January 25, 2024 Israel-Hamas war

Our live coverage of Israel’s war against Hamas has moved here.

The White House on Thursday reiterated its gratitude for Qatar — which has acted as a key mediator in hostage talks — after an apparent leaked recording of Prime Minister Netanyahu calling the country “problematic.”

In a gaggle with reporters earlier, Kirby declined to comment on the recording and said the US would continue working on a deal to secure the release of hostages.

Brett McGurk, a top White House adviser and Middle East coordinator, was in Doha for talks on Wednesday. And CIA Director Bill Burns is expected to soon meet Qatar’s prime minister — along with Egypt’s intelligence director and Israel’s Mossad director — as part of continued hostage talks.

Bill Burns, director of the CIA, is expected to meet with officials from Israel, Egypt and Qatar to discuss a deal to secure the release of remaining hostages held by Hamas, according to a US official familiar with the plans.

The meetings come amid intensive discussions on the parameters of a new deal that would pair hostages’ release with a cessation in the fighting in Gaza. The meetings are expected to occur in Europe, the official said.

US officials said they remain focused on securing a release of hostages after a leaked recording said to be of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticizing Qatar drew anger from the Gulf state.

Here’s what else you need to know:

Palestinians flee Khan Younis, moving toward Rafah, in the wake of the Israeli ground operation, in the southern Gaza , on Thursday, January 25.

As the Gaza war nears its fifth month, with more than 25,000 Palestinians – civilians and combatants – dead and Israel nowhere close to achieving its objective of destroying Hamas, no one seems to have come up with a concrete proposal that’s palatable to both parties to pause the conflict, let alone end it. But there are suggestions, however half-baked, from both sides, that show a willingness to talk.

Indeed, Qatar — the main go-between — says there are “serious discussions” with Israel and Hamas, and is receiving “constant replies” from both sides. They’re not “negotiations” yet, says the White House. But with indirect talks ongoing, we seem to be inching toward what Ofer Shelah, Senior Researcher with Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), describes as a “Zopa” — a zone of possible agreement.

On Monday Axios reported Israel had proposed a two-month truce in exchange for the release of all the 100-plus hostages still held in Gaza. Later that day CNN learned that Mossad chief David Barnea had suggested allowing Hamas leaders to go into exile as part of a broader ceasefire.

On Tuesday, The Wall Street Journal said Hamas was now open to releasing some of the hostages in exchange for a pause in the fighting. And Reuters reported that Israel and Hamas had agreed in principle to a one-month truce, during which abductees would be freed and Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails released.

Keep reading more of this analysis on how Israel and Hamas may be inching toward a deal to end the war.

Dr. John Kahler speaks with CNN on Thursday, January 25.

Surgeons from the humanitarian group MedGlobal who are in Gaza don’t have the resources to sedate patients while cleaning their wounds, according to Dr. John Kahler, a cofounder of the group.

He says they receive between 150 to 200 patients in an outpatient center for wound cleaning per day, which can include children with face burns.

Kahler, an American doctor who has provided humanitarian assistance around the world from Haiti to Yemen, said being in Gaza is a “soul-crushing event” and “by far the worst situation” he has ever seen.

Kahler’s teams at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis tell him there is constant shelling within four or five blocks. Mass casualties with rushes of 20, 30, or 40 people at a time can be brought into the emergency room, he said.

He also has team members in Rafah at a primary health center that sees 600 to 700 patients a day, including many children. He says there is major respiratory disease, and “every one of these children is hungry. All the children have diarrhea.”

CIA Director Bill Burns testifies during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in March.

The director of the CIA is expected to meet with officials from Israel, Egypt and Qatar to discuss a deal to secure the release of remaining hostages held by Hamas, according to a US official familiar with the plans.

Bill Burns will talk with Israel’s Mossad Director David Barnea, Egyptian Intelligence Director Abbas Kamel and Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani in the coming days, the source says. It comes amid intensive discussions on the parameters of a new deal that would pair hostages’ release with a cessation in the fighting in Gaza.

