The death toll continues to rise as Israel unleashes attacks on Gaza. Here's what you should know
From CNN staff
The death toll continues to rise since Israel declared war on the Palestinian militant group Hamas after it carried out unprecedented attacks Saturday that killed more than 1,200 people.
At least 1,537 Palestinians have been killed and an additional 6,612 have been injured since the weekend's assault, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza. In the West Bank and East Jerusalem, at least 36 people have died and more than 650 have been injured, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Ramallah said.
According to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, at least 25 Americans have been killed in Israel. And in Canada, the government says another one of its citizens is presumed dead following the Hamas attack on Israel, in addition to two Canadians confirmed dead and four more people from the country who have been reported missing.
Here's what else you should know:
- Calls for aid: Hamas on Thursday appealed to world relief organizations to provide essential medical and relief supplies to Gaza as Israel continues airstrikes on the territory. Gaza's humanitarian crisis has deepened, with warnings that the population is at risk of starvation and fuel could run out within hours. Israel is withholding essential supplies from the enclave in response to Hamas' brutal terror attacks, CNN previously reported.
- International input: Russia's foreign ministry on Thursday called Israel's missile strikes on Syria “a gross violation" of international law. Russia's deputy foreign minister and Middle East envoy Mikhail Bogdanov on Thursday called for the "immediate cessation of hostilities" and the resumption of food and medicine deliveries to Gaza, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The United Kingdom will send a "significant support package" to deter attempts to further escalate the conflict between Israel and Hamas, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
- Official meeting: Blinken arrived in Amman, Jordan, early Friday local time ahead of a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordanian King Abdullah II. He vowed US support for Israel and likened Hamas’ crimes to ISIS.
- Humanitarian crisis: More than 338,000 Palestinians have been displaced by the conflict between Israel and Hamas, said Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for United Nations' secretary-general. Nearly 218,000 of those are sheltering in 92 schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency, Dujarric said Thursday.
- On the ground footage: South First Responders in Israel said on Thursday it obtained footage from cameras found on the bodies of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad militants that shows the Saturday morning assault on the Israeli kibbutz Kfar Aza. CNN geolocated the footage to the kibbutz. In one of the videos, militants wearing bullet-proof vests and wielding rifles can be seen walking through the community and yelling as gunshots are heard in the background.
- Victim stories: A woman whose mother survived the Holocaust spoke to CNN about her missing grandchildren. A woman told CNN of her losses as a result of the conflict, including her mother, three young children as well as their parents. And young Israelis around the world are returning to Israel following the attacks to join the war.
Hamas trained for its deadly attack in plain sight and less than a mile from Israel’s border
From CNN's Paul P. Murphy, Tara John, Brent Swails and Oren Liebermann
The footage is from the last two years, but it is chillingly prescient.
In a December 2022 video, Hamas fighters can be seen flooding a training area, shooting rockets and capturing pretend prisoners as they surround mock Israeli buildings.
The camp, CNN analysis shows, had just been constructed, and was very close to Erez Crossing, the pedestrian passageway between Gaza and Israel that Hamas fighters ultimately breached last weekend in a bloody attack — which killed over 1,200 people in Israel.
Another video taken more than a year ago, shows Hamas fighters practicing take-offs, landings and assaults with paragliders — the same unusual mode that Hamas deployed with lethal effect in the same October 7 attack.
A CNN investigation analyzed almost two years of training and propaganda video released by Hamas and its affiliates to reveal the months of preparations that went into last week’s attack, finding that militants trained for the onslaught in at least six sites across Gaza.
Two of those sites, including the arid training site shown in the December video, were a little more than a mile from the most fortified and patrolled section of the Gaza-Israel border. Of the remaining sites: one is located in central Gaza, and the other three in far south Gaza.
Two years of satellite imagery, also reviewed by CNN, show no indication of an offensive Israeli military action against any of the six identified sites.
Not only was there activity in the last several months at the camps, but some camps also absorbed surrounding farmland, converting it from agriculture to barren area for training in the last two years, according to satellite imagery.
In the aftermath of Hamas’ ruthless incursion — where militants abducted up to 150 people, overran Israeli military bases, and laid waste to towns and farms — questions are being raised about the intelligence and operational failures of Israel’s security apparatus.
The fact that Hamas trained for the attack in plain sight for at least two years raises questions as to why Israel, home to the Middle East’s most sophisticated military and spying operation, was unable to pick up on and stop the attack?
When CNN reached out to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) for comment, its international spokesperson Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus said the findings were “nothing new.”
He added that Hamas has “had many training areas” and Israel’s military had “struck many training areas over the years in the different rounds of escalation.”
Conricus noted that Israel has not had a major escalation with Hamas in over two years, in reference to when hostilities between Israel and Hamas erupted in 2021. It followed weeks of tension in Jerusalem, where a group of Palestinian families faced eviction from their homes in East Jerusalem in favor of Jewish nationalists.
Conricus also said that Hamas may have made the facilities “look civilian.”
