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Israel Admits Responsibility For An Airstrike On Ambulance In Gaza, Says It Was Being Used By Hamas; Blinken In Israel: "We Need To Do More To Protect Palestinian Civilians"; Donald Trump To Testify Monday In Civil Fraud Trial; Israeli Woman On Watching Hamas Kill Daughter, Kidnap Husband And Live Stream Her Family Hostage Ordeal. Aired 5-6p ET
Aired November 03, 2023 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: One of them was Sergeant Aquilino Gonell who gave a victim impact statement in court today, saying Klein repeatedly attacked him with a police riot shield. The judge called Klein's actions shocking, egregious and a betrayal of his office.
Well, coming up Sunday on State of the Union, Senators Lindsey Graham, Richard Blumenthal and Bernie Sanders, plus the Israeli ambassador to the U.N. That is Sunday morning at 09:00 Eastern and noon. Our coverage picks up with Wolf Blitzer in THE SITUATION ROOM live from Tel Aviv. Have a great weekend.
[17:00:35]
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now, breaking news, Israel admits responsibility for an attack on an ambulance outside of Gaza hospital, saying it was being used by Hamas. The bloody scenes and reports of casualties come as tough questions are being raised about the civilian death toll in this war. As Israeli forces pound Gaza from the air and on the ground, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists there will be no ceasefire until Hamas hostages are freed. Israel rejecting a new U.S. appeal for humanitarian pause in the fighting during a visit by the Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
And in New York, Eric Trump wraps up his first time in the witness stand and says his father is fired up for his own testimony next week in the civil fraud trial against their family business. We're going to tell you where the case stands right now as the Trump family is put under oath.
Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer reporting live from Israel, and you're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.
BLITZER: Let's get right to the breaking news on the Israeli military now taking responsibility for an attack on an ambulance in Gaza. We want to warn our viewers some of the images of this attack are very graphic. CNN's Jeremy Diamond is joining us right now. He's got details. He's live in Ashkelon, Israel, not very far away from Gaza.
Jeremy, what more have you learned about this strike?
JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, Israel is admitting to have targeted an ambulance inside Gaza near Al-Shifa Hospital. The Israeli Defense Forces saying that they -- this claiming that this ambulance was being used by Hamas and saying that several Hamas operatives were killed in this strike, Wolf, but the reports on the ground, obviously those images are just absolutely difficult to see. Fifteen people were killed in this strike, 50 others were wounded according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, which of course is controlled by Hamas. Israel also says in its claim of responsibility that Hamas has been known to use ambulances to transport Hamas militants as well as weaponry. But Wolf, there are questions about the legitimacy of this target, particularly as a spokesman for the Palestinian Ministry of Health says that this ambulance was part of a convoy carrying wounded individuals, were heading to that Rafah crossing in order to leave Gaza and head into Egypt.
And what's more, Wolf, they also say that they notified the International Red Cross of this convoy movement before it left. The Red Cross, Wolf, tonight is confirming that it did receive notification about this convoy before this convoy left and that it received a request to accompany that convoy before it left. Now, meanwhile, Wolf, the Israeli Defense Forces are continuing to carry out their ground operation inside of Gaza as well. Israeli military officials say that they have encircled Gaza City and we know that they have been moving towards Gaza City on several fronts from the north, as well as from the south. But what's clear is that there is still very much ongoing fighting in the northern part of Gaza. Hamas, for its part, Wolf, is continuing to fire rockets against Israeli towns and cities, targeting those cities indiscriminately without looking at whether they are civilian or military targets.
In fact, Wolf, earlier today a rocket landed about 100 meters from where a number of journalists were posted on a hill in Sderot overlooking the Gaza Strip. I want to show you the moment that this rocket landed not far from my team's position.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DIAMOND: A rocket perhaps for an interception, shrapnel may have fallen, but what we heard was a very, very loud, appear to be some kind of an impact calling directly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DIAMOND: And, Wolf, that was actually the aftermath of that rocket impact. But during earlier when that rocket came down, my photo journalist, Matias Psalm (ph), was actually able to get video of that rocket coming in very fast and making a very loud impact not far from that position of journalists. It actually landed in a courtyard of a kindergarten. That kindergarten, of course, was unoccupied at the moment. But it just shows of course, Wolf, that even as the Iron Dome does intercept the majority of those rockets, some of them do still come in, Wolf. [17:05:13]
BLITZER: Very scary indeed. Jeremy Diamond in Ashkelon, Israel for us, thank you very much. Stay safe over there.