The meetings are expected to occur in Europe, the official said. The CIA declined to comment. The White House, which also declined to confirm Burns’ meetings, said Thursday that ongoing hostage talks were “sober and serious.”

Another top American official, White House Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk, has been in the region this week to continue discussions on the release of hostages. McGurk has visited Cairo and Doha for the talks.

Egypt and Qatar have acted as key players in brokering with Hamas, including securing a temporary pause and hostage release in November.

The Washington Post first reported Burns’ plans.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a weekly cabinet meeting at the Defence Ministry in Tel Aviv, Israel, on January 7.

Families of hostages held in Gaza Thursday have forcefully denied leaking a recording of a meeting where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to criticize Qatar, saying his officials record the meetings while families have to leave their phones at the door. 

“All conversations in meetings with the Prime Minister are recorded by his office and his associates sitting in the meeting. The families participating in the meeting have their phones taken at the entrance,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement.

The Forum represents relatives of many of the people kidnapped on October 7 who are being held in Gaza.

Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a CNN question about who leaked the audio, which infuriated Qatar.

What is the US saying: The US State Department told CNN it had no comment on the alleged leak, but hailed the Gulf nation’s mediating role during the war in Gaza. Vedant Patel, State Department principal deputy spokesperson described Qatar as an “immense and integral partner” and said the country played “an irreplaceable role in ongoing efforts to release hostages” while speaking to CNN’s Eleni Giokos.

The US says it remains focused on securing a release of hostages, including in discussions with Israel and Qatar, after a leaked recording said to be of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticizing Qatar drew anger from the Gulf state.

CNN cannot verify that the voice on the leaked recording belongs to Netanyahu.  

Kirby did not reveal further US frustrations at the comments, though impatience has been growing inside the White House at Netanyahu’s public rejections of a two-state solution and a lack of progress in securing the release of hostages.

Kirby said efforts on striking a hostage deal — which have included Qatar as a mediator — would proceed apace.

Screenshot from a video shot outside the Al Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza City on January 25.

At least 20 people were killed as they waited for aid near Gaza City on Thursday, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.

Another 150 were injured — dozens critically — when an Israeli military strike hit “thousands of people desperate to get humanitarian aid at the Kuwait roundabout in Gaza City,” the health ministry said.

Journalists at the scene said people were waiting for aid along a main road, with local reports describing multiple casualties amid shelling and gunfire.

Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra said that the number of dead was “likely to increase” as hospitals do not have the means to treat them, and Gaza’s Civil Defense described the injuries as “unbelievable.”

Here’s what else to know:

A general view of Al-Shifa Hospital, Gaza, on December 10.

Fourteen out of 36 hospitals in Gaza are still partially functioning, with access to some impossible because of the conflict, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which cited the World Health Organization.

It said in an update that partial functionality indicates “a hospital is accessible to people in need of health care, can take in some new patients and can undertake some level of surgery.” 

The UN also provided status updates on two medical facilities in Gaza:

Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis: “No one can enter or exit the facility due to ongoing bombardments in the vicinity, including 400 dialysis patients in need of support. Health staff are reported to be digging graves on hospital grounds due to the large numbers of fatalities anticipated and the need to manage burials,” OCHA said.

Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City: The situation has somewhat improved with the facility now having about 120 health and care workers and roughly 300 patients. The hospital conducts between five and 10 surgeries daily, mainly trauma cases that require immediate care.

OCHA cited the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as saying the Israeli military “continues to shell areas that it has unilaterally designated as ‘safe’ for evacuation, reinforcing that nowhere in Gaza is safe.”

Palestinian people wait with empty containers as food is distributed by charitable organizations in Rafah, Gaza, on January 25.

The Rafah area in southern Gaza now hosts more than 50% of Gaza’s population, and people are facing worsening sanitary conditions and growing hunger, according to the United Nations.

