to go on develop post-traumatic stress disorder so what's important is to intervene early. An intervention means again any kind to go on and develop post-traumatic stress disorder.

[08:55:02]

So what's important is to intervene early. An intervention means, again, any kind of thing that would help you decrease your overall anxiety level. So there are lots of as I alluded to earlier exercises one can do that do take down your anxiety level, which helps you manage trauma more, you want to pay attention to your mood. So actually spending time talking about anything positive, anything positive.

And in fact, we hear or someone anywhere and they too can think about what can they do to help their situation, because helping and being involved in something that feels like an active action really does help with managing the trauma of this.

So those sorts of things are going to be very important to the people who are involved in of course, you know, people like myself, we're getting involved in mental health care for those people as well.

BLACKWELL: Dr. Gail Saltz, some great advice there. Thank you so much. And thank you for spending your morning with us. We'll be back in about an hour.

WALKER: Smerconish is up next. We'll see you back here at 10:00 a.m. Eastern.

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