The Israeli attack on an ambulance comes just hours after the U.S. Secretary of State Antony blinking left Israel declaring more needs to be done to protect Palestinian civilians in Gaza. CNN's MJ Lee is over at the White House following Blinken's latest mission here to the Middle East.
MJ did Secretary Blinken get any assurances from Israel about aid to Gaza or civilian casualties?
MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, this mark Secretary Blinken's third visit to Israel since the war broke out and he had a blunt message that he wanted to deliver to Israel. He said that Israel must do more to protect Palestinian civilians. This, of course, reflects the growing concern within the Biden administration about the rising civilian death toll in Gaza and the humanitarian suffering there as well. And it also reflects the private warnings that U.S. officials had been delivering to their Israeli counterparts, saying that unless Israel significantly changes course to mitigate the amount of humanitarian suffering in Gaza, that its support from the global community is going to erode. And we saw Secretary Blinken today in Israel taking that warning public, saying that Israel is at risk of losing its support from its allies.
Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANTONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: We need to do more to protect Palestinian civilians. Failure to do so plays into the hands of Hamas and other terror groups. There will be no partners for peace if they're consumed by humanitarian catastrophe and alienated by any perceived indifference to their plight.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: And, Wolf, in his meetings with Israeli leaders and the Israeli war cabinet as a part of that push to have Israel minimize as much as possible civilian casualties, we saw Secretary Blinken making a hard push for this humanitarian pause or humanitarian pauses, saying that those would be essential for getting more humanitarian aid into Gaza and to make sure that civilian deaths can be minimized. But we saw Prime Minister Netanyahu after that meeting with Secretary Blinken rejecting that call, essentially, saying that they are not going to consider any pauses unless hostages in Gaza can get out. We of course, know that those negotiations and those talks have been ongoing but we've not seen a big breakthrough so far. Now here in the U.S., Wolf, the calls for those humanitarian pauses, those have been growing as well. And it's not just coming from the Biden administration, we saw a group of more than a dozen Democratic senators writing a new letter saying that those kinds of pauses would be necessary. And that is on top of some of the growing calls that we are seeing here for a general ceasefire as well, something that the administration has not called for. Wolf.
BLITZER: MJ Lee at the White House for us. MJ, thank you very much.
Also tonight, the Israeli military is on heightened alert at its northern border amid escalating rocket attacks from inside Lebanon. The leader of Hezbollah warning that that front could explode into a wider war as he speaks out in praise of the Hamas attacks on Israel. CNN's Ben Wedeman is joining us from inside Lebanon right now. He's in the capital of Beirut.
Ben, this is the first time we've heard from Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah since the war began. Update our viewers.
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, he hasn't said a word, Wolf, since the seventh of October in much anticipation and speculation has been going on about why. But finally, this afternoon at 03:00 p.m. local time, he finally emerged on the airwaves across the Middle East.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
WEDEMAN (voice-over): They turned out in the 1000s to hear their leader, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah speaking out for the first time since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.
All options, he warned, are open and we can exercise them at any moment.
Already, Hezbollah and Israel are engaged in a deadly exchange of fire along the border. Hezbollah has buried almost 60 of its fighters killed so far. It was his speech watched closely across the Middle East, while other Arab leaders beseech the U.S. to put pressure on Israel to relent in its offensive in Gaza. Hezbollah, well-armed in battle hardened, is the only one Putting military pressure on Israel.
[17:10:04]
Time down in the process, Nasrallah claimed, a third of Israel's army. The U.S. has deployed two carrier groups to the eastern Mediterranean to deter Hezbollah and others from joining the fight. Nasrallah's response, I tell the Americans threats and intimidation against us and the resistance in the region are pointless. But despite the high expectations for this speech, it ended ambiguously without a clear indication of where Hezbollah and Iran's other allies in the region will go.
In the lead up to the speech, Hezbollah supporters put out what some called trailers with an ominous tone of what might be coming. After the speech, the word here in Lebanon was that the trailers were better than the film.