Further escalation of hostilities in the Rafah area “could have serious implications for over 1.3 million people who are reportedly sheltering in the governorate,” the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in an update.

Hundreds of thousands of displaced people are now in the streets of Rafah, as well as the southern city of Khan Younis, “living in makeshift shelters in miserable conditions, with little or no access to food, water, medicines and appropriate shelter,” OCHA said.

A lack of water availability has also aggravated sanitary conditions, with the amalgamation of solid waste worsened by rain.

These are some numbers of the dire situation, as outlined in the OCHA report:

The US sanctioned several high-ranking Houthi leaders allegedly behind the rebel militia’s attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

The sanctioned individuals include Mohamed al-Atifi, the group’s so-called “minister of defense,” as well as leaders of the Houthi naval forces.

Later Thursday, the UK announced it had also sanctioned the leaders, in a coordinated move alongside the US. The UK government said the sanctions were imposed to disrupt the Houthis’ ability to carry out attacks on international shipping vessels.

The Iran-backed Houthis say the attacks in the Red Sea are revenge against Israel for its military campaign in Gaza.

CNN’s Max Foster and Catherine Nicholls contributed to this reporting.

Gaza’s Civil Defense said they have dealt with “unbelievable” injuries after an attack on civilians waiting for aid near Gaza City Thursday.

Civilians were “targeted” by Israeli forces at the Kuwaiti roundabout in Gaza City, where they were gathered to pick up bags of flour, Basal added. 

Mohammed Al-Rifi, who sustained injuries in his arm and leg after the shelling incident by the Kuwaiti roundabout, said he and others there were “shelled four times.”

Abu Kareem, who was standing outside Al-Shifa Hospital, said that people went to the Kuwait roundabout to “get what they could, and were met with shelling.”

“The Israeli military instructs people to go to these locations designated for aid pickup, and then they target it. We’re never going to find food to eat,” Kareem said.

“We are resorting to food one would normally feed livestock,” he said. 

CNN asked the IDF earlier Thursday for comment on any military operations in the vicinity of the roundabout.

Members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) deliver medical aid to the Nasser Medical Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza, on October 29.

“Concrete actions” are required to preserve “life saving” medical services in war-torn Gaza, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) warns.

The ICRC says only two referral hospitals are providing advanced medical services in Gaza, in a statement released Wednesday.  

However, the ICRC warned that the future of the Nasser Hospital and a third facility, Al Amal Hospital, operated by the Palestine Red Crescent Society, hang in the balance as fighting continues in their immediate vicinity. The head of the ICRC office in Gaza, William Schomberg said “the cumulative impact on the health system is devastating.” 

In a statement sent to CNN, Dr. Ashraf Al-Qidra, the spokesperson for the Hamas-run Ministry of Health in Gaza described the situation at Nasser Hospital as “extremely catastrophic.” 

“The hospital is operating at 10% of its capacity. Operating rooms have run out of anesthesia and painkillers for patients and the wounded,” Al-Qidra added. 

Torrential rain in Gaza is making an already brutal existence even harder for the tens of thousands of people displaced and camping in the open air. 

CNN video from Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, shows dozens of people searching for their belongings after torrential rain washed away mattresses, food and clothes overnight Wednesday.

An estimated 1.9 million people in Gaza are displaced, with more and more crowding into open areas in the center and south of the territory. The mass displacement has led to widespread hunger and the spread of respiratory and skin diseases. 

Parents in Deir Al-Balah told CNN they cannot sleep, because they are trying to comfort their children. And then storms compound their misery. “We were all asleep, and at midnight, we woke up when all those tents were drowned in water. We started carrying our children,” said Ahmad Al Rebai.

“All we say is enough with all this. We want to go back to our homes in Gaza. We are tired of this life,” one man said. “It has been three and a half months. Enough with this life. It’s better that we die than live like this.” 

Legal adviser to Israel's Foreign Ministry Tal Becker, left, and British jurist Malcolm Shaw sit inside the International Court of Justice (ICJ) as judges hear a request for emergency measures to order Israel to stop its military actions in Gaza, in The Hague, Netherlands, on January 12.

