April 12, 2024 - Israel-Hamas war

The US is sanctioning four leaders of Hamas’ cyber and drone operations based in Gaza and Lebanon, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller announced on Friday. 

“Operatives of terrorist group Hamas have used information warfare and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) to facilitate terrorist violence across multiple fronts,” Miller said.  

Those sanctioned include:

The al-Shimali unit manages the development and production of automatic 120mm mortars, mobile launchers for Grad rockets, development and production of flight simulators, UAVs for intelligence gathering and suicide UAVs, according to the Treasury Department. 

“The United States will continue to target Hamas’s destabilizing attempts to launch terrorist attacks, as well as to disrupt Hamas terrorists wherever they operate, including across cyberspace,” Miller said.

Hamas and Hezbollah have developed moderately effective cyber capabilities in recent years, according to private experts who track them. Hamas has used those capabilities in espionage campaigns aimed at Israel and Arab governments for years, researchers have found. In an interview with CNN in November, Israel’s cyber defense chief alleged that Hezbollah-backed hackers had breached private security cameras in Israel to try to track the movements of Israeli soldiers.

Israeli forces surrounded and attacked the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza on Friday, wounding several journalists and at least one other person.

Turkish state broadcaster TRT accused Israeli tanks of launching a “targeted attack” on the journalists, including TRT Arabi cameraman Sami Shehada, who lost a leg, and correspondent Sami Barhoum, who suffered minor injuries. CNN stringer Mohammad Al-Sawalhi was also among those hurt.

The TRT statement called the assault "a deliberate attack against media professionals, marked clearly with 'PRESS' on their jackets" and said it was "part of a broader pattern of violence" against journalists in Gaza. As of Friday, at least 95 media workers have been killed covering the war, according to preliminary figures from the Committee to Protect Journalists.

CNN video shows Shehada's right leg was severed.

“We were filming in a safe place, I was wearing my flak jacket and my helmet — even the car I was in had a 'PRESS' and 'TV' sign marked on it. It was clear that I was a civilian and a journalist. We were targeted,” he told CNN from his operating bed.

CNN has reached out to the Israel Defense Forces for comment on the attack and allegations that journalists were targeted at the camp. 

Video from the scene: Footage filmed by Al-Sawalhi shows people — including children, women and the elderly — taking cover in shops and running away in panic as repeated artillery fire and gunshots can be heard in the near distance.

CNN spoke to an elderly man named Saleh, who said he was trying to flee the area after Israeli tanks surrounded the camp and that he'd been hit by shrapnel.

Moments later, Saleh could be seen crossing the street when intense artillery fire struck the road a few meters from where Al-Sawalhi was filming. The journalist was hit by shrapnel, slightly injuring his right hand.

Graphic footage of the aftermath shows the elderly man severely wounded, with a bloody head injury. Saleh, Al-Sawalhi, and a number of other journalists were taken to Al-Awda Hospital for treatment, CNN footage shows.

Recent attacks: Nuseirat camp, located north of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, has been the target of several Israeli airstrikes in recent days, including one that killed 14 people Tuesday, according to the spokesperson for Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.

Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and US Central Command Commander Gen. Erik Kurilla on Friday discussed preparations for a potential Iranian attack on Israel.

Gallant and Kurilla spoke about “readiness for an Iranian attack against the State of Israel, which may lead to regional escalation,” according to a statement from Gallant’s office.

Following the meeting, Gallant called Kurilla “a true friend of Israel” and thanked him for US support for Israel. 

“Our enemies think that they can pull apart Israel and the United States, but the opposite is true — they are bringing us together and strengthening our ties. We stand shoulder-to-shoulder,” Gallant added.

The defense minister said Israel was “prepared to defend ourselves on the ground and in the air” and would respond “in close cooperation with our partners.”

 The two met at the Israeli Hatzor Air Base near Ashdod in Israel's Southern District.

The US Defense Department is moving additional assets to the Middle East region, a defense official told CNN, as Israel and the US brace for a potential Iranian attack on Israeli facilities in the country and the broader region.

The move is "to bolster regional deterrence efforts and increase force protection for U.S. forces," according to the official. 

The Pentagon has been working specifically to reinforce air defenses for the US troops stationed in Iraq and Syria, who came under attack by Iran-backed proxy forces over 100 times between October and February. In January, three US service members were killed when a drone got through US air defenses at the Tower 22 base in Jordan. 

The US is not anticipating that Iran or its proxies will attack US forces as part of its retaliation, but are moving the assets just in case.  

The European Council has adopted sanctions against three Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad entities, in light of "their responsibilities in the brutal and indiscriminate terrorist attacks" that occurred across Israel on October 7.

The listed entities are:

They are now subject to an asset freeze and a travel ban to the European Union, the EU Council said Friday in a news release, adding, "the provision of funds to them, directly or indirectly, is now also prohibited."

Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Israel Katz welcomed the decision. It "sends a clear message: those who murder, rape, burn, abuse the bodies of babies, girls, women, and men, and commit atrocities against humanity - will pay the price," Katz said in a post on X.

Some context: In March, a United Nations team found “clear and convincing” information that hostages in Gaza were sexually abused, and there are “reasonable grounds” to believe the sexual violence is ongoing.

CNN's Richard Roth contributed previous reporting to this post.

The Israeli military does not understand how humanitarian operations work, a top United Nations official said Friday, maintaining there is a "degree of mistrust" that needs to be resolved between the Israel Defense Forces and nongovernmental organizations on the ground in Gaza.

Fears over the safety of humanitarian workers in Gaza have risen in the wake of a deadly Israeli strike on April 1 that killed seven workers from nonprofit World Central Kitchen.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator in the Occupied Palestinian Territories Jamie McGoldrick told reporters Friday that humanitarian workers "fear for their own safety" after the WCK killings and other incidents, such as an attack on a UNICEF convoy Wednesday.

"There's a degree of mistrust and misunderstanding that we have to address," he added.

CNN has reached out to the IDF regarding McGoldrick's remarks.

The UN official spoke to journalists after returning from Gaza, where he held a meeting with the head of the IDF Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Yaron Finkelman. During the meeting, he said they discussed interactions between Israeli soldiers and NGOs, concerns over "weapons discipline," and clearer markings on NGO-affiliated vehicles.

McGoldrick also highlighted dangers posed by inadequate communication infrastructure inside Gaza.

Israel’s former head of military intelligence is urging Israel’s leadership, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to strike a hostage deal that includes an indefinite ceasefire and work with a reformed Palestinian Authority to restore order in Gaza. 

Tamir Hayman, who now heads the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv, said Israel risks falling into a perpetual war of attrition, where there is “endless friction” with its neighbors. He gave recommendations in a roadmap on “the day after” the war, which INSS released Friday. 

A prolonged war, said the retired general, risks either leaving Gaza under Hamas rule or at the mercy of a power vacuum where various armed groups may compete for authority. Israel needs to work with a reformed Palestinian Authority, he told CNN, “instead of chaos, instead of no man’s land” in Gaza. 

Hayman has warned of the urgency of these decisions, saying Israel will not “have any other opportunities” to do so, especially as presidential elections in the United States loom. Israeli leaders must “do the right thing” and not focus on achieving “immediate short-term” wins, Hayman said. 

Remember: Netanyahu has repeatedly ruled out the possibility of a Palestinian Authority-ruled Gaza, and talks for a ceasefire-hostage deal continue to stall as Hamas tells negotiators that it cannot identify and track down 40 Israeli hostages needed for the first phase of an agreement. The Palestinian Authority governs parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank but was expelled from Gaza by Hamas in 2007.

There is a "very credible" threat of Iranian retaliatory strikes against Israel, the White House said Friday, as US President Joe Biden receives constant updates on the situation from his national security team. 

“We’re watching this very, very closely,” said national security spokesperson John Kirby, who declined to provide information about the expected timing of the threat.

But he said US officials were in “constant communication” with their Israeli counterparts about the matter and that steps were underway to ensure Israel is able to defend itself.

He pointed to a visit to Israel on Friday by US Central Command chief Gen. Michael Kurilla to have “those conversations directly with his (Israel Defense Forces) counterparts.” Biden is also receiving briefings multiple times a day on the situation, Kirby said.

“He has made it clear to the entire national security team that that we will take seriously our commitments to the defense, the self-defense of Israel,” Kirby said.

The US is also assessing its own posture in the region ahead of the potential retaliatory attack, he added.

US markets react: US stocks slid and oil prices spiked Friday morning, in part due to worries on Wall Street about escalating tensions in the Middle East.

CNN's Krystal Hur contributed reporting to this post.

A surgeon who visited Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza after Israeli forces laid siege to the complex for two weeks said valuable medical resources were destroyed.

Dr. Athanasios Gargavanis recalled the scale of material destruction wrought in the wake of the attack, including an oxygen plant, a CT scan and laboratory equipment.

The specialized surgical buildings was blown out from the basement to the second floor, the World Health Organization doctor said, adding further assessment by an engineer would determine whether the buildings could be restored. 

Health workers in Gaza have claimed that Israeli forces killed hundreds of Palestinians and left their bodies to decompose during their two-week siege of the complex in March. 

The world saw for the first time the full scale of the destruction left by Israeli forces on Al-Shifa when footage of the complex emerged on April 1 — the day that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed its withdrawal from the hospital.  

The IDF claimed “hundreds of terrorists were killed or captured” during the two-week siege. CNN cannot independently verify the IDF's statement.