(END VIDEO TAPE) WEDEMAN: And what we've seen in the aftermath of that speech is that there's been widespread relief. Many people hear, the fact that probably the vast majority do not want to see Lebanon dragged into a war with Israel. People still remember what happened in 2006, went for 33 days, the war raged in the south, and there were massive bombings in Beirut, as well. People before the speech, Wolf, many people tried to leave the country, others went to safer homes in the mountains, others were storing up supplies in the event that the speech would really escalate the situation. But that didn't happen.
And I think people are feeling a lot more comfortable here in Beirut. That doesn't mean that Lebanon is out of the woods at the moment. This is a very unstable situation. But for now, it appears it's going to be essentially more of the same as far as what's going on on the border between Israel and Lebanon. Wolf.
BLITZER: We shall see. Ben Wedeman in Beirut for us. Ben, thanks for that report.
Joining us now here in Tel Aviv, Mark Regev. He's the senior adviser to the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Mark, thanks very much for joining us.
MARK REGEV, SENIOR ADVISER TO PM BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: My pleasure.
BLITZER: Let me get your thoughts, first of all, on this Israeli strike against this ambulance leaving this major hospital in Gaza.
REGEV: Well, the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces have released a detailed statement. They say that Hamas was using this ambulance to transfer their fighters from one position to another. That's of course a war crime. You're not supposed to use ambulances to, you know, to move your combatants from one place to another.
In doing so, I mean, we don't target ambulances, but in doing so, they made that ambulance a legitimate target. And we made a choice to make an exception in this case. We thought the target was important enough to take it out and we took out the target.
BLITZER: Will you release -- will Israel, the government, released any evidence that this ambulance was being used by Hamas as a military vehicle?
REGEV: I believe the IDF has already said they hope to be able to release pictures and maybe even video soon.
BLITZER: How soon you think?
REGEV: I can't speak for them.
BLITZER: But you understand that the public relations, the pressure that Israel is under right now for doing this on the heels of those two airstrikes on that Jabalya refugee camp.
REGEV: Look, we know that there have been documented cases in the past of Hamas using ambulances. We know that Hamas has built infrastructure, military infrastructure, their command posts underneath hospitals. We saw what Hamas was capable of doing when they invaded Israel and massacred our people. They raped, they burnt people alive, they shot young people in a ravine who are attending an open air concert, they shot children in front of their parents and parents in front of their children. These people are capable of that sort of brutality, should you really be surprised that they'd be capable of using an ambulance as a machine of war?
BLITZER: Is Israel safer now as a result of the airstrikes going on in Gaza?
REGEV: Wouldn't be safer when this is operation is over. And Hamas will have been destroyed as a military machine and Gaza will not be run anymore by this brutal and horrific terrorist organization.
BLITZER: What do you say to Secretary Blinken and President Biden, for that matter, who are urging Israel to cut back on the airstrikes because of the civilian casualties?
REGEV: So we believe we can pursue a relentless campaign against Hamas's terror machine. And at the same time, make a distinction and do our best to keep civilians out of the crossfire and to provide them with humanitarian support.
BLITZER: But you see, a lot of civilians are getting killed, including kids.
REGEV: First of all, I don't want to see anyone no innocent civilian caught up in the crossfire, especially children, right? We wouldn't like to see anyone, any children killed. But unfortunately, our strategy is made difficult by the fact that Hamas deliberately uses Gaza civilians as human shields for their war machine.
BLITZER: Ask you one final quick question, a pause, you hear the Secretary of State asking Israel to at least consider a pause in all the fighting that's going on right now, and maybe even some sort of temporary ceasefire.
[17:15:03]
REGEV: So we're open to a pause, that includes a release of hostages. People say a humanitarian pause. OK, what is more humanitarian than achieving the release of the people who were brutally kidnapped and held now and underground, I don't know dungeon somewhere. The Red Cross has not been allowed to visit them, and even though they've asked. Surely, that should be part of any sort of arrangement for humanitarian pause.
BLITZER: Mark Regev, thanks very much for coming in.
REGEV: My pleasure.
