December 7, 2023 Israel-Hamas war

Our live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war has moved here.

Editor’s Note: The following post includes graphic material. Audience discretion is advised.

Simchat Greyman had to pause several times when describing the evidence of sexual violence he saw when recovering the bodies of victims of the October 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel.

One body was so severely brutalized that he and his colleagues from ZAKA, the ultra-orthodox Jewish human remains recovery organization, couldn’t tell whether it was a man or a woman.

Greyman described finding a woman who was shot in the back of her head, lying on her bed, naked from her waist down. A live grenade was planted in her hand.

And then there was the body with the nails.

“I was called into a house, I was told there are few bodies over there. I saw in front of my eyes a woman, laying (down). She was naked and she had nails …,” Greyman managed to say before pausing for a long time, struggling to get the words out.

“She had nails and different objects in her female organs. Her body was brutalized in a way that we could not identify her,” he added, the trauma clearly visible on his face.

Greyman was testifying at a United Nations session on sexual and gender-based violence in the October 7 Hamas terror attack, hosted by Israel at the UN headquarters in New York on Monday.

He was one of several eyewitnesses invited to address the meeting, providing evidence that sexual violence and rape occurred and were weaponized by Hamas during the attacks.

CNN cannot independently verify individual allegations and claims. However, several first responders who attended the scenes of the October 7 attack told CNN the attacks were overwhelmingly gruesome and that some female victims were found undressed.

The evidence of sexual violence presented during the session at the UN was ample and overwhelming and came from different sources.

While Greyman spoke about his experience from the search and rescue operations, Yael Richert, a superintendent with the Israel Police, shared information gathered during the investigation so far.

She said survivors of the terror attack told investigators they witnessed Hamas terrorists perpetrating sexual violence against the victims. She quoted testimonies of several individuals all of whom either directly witnessed sexual violence or saw clear evidence of it.

Read more about the rape and sexual violence inflicted by Hamas

A picture taken from Rafah shows smoke above buildings during Israeli bombardment on Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, on December 7.

The humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate in Gaza as Israeli forces expand their operations throughout the Palestinian enclave.

Since Tuesday, the military has been operating in the southern city of Khan Younis, engaged in “intense battles” with Hamas fighters.

The conflict has caused “unimaginable loss, destruction and misery” and “everyone in Gaza is hungry,” the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said.

Israel’s security cabinet on Wednesday approved a “minimal” increase in the amount of fuel entering Gaza, but global leaders and aid groups say there needs to be much more assistance entering the enclave.

Here’s what to know:

The Israeli military in the early hours of Friday local time responded to an allegation that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) deployed white phosphorus in southern Lebanon on Thursday.

The Lebanon National News Agency (NNA) alleged Thursday that Israeli artillery shelled the outskirts of the town of Rmeish, south Lebanon, with “phosphorus.”

Video obtained by CNN shows columns of white smoke above the outskirts of the hilltop town. CNN is unable to confirm the use of phosphorous munitions. 

In a statement to CNN, the IDF said that it “only legal weapons and ammunition.”

Is white phosphorus illegal? Under an international protocol ratified by Israel in 1995, the use of such incendiary weapons is allowed when “not specifically designed to cause burn injury to persons,” CNN previously reported.

There is no prohibition, per se, against white phosphorus in conflict. But the timing and location of its use are restricted.

For example, it is illegal under the protocol to use white phosphorus against any personnel, civilian or military. It can be directed only against military targets. International law says incendiary weapons cannot be used where civilians are concentrated.

Israel’s history with white phosphorus: Israel previously faced widespread criticism for firing white phosphorus shells over densely populated areas during a Gaza offensive that began in late 2008. HRW said in a 2009 report that Israel’s white phosphorus munitions had killed and injured civilians and damaged civilian structures, including a school, a market, a humanitarian aid warehouse, and a hospital. HRW claimed that Israel’s use of the weapons in crowded neighborhoods “violated international humanitarian law (the laws of war), which requires taking all feasible precautions to avoid civilian harm and prohibits indiscriminate attacks.”