However, five of the sites — the sixth is a landing strip — do not have civilian features and are nearly identical in how they are constructed and arranged.
Read more about Hamas' training that led up to the October 7 attack.
"I pretended to be dead": Israeli-American describes how he survived the Hamas music festival attack
From CNN’s Jillian Sykes
“I probably won’t make it out of here. I love you with all my heart.”
That's the text Israeli-American Aviv Oz sent his girlfriend as he hid motionless for hours during Hamas’ music festival massacre.
Oz, 34, was working as a visual artist at the Nova festival Saturday when the music was suddenly replaced by the sound of blaring alarms.
Like many others, Oz and his friends instinctively ran to their cars to escape, but a traffic jam quickly formed. Moments later, gunshots and shouting erupted from different directions. Then, "complete chaos," he said.
"It was like a scene from Call of Duty, from a battlefield. A real-life nightmare," Oz said.
After deciding to abandon his car and run, Oz was separated from his friends and found himself jumping into the bottom of an empty, concrete pool. Before his phone ran out of battery, he was able to send a few messages to his loved ones.
“To my understanding I was going to die, and I needed to say goodbye,” Oz told CNN.
“When I decided to lay down and wait for my death, I could see the terrorists passing through," he said. He could hear them laughing and smelled smoke and gunpowder while "I pretended to be dead," he said, adding that he stayed motionless for five hours.
When he thought it was safe, Oz slowly made his way out of the pool and ventured back out to his car — which he found "shredded by bullets" — to charge his phone and call for help.
“The ground was full of innocent people,” Oz told CNN.
He headed back to his hiding spot while waiting for help to arrive.
“There was another person, an Israeli woman, who was hiding in the bushes all this time,” he said. “She joined me, and we waited in a panicked silence until special forces found us.”
While he is thankful to be alive, Oz said he is deeply mourning friends and coworkers who were killed.
Oz, who has family roots in Queens, New York, is living in Israel and plans to make it his permanent home.
"It isn't self-defense if you are an occupying force," queen of Jordan says about conflict
From CNN's Jomana Karadsheh and Caroline Faraj
Queen Rania al Abdullah of Jordan posted on social media, in response to the Israeli-Hamas conflict, "It isn't self-defense if you are an occupying force."
Rania, who is of Palestinian descent, posted her message Wednesday as an Instagram story, a format that disappears after 24 hours. Jordanian state-owned media AlMamlaka TV republished the post.
Included in the queen's Instagram story was a post from Palestinian journalist Motaz Azaiza, which shows aerial footage of destruction in Gaza following Israel's bombardment.
The queen also shared a video from the news website "Eye on Palestine," which appears to show Palestinian children injured following Israeli airstrikes.
CNN has reached out to Rania's office for comment.
More context: Israel withdrew its troops from Gaza in 2005, but its blockade on the enclave effectively allows the country to control access to the land, air, and sea of the strip.
The blockade includes tight restrictions on the movement of residents in and out of Gaza and the movement of goods in and out.
Current conflict: Israel’s continued airstrikes in Gaza have hit hundreds of targets and neighborhoods, deepening the humanitarian crisis. The Israeli airstrikes are in response to Saturday’s attacks when Hamas members broke through the heavily fortified border fence into Israeli territory. Hamas gunmen killed more than 1,200 people, including civilians and soldiers, and also took hostages.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordanian King Abdullah II met on Wednesday to discuss recent events and how to stop the escalation in Gaza, Jordan's Royal Hashemite Court posted on social media Wednesday.
"Jordan is making intense efforts to discuss urgent international action to stop the escalation, protect the Palestinians, and prevent their displacement," King Abdullah II said. "The dangerous escalation and acts of violence and aggression currently taking place in the Palestinian Territories are proof that confirms, once again, that our region will never be secure nor stable without achieving just and comprehensive peace on the basis of the two-state solution."
The two-state solution is a decades-old plan to establish a Palestinian state next to Israel.
This week, thousands took to the streets of Amman, Jordan, in a protest supporting the people of Gaza.
More than 338,000 Palestinians have been displaced by the recent conflict, UN says
From CNN's Mitchell McCluskey
More than 338,000 Palestinians have been displaced by the conflict between Israel and Hamas, said Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for UN's secretary-general.
Nearly 218,000 of those are sheltering in 92 schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency, Dujarric said Thursday.
Airstrikes have hit at least 88 education facilities, including 18 UNRWA schools and 70 Palestinian Authority schools, according to the UN. Two of the UNRWA facilities were being used as emergency shelters for displaced people, the UN added.
"This means that for the sixth consecutive day, more than 600,000 children have had no access to education in a safe place in Gaza,” Dujarric said.
The UNRWA said 12 of its personnel have been killed since October 7.
The UN has warned the situation in Gaza is continuing to worsen as humanitarian organizations are unable to bring aid into the sealed-off enclave.
The World Health Organization said the hospitals in Gaza are "at a breaking point."