BLITZER: Appreciate it very much. Mr. Regev, the senior adviser to Prime Minister Netanyahu. Coming up, what one Israeli family was forced to go through after Hamas terrorists stormed their house. My emotional interview with a woman who gives us a gut wrenching look at their horrifying nightmare. And new twists in the New York civil fraud trial against Donald Trump and his adult children. Stay with us. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: New developments tonight in former President Donald Trump's New York civil fraud case, the judge overseeing the trial now expanding the gag order and Trump's daughter Ivanka withdrawing her appeal to get out of testifying next week. CNN's Kara Scannell is just outside the courthouse in Manhattan.
[17:20:02]
Kara, so why did this judge expand, first of all, this gag order?
KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, the judge expanded this gag order after Donald Trump's attorneys repeatedly raised questions about the judge's law clerk and letters and notes that she was passing to him during the trial. They said that there's a suggestion here that there's bias because of the law clerk's political leanings. So the judge has heard them, bring this up for the past several days. And he finally has had enough. So he extended the gag order, saying that attorneys are now prohibited from speaking either in the court or outside of the court about any communications that the judge has had with any members of his staff.
And the judge saying that one reason that he's doing this is because they have received hundreds of threats through e-mails, calls, voicemails, letters to his chamber, saying that that outweighs any first amendment rights that they may have to raise these issues. And the Trump's attorneys have already made the record in this case forward. He's saying that speaks for itself if they want to raise it on appeal, that this order came after the day of testimony, Eric Trump finishing his testimony. He was on the stand in total for about four hours. So, now that he has testified, his brother Don Jr. has testified, the next one up Monday is former President Donald Trump.
He will take the stand after court today. Eric Trump said his father is ready.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ERIC TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP SON: My father shouldn't be here. I know he's very fired up to be here. And he thinks that this is one of the most incredible injustices that he's ever seen and it's really is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCANNELL: So, Donald Trump will testify on Monday. Now that is expected to go all day. Then on Wednesday, Ivanka Trump will take the stand after she dropped the challenge to try to block her testimony. Wolf. BLITZER: All right, Kara, stay with us. Don't go too far away. I want to bring in Shan Wu right now, former federal prosecutor to get some analysis of what's going on all these dramatic developments.
Shan, Eric Trump says his father is, quote, "fired up about testifying." What sort of risk is Trump -- Donald Trump potentially taking if he does testify under oath without taking the Fifth Amendment?
SHAN WU, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, Wolf, you never want your client to be all fired up to take the witness stand. You want them rather calm and methodical, ready to answer questions. If former President Trump wants to get up there and be all fire and brimstone, they go out of speeches, it's not going to go very well for him, because a jury might care about that, the press does. But a judge is not going to be interested in that. He's going to start to probably warn Trump to answer the questions rather than meandering off into the wilderness there.
So that kind of attitude is not really the best one to have. You want to be clear, you want to be calm and sound like you're being helpful.
BLITZER: Trump briefly testified once in the trial, Shan, but this time will be very different. What can we expect?
WU: Well, I think it will be quite different this time, it'll be the AGs lawyers questioning him. They're going to want to really drill down on facts, testing what he knew, probably showing him communications. And what I would expect is he is going to really go arm's length on this and say he was too busy, he relied on the accountants, sort of a version of what you heard from his sons. But he's likely to be much more blustery about it. I think he'll lean heavily into the idea that not only as head of the company but as a former president of United States he was much too busy to be checking on his accountant's figures, and I think that's where it's going to go.
BLITZER: So, Kara, let's look ahead when Trump starts to testify under oath, give us a sense, your sense of you're there on the scene. You're speaking to experts over there. What's your sense? What are we going to anticipate?
SCANNELL: I mean, what we have seen throughout this trial is that there has been a lot of objections during the testimony, particularly when the former president is in attendance. So, it is likely we could see his lawyers object to a lot of lines of questioning that the Attorney General's Office begins to press the former president on. And we could possibly see, as Shan was saying, the former president start to expand in speechify. And there the -- throughout the course of this trial, the judge has tried to rein that in having to have witnesses answer yes or no to certain questions and not give speeches. So he has tried to tamp that down.