Israel declassified more than 30 documents, including summaries of cabinet meetings, as part of its defense against an accusation of genocide made by South Africa at the International Court of Justice, an Israeli official familiar with the matter told CNN Thursday.

The declassification of the documents aimed to show that the Israeli government took steps to bolster humanitarian aid and medical support to Palestinian civilians in the first months of the war.

Israel declassified the documents, the official said, in an effort to rebut South Africa’s allegation of genocide, which hinges on the Israeli government’s intent.

What’s next in the ICJ case: The court is due to announce an order in the case on Friday. It is not clear what the order will be, but it could call for a ceasefire in the conflict. World Court rulings are legally binding, but the court has no mechanism to enforce its decisions. A final ruling on whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza is likely to take months or years to deliver. 

The New York Times was the first to report the documents, which are not available to the public. 

Trucks carrying aid arrive in Rafah, Gaza, on January 17.

The UK will triple its aid to Gaza and coordinate efforts with Qatar to increase the flow of supplies and equipment to those most in need in the enclave.

On Thursday, the UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron will oversee 17 tonnes of family-sized tents being loaded onto a plane to Egypt, according to a UK foreign office statement.

Cameron, who is carrying out a diplomatic tour of the Middle East described the “scale of suffering” in Gaza as “unimaginable.”

The foreign minister said he told Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu during a Wednesday meeting that “far more trucks need to be able to enter Gaza and more crossings need to open.”

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) says that Israeli forces are again targeting the Al-Amal hospital in Khan Younis amid heavy fighting in the area.

In a statement Thursday, the PRCS said there was “ongoing shelling and gunfire in the hospital’s vicinity.”

The PRCS also alleged that Israeli forces had imposed “a complete curfew around the hospital since yesterday afternoon, restricting the movement of ambulance crews to and from the hospital. Thousands of displaced individuals live in constant fear and anxiety due to the ongoing siege and bombardment.”

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Wednesday that they continue to operate in Khan Younis, where they are pursuing “military targets, outposts, infrastructure and command and control centers”, and said the operation there will continue for “several days”.

The IDF regularly asserts that it does not target hospitals but that Hamas uses them as cover for its military operations.

At least 20 people have been killed and as many as 150 injured — including dozens critically — when an Israeli military strike struck “thousands of people desperate to get humanitarian aid at the Kuwait roundabout in Gaza City,” the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said.

Journalists at the scene said people were waiting for aid coming from the south along the Salah al-Din road, and local reports speak of multiple casualties amid shelling and gunfire.

Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra said that the number of dead was “likely to increase as a result of the dozens of serious injuries that arrived at the Shifa Medical Complex, which lacks medical capabilities.”

The journalists said that multiple casualties had been taken to Al Shifa and Al Ahli hospitals.

CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces for comment on any military operations in the vicinity of Kuwait Junction. 

On Wednesday, video from the same location showed hundreds of people running in panic, some carrying boxes of aid, as gunfire reverberated in the background.

Israeli singer and Netflix hit series Fauda actor Idan Amedi -- who was wounded in the Gaza Strip where he was serving as a reservist earlier this month -- addresses a press conference at Hashomer hospital in Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv, Israel, on January 25.

One of Israel’s best known actors and entertainers, Idan Amedi, has spoken in public for the first time since being badly wounded during combat in the Gaza Strip earlier this month.

Speaking outside the Sheba hospital, Amedi said:

Amedi was badly wounded during combat in the Gaza Strip in early January.

Wearing a sling on one arm and still with a face injury, Amedi said that shrapnel had penetrated his neck and hit his spine, luckily without hitting the cord. He was injured in his arms too. He described being alive as a miracle.

He said that when he woke up at the hospital after surgery, he asked whether his friend Akiva, who was next to him when he was wounded, had survived. He was told that he hadn’t.