Earlier Thursday, the International Committee of the Red Cross warned hospitals in Gaza "risk turning into morgues" as they lose power during Israel's bombardment of the enclave. And shortages of food, water and electricity have already been putting extra strain on medical facilities.
The World Food Programme (WFP) said it has plans to work with the UNRWA to “reach over 800,000 people across Palestine”. On Wednesday, the WFP said it delivered food to over 175,000 displaced people across 88 shelters.
There is no specific evidence of a threat to the US at this time, Homeland Security officials say
From CNN's Priscilla Alvarez
There is no specific or credible intelligence indicating a threat to the United States as result of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, officials with the US Department of Homeland Security said Thursday.
Still, officials stressed they are keenly aware of how volatile and unpredictable the threat environment might be.
“We are especially vigilant, at this time, against the potential for violence here in the United States from a variety of threat actors,” a Homeland Security official told reporters Thursday, citing the potential for violence driven by anti-Semitic, Islamophobic or anti-Arab sentiments.
In addition to preparing state and local agencies for any potential domestic impacts, the official also alluded to concerns about the situation in Israel developing into a wider conflict on multiple fronts.
“Everybody is pretty well-attuned to the different ways in which the conflict could expand: you know, a northern front involving Lebanese Hezbollah, other actors in the region becoming involved," the official said. "Each of those, were they to materialize, would have potential implications for our homeland security," they continued.
On Thursday, US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris discussed homeland security issues with senior law enforcement and national security officials, according to the White House. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was among the attendees.
In a keynote address at the Foundation to Combat Anti-Semitism’s Inaugural Sports Leaders Convening Thursday, Mayorkas underscored the urgency in confronting anti-Semitism.
“The events of the last five days have awoken a sometimes deep-seated, sometimes generations-old fear in Jewish people everywhere. The paradigm for anti-Semitism, and anti-Semitic violence, has shifted precipitously over the past five days,” he said, according to a copy of the address provided by DHS. “So must, too, the urgency with which we confront it.”
Russia calls for immediate cessation of hostilities and delivery of food and water to Gaza
From CNN’s Mariya Knight
Russia's deputy foreign minister and Middle East envoy Mikhail Bogdanov on Thursday called for the "immediate cessation of hostilities" and the resumption of food and medicine deliveries to Gaza, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
His remarks were in a phone conversation about the "emerging catastrophic situation in and around the Gaza Strip” with PLO Executive Committee Secretary General Hussein al-Sheikh, the statement said.
Both parties called “indiscriminate bombing” resulting in numerous civilian casualties “unacceptable," the statement said.
"The emphasis was made on preventing the exodus of the population from the Gaza Strip, which should become part of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders with its capital in East Jerusalem,” it said.
Gaza's humanitarian crisis deepened Thursday amid warnings that the population is at risk of starvation as Israel launched airstrikes in retaliation for the attacks by Hamas on Saturday that killed more than 1,200 people.
Biden administration scrambles to get Americans stranded in Israel back home
From CNN's Pete Muntean, Gregory Wallace and Donald Judd
The Biden administration said it will begin chartering flights on Friday from Israel to destinations in Europe, as officials scramble to get Americans stranded in the war-ravaged country back home to the US.
Once the travelers get from Israel to Europe – on Israeli, Turkish and other regional airlines – they’ll be ferried home by US-based and other carriers.
Worried about safety, United, American and Delta all ceased operations to and from Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel’s lone international airport, earlier this week. The US government charters are expected to open new routes for those fleeing the ongoing violence, however many flights and available seats there may eventually be.
But concerns about the danger, security and insurance coverage are still getting in the way of a more sweeping response to the overwhelming clamor for flights.
“We know there’s a demand signal out there,” Biden administration spokesperson John Kirby told reporters Thursday, “and we’re going to try the best we can to meet it.”
A handful of non-US airlines have continued to operate out of Ben Gurion in the week since Hamas militants attacked Israeli civilians, killing at least 1,200 people and triggering a deadly barrage of Israeli strikes in Gaza. With the hostilities ongoing, the Federal Aviation Administration warned that it’s a “potentially hazardous situation” to fly in the region.
European airlines are heeding the warnings. A British Airways flight aborted its approach into Tel Aviv facing rocket fire this week, and then the airline quickly joined the list of international carriers suspending service into Israel. KLM, Lufthansa and Air France have also done so.
Meanwhile, some travelers have been able to leave the country on one of the regional carriers, including the Israeli airlines El Al and Arkia. Also still operating are the UAE’s Emirates airline, Turkish Airlines and the Russian airline Red Wings, according to data compiled by CNN from the tracking site FlightAware and the flight data provider Cirium.
West Bank and East Jerusalem death toll rises to 36, Palestinian officials say
From CNN’s Kareem Khadder
At least 36 people have died, and more than 650 have been injured, in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since Saturday, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Ramallah.
The deaths occurred in clashes from Israeli “aggression,” the ministry said. The Ministry of Health also confirmed that many of those killed sustained injuries from bullets.
CNN previously reported violence has risen in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem since Israel declared its war on Hamas and continued to strike Gaza since Saturday.