But it will certainly be, as Shan has pointed out, you know, this moment of tension, we'll have the former president sitting just, you know, inches feet from the judge who he has criticized and attacked on social media, with the New York attorney general expected to be in the courtroom has she has been every time he's been there. And it's a high stakes testimony for him. You know, he's already testified in deposition where he's tried to distance himself saying he relied a lot on his internal accountants, but he has also demonstrated that he knows how he's valued properties. He's spoken very publicly throughout this trial about his disagreements about the value of Mar-a-Lago, so a lot of this are things that he can be pressed on under oath and there are so much at stake here for the future of his business in New York. Wolf.
BLITZER: See what happens next week. Kara Scannell, Shan Wu, thank you both. Appreciate it very, very much.
[17:25:04]
Up next, my powerful very emotional conversation with an Israeli woman who endured the unthinkable during the Hamas attack. Her daughter murdered, and her family held hostage for hours, all while the terrorists live streamed their suffering online. Stay with us here in THE SITUATION ROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We have some breaking news. I want to go to CNN's Paula Reid. She's watching one of these investigative cases going on with Donald Trump. She's got some major news that is just breaking right now.
What are you learning, Paula?
PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf. A federal appeals court has frozen a gag order that has been imposed on former President Trump here in Washington, D.C. Now, this is a gag order related to the federal prosecution of the former president for alleged election subversion.
Here, the appeals court has granted a request from the former president's legal team to freeze the gag order and actually hear arguments on the issue. In just a few days, actually, they've scheduled this for November 20th. They're clearly mindful of the fact that they need to move this issue along swiftly and likely not delay this case too far into the election cycle next year.
Now, in this case, Judge Tanya Chutkan, the judge overseeing the case here in Washington, she imposed a gag order on the former president, limiting his ability to target witnesses in the case, court staff members, and even prosecutors and this came after a series of statements made by the former president.
We know he also has a similar gag order for the case of in New York. But the former president's lawyers argued that this is a violation of his first amendment and he shouldn't be able to criticize, for example, prosecutors. They note the fact that he is a candidate for the presidency, and they say that his quote, political speech is entitled to the highest protection.
But now this case will be considered by three judge panel in the Court of Appeals, and will be a really important decision because gag orders are increasingly becoming a hot button issue in many cases, former President Trump is facing.
BLITZER: Certainly as I. Paula, thanks for that breaking news. I appreciate it very much.
And we'll take a quick break much more right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:35:51]
BLITZER: Here in Israel this week, I had the chance to speak with a woman named Gali Idan, a victim of the Hamas attacks who has been living in nightmare since October 7th. Earlier that morning, air raid sirens started going off in the Nahal Oz kibbutz near the Gaza border. Gali ran into the shelter with her husband, Tzachi, their nine-year- old son, Shahar, their 11-year-old daughter, Yael, and their 17-year- old daughter, Maayan. Then the Hamas terrorists entered their house and tried to force their way into the shelter, shooting and killing Maayan through the door.
The Idan's family and friends saw what was happening because the Hamas terrorists used a neighbor's phone to live stream the attack on Facebook. After murdering their daughter, the Hamas terrorists also took Gali's phone and live stream the rest of her family being held hostage on the floor for hours. In a final act of terror, Hamas kidnapped Gali's husband, Tzachi, and took him to Gaza. Now in my conversation with Gali, we want to warn our viewers what you're about to hear and see is disturbing.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GALI IDAN, DAUGHTER KILLED, HUSBAND KIDNAPPED BY HAMAS: We woke up because they were screaming that alert for missiles are on and our daughters yelled to come to the shelter. Tzachi and I looked at each other and said something's wrong. And they got a message that there's fear of terrorist attack on the kibbutz.
BLITZER: They might be crossing the border into the kibbutz.
IDAN: Yes, they might be crossing the border into the kibbutz and crossing the fence into the kibbutz and the houses. So they told us to keep quiet. Now you need to understand that kids when they're fearful, they cannot be quiet. We were all in this tiny room which is the kids room the sleeping area because so we won't wake them up. They started to say that they are walking in -- in the path, you know, in the kibbutz and --
BLITZER: The terrorists.
IDAN: Yes. So Tzachi took a chair. Sorry, he took a chair and put it near the door because we don't have an actual lock on the door. And we were like waiting and being quiet. Just, you know, fearful and crying. The kids were crying and trying to calm them down. And between our house in the neighbor's house, and you heard the glass shatter. And after a while we heard somebody's walking in the house.