In response, Israel pledged to limit the use of white phosphorus and make greater efforts to protect civilians during conflicts. Still, the government said that it had used white phosphorus lawfully.

Claim of recent use: In October, Human Rights Watch accused Israeli forces of using white phosphorus during military operations in Gaza and Lebanon.

According to the HRW report, the rights group said it verified one video taken on October 10 in Lebanon and another video in Gaza on October 11 that it claimed shows “multiple airbursts of artillery-fired white phosphorus over the Gaza City port and two rural locations along the Israel-Lebanon border.”

Israel denied the claims by Human Rights Watch.

Dror Kaplun

An Israeli man presumed to have been held hostage in Gaza was killed on October 7 when Hamas launched a terror attack on Israel, his kibbutz announced in a statement Thursday.  

Kibbutz Be’eri announced the death of resident Dror Kaplun, 68, but did not specify when Israeli authorities informed the kibbutz about his death.  

It is not clear where he was killed.  

CNN has reached out to the Israeli prime minister’s office for more details.  

His wife, Marcel Frailich Kaplun, was also killed on October 7, the kibbutz said at the time.  

After the October 7 attack, the hostages’ families forum released a statement saying his children saw a video in which Kaplun and his wife were seen taken by militants and tied up toward the fence of the kibbutz.

Shoukry appears on CNN on Thursday, December 7.

Egypt will not let Palestinians temporarily relocate to the country while Israel carries out its military operation in the Gaza Strip because it would be a violation of international humanitarian law, the foreign minister said Thursday.

Some context: The United States has also objected to any efforts to move Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip. Vice President Kamala Harris said in a meeting Saturday with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi that Washington will not allow for the forced relocation of Palestinians or any redrawing of the current border of the Gaza Strip.

“Under no circumstances will the United States permit the forced relocation of Palestinians from Gaza or the West Bank, the besiegement of Gaza, or the redrawing of the borders of Gaza,” Harris said, according to a statement from the vice president’s office.

More from the interview: Earlier Thursday, the Egyptian Authority for Crossings and Borders published a list of dozens of foreign nationals set to leave Gaza. Pressed on why it took so long to get those people out of the enclave, Shoukry said it’s all contingent on agreements.

“It is totally up to Israelis to define and to provide the lists of those who can come out, and when they do we facilitate the repatriation. So, this is all to maintain the Rafah crossing, not to affect at all the flow of humanitarian assistance,” Shoukry told CNN.

The list included more US citizens alongside nationals of Romania, the United Kingdom, Ukraine and Kazakhstan. It also includes 13 United Nations personnel intending to enter Gaza. 

Shoukry also said he thinks “it is necessary for the Palestinian people to demonstrate who they will accept as governance of the Gaza Strip.”

When asked by Tapper whether Palestinian people would be better off with a group other than Hamas, the foreign minister said it would be up to the Palestinian people to decide.

Images from Gaza circulating on social media Thursday showed a mass detention by the Israeli military of men who were made to strip to their underwear, kneel on the street, wear blindfolds and pack into the cargo bed of a military vehicle.

Images from Gaza circulating on social media Thursday showed a mass detention by the Israeli military of men who were made to strip to their underwear, kneel on the street, wear blindfolds and pack into the cargo bed of a military vehicle.  

The exact circumstances and dates of the detentions are unclear, but some of the detainees’ identities were confirmed by colleagues or family members. 

At least some of the men are civilians with no known affiliation to militant groups, according to a conversation CNN had with one of their relatives and a statement by one of their employers, a news network.

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor posted an image of one detainment and said in a statement on its website Thursday that “the Israeli army detained and severely abused dozens of Palestinian civilians.” 

The men can be seen in the cargo bed of a military vehicle. 

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has not responded to CNN’s request for comment on the images. CNN has geo-located some of the images to Beit Lahia, north of Gaza City.

The Israeli media, without indicating a source, has portrayed the images as the surrender of Hamas members.

“We investigate and check who has ties to Hamas, and who does not,” he said. “We arrest them all and question them. We will continue dismantling each one of those strongholds until we are done.”

