March 21, 2024 Israel-Hamas war

US Central Intelligence Agency Director Bill Burns will join hostage talks in Qatar on Friday as negotiators work toward a deal that would secure the release of hostages held in Gaza alongside a temporary ceasefire, sources familiar with the plans said.

The head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, David Barnea, will travel to Qatar Friday for the talks, Israeli prime minister’s office said in a statement on Thursday.

Barnea will meet with Burns, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani and Egyptian Intelligence Minister Abbas Kamel, according to the statement.

“The meeting of senior officials will be held in the framework of the negotiations in Doha, the goal of which is to advance the efforts to return the hostages,” it added.

CNN has reached out to CIA for comment. 

Burns has been instrumental in trying to secure a deal on hostages, traveling several times to the Middle East and Europe for talks. So far, the efforts haven’t yielded an agreement.

There were signs, however, that progress was being made, and American officials voiced cautious optimism this week that a deal could be reached. In an interview on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the negotiations to secure a ceasefire and hostage deal are "getting closer.”

“I think the gaps are narrowing, and I think an agreement is very much possible,” Blinken said in an interview with Saudi news channel Al Hadath in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

This post has been updated with additional comments from Israeli officials.

The top US commander for the Middle East said he is “not aware” of Israel’s plans to mitigate civilian harm if the Israel Defense Forces launch an operation in Rafah, Gaza.

Gen. Michael "Erik" Kurilla, US Central Command commander, said he does not believe Israel has finalized those plans yet.

Kurilla said the US is trying to alleviate human suffering in Gaza through the airdrops Central Command forces have been conducting with regional partners including Jordan. 

"We've approached now almost a million meals in the north, with eight other countries," Kurilla said, adding that there "has been some progress in the last two weeks" with regard to getting aid in via land. 

“I talked to Ambassador (David) Satterfield, who is the Special Representative for humanitarian efforts, and he has seen some progress on the challenges of internal security distribution inside of Gaza,” Kurilla said.

The head of the World Health Organization said that famine in Gaza can only be prevented by opening up more land crossings into the strip.  

“Recent efforts to deliver food by air and sea are welcome. But only the expansion of land crossings will enable large-scale deliveries to prevent famine,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Thursday.

The WHO chief also said that up to 16% of children under age 5 in northern Gaza are now malnourished and that children were dying “from the combined effects of malnutrition and disease and lack of adequate water and sanitation.” 

“Once again, we ask Israel to open more crossings and accelerate the entry and delivery of water, food, medical supplies, and other humanitarian aid into and within Gaza,” he said, also calling for the release of all hostages and an immediate ceasefire.

What an Israeli official says: Last week, Col. Elad Goren of Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) said that “the problem isn’t opening more crossings, the problem is distributing the aid to the people in Gaza.”

Goren said that international aid organizations “do not have the capacity and have yet to take real steps to improve on distribution of aid across Gaza.”

Muhammad Hassan Abu Watfa, 30, breathes a sigh of relief. For the first time since Israel launched its offensive on Gaza, he has hope that his young family will be safe.  

Watfa had expressed fears that the health of his eldest child, 3-year-old Hassan, was "declining for the worse," because Israel’s siege on aid entering the strip meant he could not access medication to treat his immunodeficiency disease.  

But on Thursday, Watfa told CNN that his son was granted a medical evacuation to Cairo.

Hassan will travel through the Rafah crossing with dozens of other vulnerable patients who require lifesaving treatment — alongside his 1-year-old sister Rana Watfa and his mother, Noura Abu Watfa.  

The Watfa family, who were displaced from northern Gaza to the European Hospital in Khan Younis, have survived Israeli strikes, perilous displacement and life-altering injuries.

Now, they are wondering if they will ever be reunited.   

"I hope that things will be easier for my son and that his condition improves," the father told CNN. "Here I am alone in the European Hospital; I have been in the hospital for months, and I hope that I will have the opportunity to travel and complete my treatment."

Wafta was severely wounded by a strike while trying to buy bread in northern Gaza on October 16. His right foot was amputated twice. 

The US United Nations Security Council resolution on Gaza could come to a vote as soon as this week, a diplomat familiar with the matter told CNN Thursday.

The resolution, which the US has been working on for weeks, calls for “an immediate and sustained ceasefire … in connection with the release of all remaining hostages.”