You heard them walking on the broken glass. And it wasn't like one person. You can hear and we were quieting the kids and, you know, like --
BLITZER: Your huddled together?
IDAN: Yes. Me and Shahar and Yael underneath the bed with Maayan and Tzachi was near the door and we were really, really scared and --
BLITZER: Were hearing Arabic?
IDAN: No, they were not talking until they got into the door, the shelter door. And then we heard in Hebrew. And they banged on the door really loud and said, open the door, open the door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language). Open the door.
IDAN: Help. Open the door.
BLITZER: In Hebrew they said that?
IDAN: In Hebrew. Unfortunately, there was Tomel (ph). He was killed afterwards. He was a 17-year-old boy from the kibbutz. And they used him to open doors like a bait.
BLITZER: So it was Tomel (ph) who was speaking in Hebrew.
IDAN: Yes. And then when they saw Tzachi locked the door and struggle it, you know, to lock it real hard and they started shouting. We do not shoot. We do not shoot, open, open.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I will not shoot. Open the door or I will not shoot.
IDAN: You could hear three or four of them shouting and Tzachi is struggling the door. And they fought him to open the door. And they're still shouting and shouting. And then Maayan saw that there's a crack starting to open and she jumped on the door to help Tzachi close it. At that moment there was a gunshot.
[17:40:11]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I will not shoot. I won't shoot now.
IDAN: I was hanging on to one of the kids, I think it was Yael. I'm not sure. And then Tzachi was shouting who got shot, who got shot? And then he said it was Maayan, it's Maayan, it's Maayan. Help, help. It's Maayan.
BLITZER: It's your daughter.
IDAN: It's my daughter. It's my 18 and four days daughter. And he was -- I didn't see him because there was no light yet, but the light came on. And I saw Tzachi. I think it was over her or she dropped near him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go out. Go out.
IDAN: I didn't see her yet. And then Tzachi was yelling. She's dead. She's -- help her, help her, she's dying, she's dying. Because he was in a pile of blood of her blood. He was sitting there, you know, with his hands on his head. And he was saying, Maayan, help her, Gali help Maayan. And I went to her. And I saw her on her back straight. Still, you know, shaking, the body was still shaking, but she was there because when I checked her, he said, check where's she's bleeding from.
And I checked, and it was, I went up to the head. And then I felt the injury. And I said, I said Tzachi, she's gone. She's gone. She's not here. She's gone. And they took us out. Immediately they took us everybody --
BLITZER: The terrorists.
IDAN: Yes. And they told the kids not to look. I shouted them not to look because I didn't want them to see their dead sister in a pile of blood. Tzachi went out with his hands and knees, all bloody.
Then afterwards, I realized that I was on live on Facebook with Tomel's (ph) mother's phone. And that everybody saw them entering and shooting the door, the door of the shelter and killing Maayan actually. They sat us on the floor and took my phone and said, is this your phone? I said yes. What do you need my phone for? And he said, I want to do live on Facebook. What's your code? I gave him the code. And he just started, say, repeat after me. And he said I don't remember the exact message.
But he told me something to say that about the government or I don't remember the exact thing but that they are here. And they're fighting and then they took the phone and actually started filming us live.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language).
GALI: (Speaking in Foreign Language).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language).
GALI: (Speaking in Foreign Language).
Now I thought it was done. And I'm still trying to understand what happened or shocked and Tzachi was broken. He couldn't speak. He was crying. And the kids asked Tzachi what -- are you bleeding? And he said no. And then he just nodded his head and I had to tell the kids that they just killed Maayan and it's her blood.
And then the kids started crying and shouting. And they said to the terrorists to the heart, you know, that holding us hostage said, don't kill us please, don't kill us. And there were filming it all the time. I realized that now but I didn't know then. And I was still in shock about Maayan. And then the red color the alert started shouting that their missiles coming. And I told them, I tried to jump to the shelter and they said no, no you're staying here.
(Speaking in Foreign Language).
[17:45:05]
He said don't worry, our commander knows we're here so he won't shoot some missiles in here you're safe.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: We're going to hear more of the Idan family story in just a moment. Stay with us for that. There are a lot more tears coming up. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: I've been sharing the very emotional story of Gali Idan whom I met earlier this week here in Israel. They lived in a kibbutz in Southern Israel near the Gaza border. And on October 7th, Hamas terrorists entered their house, shave through the door to the shelter killing their 17-year-old daughter Maayan. The terrorists then held the rest of the family hostage in their home for hours live streaming the whole thing on Facebook. And when the terrorists left, they kidnapped Gali's husband. Here's more of what Gali told me about their ordeal. I want to warn our viewers once again what you're about to see and hear is disturbing.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
[17:50:13]
IDAN: They put us on the ground and said, stay here don't move. If you move, you're dead. And they took all the knives that we had said don't do anything stupid. And meanwhile, Yael, my kid, my 11-year-old, she started communicating with the commander asking him, why are you doing this? Why did you kill my sister? And he said, yours -- don't worry your sister with -- is with Allah. She's safe now. She's with Allah.
Tzachi, all this time cannot talk. He's shocked. He's not functioning because he saw his kid dead. And he was just holding his head and crying. And I was looking at him. And, you know, when you have this impression of nothing behind it, it was like that. Tzachi is one of the strongest men I know. Every time that something happens, he's the one that holds the situation. It was painful to see him like that.
And then they said, OK, you and you, and they were pointing at Tzachi and Domri (ph). He said you and you get up. You're coming with us. And they cuffed his hand with white stripes and barefooted also, I think. And they said, OK, you're coming with us, and they took them. They were in front of the back door. They asked whose car is it? And Tzachi said, this is my car. To us, they said, OK, stay on the ground, or you will be killed. We'll shoot you or you'll be dead.
So we stayed, we told our husbands, Leisha (ph) and me, we said, we love you. Don't do anything stupid. Don't be a hero. Just do what they say, please. And the kid started yelling, don't take him, don't take him. And they said, no, no, it's OK. He'll be back. He'll be back. They promised the kids he'll be back. We couldn't do anything. And it was until I think 5:30 in the afternoon that we heard people talking around us, you know, and we just looked outside, peeked outside, Leisha (ph) picked outside and said they're -- there's somebody is walking around the house.
They said (Speaking in Foreign Language) which is IDF, IDF. There are actually our saviors. They took us out of the house, actually. But the kids didn't want to go. They said please, I don't want anybody else to be dead in this house. I don't want anybody else getting murdered. The kids didn't want to go. It took me 20 minutes outside the kibbutz just to breathe because I couldn't breathe all the way. I held Shashar on me and Yael and we went out like this. Sorry.
BLITZER: Your 11-year-old daughter and your nine-year-old son.
IDAN: Yes.
BLITZER: And Tzachi had already been taken. Already been kidnapped.
IDAN: Yes.
BLITZER: And Maayan, your daughter, was dead. And her body was left in the house?
IDAN: It was left in the house. I couldn't -- they didn't let us go there. We asked them to go to see Maayan. The terrorists, they didn't let me see my daughter before I went. They didn't. I couldn't say goodbye. I couldn't. She stayed there for three days.
BLITZER: In the house?
IDAN: Her body, yes, in a pale of blood, you know, on the floor.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: A very, very emotional interview from just part of our time here in Israel this weekend. We're going to share more of Gali's story in the next hour of THE SITUATION ROOM. You'll want to watch this very, very powerful.
[17:54:22]
We also have a lot more coming up on other breaking news we're following here in Tel Aviv, including that Israeli strike earlier today on an ambulance in Gaza. And those first comments from Hezbollah's leader on whether the Israel-Hamas war could broaden into a larger regional conflict. There's a lot of breaking news we're covering it all. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Happening now, breaking news, a federal appeals court just froze the gag order against Donald Trump and the election interference case in Washington. We're going to break down the decision and what it could mean for the former president as the criminal proceedings against him move forward.
Also, tonight, Israel defends its airstrike on an ambulance in Gaza, claiming the vehicle was being used by a Hamas terrorist cell. New reaction coming in to the disturbing scenes outside a hospital and the reported casualties.
And CNN confronts embattled Republican Congressman George Santos about an alleged campaign fraud scheme. The latest charge against him on top of the litany of lies, standby for that exclusive interview.
Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Tel Aviv, Israel, and you're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
[17:59:54]
We begin this hour with the breaking news back in Washington, Donald Trump's gag order in the federal election interference case just put on hold. CNN's chief legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid is working this important story for us.