The diplomat said that work is underway to try to ensure the resolution passes, but Russia has in the past threatened to veto. 

The US resolution comes after the US vetoed multiple prior UNSC resolutions calling for immediate ceasefires. US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said after vetoing an Algerian resolution in late February that it “would put sensitive negotiations in jeopardy.”

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in an interview Wednesday that he hopes “very much that countries will support” the US resolution. 

“I think that would send a strong message, a strong signal,” he told Saudi news channel Al Hadath, according to a transcript from the State Department.

Ahead of a European Council meeting in Brussels, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said Thursday that the situation in Gaza is "not (just) a humanitarian crisis," but "the failure of humanity."

He added that he hopes the council "will send a strong message to Israel: Stop blocking, stop preventing the food to come into Gaza and take care of the civilians."

Also prior to the meeting, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said it's imperative that the principles of humanitarian law be upheld in Gaza.

“We must stick to principles in Ukraine as in Gaza without double standards,” he said.  

Guterres reiterated his call for a ceasefire in Gaza. “As we condemn the terror attacks of October 7 and as we condemn other violations of international humanitarian law by Hamas, we also condemn the fact that we are witnessing a number of civilian casualties in Gaza that is unprecedented in my time as secretary-general,” he said.

Borrell said that the council today will approve conclusions that will go "much further" than the ones agreed to in October, when the ministers called on humanitarian pauses in Gaza. 

A woman living near the Al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza posted a series of videos describing the current situation as dire as Israeli forces continue operations at the medical complex.

Standing inside her family home, Emmy Shaheen said in one Instagram post, uploaded on Thursday, that "the situation here is catastrophic. Catastrophic. Do you hear? Where can we go? Shelling, shelling, there is shooting." Shaheen added: "They are shooting at a building immediately opposite us…I can see the bullets penetrating the block of flats."

CNN has geolocated Shaheen’s home from her previous videos on Instagram as immediately to the north-west of Al-Shifa hospital, where Israeli forces are on the fourth day of an operation against Hamas fighters said to be in the area.

As another explosion reverberated, Shaheen said: "I don't think we won't be saved from here … Oh God. I have already told you that we won't be saved from here."

She also said that members of her family were injured when their apartment was struck. In another post, she shared video of a man with what appeared to be a shrapnel injury to his back, saying that it was her brother.

CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces for comment on whether it has refused to allow the Red Cross to organize the evacuation of the area. 

Talks aimed at releasing hostages for a ceasefire in Gaza are “progressing positively” — however, “a lot of differences” remain — a diplomat briefed on the matter told CNN.

The diplomat did not highlight what the differences were but was skeptical that the sides were close to an agreement. On Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the sides are getting closer to a deal and that the “gaps are narrowing.” 

The slow progress of the talks was reflected further after Mossad Director David Barnea left Doha after just one day of indirect talks on Monday. Israeli technical teams are now in Qatar trying to iron out details of a deal, Qatari officials said this week. 

“I don’t think we are at the moment now where we can say we are close to a deal … It is still too early to announce any successes,” Qatari foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al-Ansari said on Tuesday. 

Biggest sticking points: It’s unclear what differences still remain but one of the toughest obstacles may be the Hamas demand that after the initial exchange of hostages and prisoners, Israel would agree to a permanent ceasefire and a withdrawal of the Israeli military from Gaza. Israel’s government has repeatedly said those terms are unacceptable and that they still intend to continue the fight against Hamas until “complete victory.”

“We worked very hard with Qatar, with Egypt, and with Israel to put a strong proposal on the table. We did that; Hamas wouldn’t accept it. They came back with other requests, other demands. The negotiators are working on that right now,” Blinken said on Wednesday. 

US House Speaker Mike Johnson said he will extend an invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress after members of his conference encouraged him to do so yesterday in their conference meeting.  

Johnson also revealed he has been invited by Netanyahu to speak at the Knesset, Israel's parliament, and said it would be a “great honor” to do so.

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy addressed the Knesset when he was in the position in May 2023. 

More context: An invitation to address a joint session of Congress would require buy-in from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who sharply criticized Netanyahu in a floor speech last week, when he also called for Israel to hold new elections.

Johnson's invitation also comes at a time when additional military aid to Israel appears stalled on Capitol Hill.