In a statement Thursday, news outlet The New Arab, or Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, said one of its correspondents and several members of his family were among those detained as part of the incident portrayed in the images.

“Today, Thursday, the Israeli occupation army arrested the journalist and the director of ‘The New Arab’ office in Gaza, our colleague Diaa Al-Kahlot, from Market Street in Beit Lahia, along with a group of his brothers, relatives, and other civilians,” Al-Araby Al-Jadeed wrote.

“The occupation deliberately forced Gazans to take off their clothes, searched them, and humiliated them when they were arrested before taking them to an unknown destination, according to what the people there told us,” he said.

Hussam Kanafani, the Al-Araby Al-Jadeed editor-in-chief, said in the statement that Al-Kahlot and his family were still missing.

“We will make every effort possible, in cooperation with international institutions and organizations concerned with the rights and freedom of journalists in the world, to determine the whereabouts of our colleague Diaa and release him as soon as possible,” Kanafani said.

CNN spoke with a relative of another detained men, Hani al-Madhoun, from his home in the United States.

“Israeli forces arrived on the street and called out all the men to come out, and they complied,” al-Madhoun told CNN. “This house was their place of refuge after our two homes were destroyed.”

Al-Madhoun said he was in contact with his sister, who is in Gaza.

He said he recognized his cousin Aboud in one of the photographs and saw his brother Mahmood in a video. He said that Mahmoud is a shopkeeper and Aboud “is not involved in any activities; he helps his father in construction.”

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday described how US pressure has resulted in incremental progress from Israel in protecting civilians and allowing aid into Gaza.

Blinken noted that after each of his trips to Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government shifted toward the US position.

The top US diplomat noted that on his first trip to Israel, in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 Hamas attack, “we made the case for the imperative of getting” aid into Gaza.

“After we left, that assistance started to flow,” he said at a news conference at the State Department alongside UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron.

He said on his second trip, the focus was on emphasizing how “humanitarian pauses could be beneficial in getting hostages out, getting more assistance in.”

“Well, shortly after we left that’s also what happened,” he said. 

On his most recent trip to Israel last week, Blinken stressed the need to protect civilians and pressed the Israeli government not to carry out its offensive in south Gaza in the same way it did in the north. He also stressed the need for sustained humanitarian assistance.

“What we’ve seen over the initial days is some important additional steps in the direction of doing just that,” Blinken said.

Still, the top US diplomat reiterated that there remains a gap between the “intent to protect civilians and the actual results that we’re seeing on the ground.”

Israel says it will open the Kerem Shalom border crossing between Israel and Gaza for the inspection of aid trucks in the “next few days” as the United Nation’s aid chief hailed the “promising signs” pointing toward this development. 

Col. Elad Goren made the announcement during a news briefing Thursday organized by Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, more commonly known as COGAT. 

He did not specify whether the trucks will be allowed to travel to Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing itself after the inspection or whether they will need to travel through the Rafah crossing in Egypt, which is already being used to facilitate aid deliveries. 

“We will open Kerem Shalom just for inspection. It will happen in the next few days,” Goren said. 

Goren, who is head of the Civil Department at COGAT, said it would be essential to open the crossing if Israel wanted to inspect more than 200 trucks a day bound for Gaza. 

A few hours later, UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told a briefing in Geneva that there are “promising signs” indicating that the much-debated crossing would “be able to open soon.” 

Griffiths also did not provide any details regarding what role exactly the crossing would perform if opened. 

The UN has been calling for several weeks for the crossing to be opened, saying it would facilitate deliveries of more vital humanitarian aid to Gaza. 

In this October 18 photo, President Joe Biden meets with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv.

US President Joe Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday to discuss the latest developments in the war between Israel and Hamas.

During the conversation, Biden reiterated the need for Israel to protect civilians, according to a readout of the call from the White House.

Biden also told Netanyahu that more aid was “urgently required across the board,” according to the statement.

The president additionally relayed “deep concern” for hostages still being held in Gaza, telling Netanyahu that Hamas’ refusal to release young women civilian hostages is to blame for the breakdown in the humanitarian pause last week.

Israeli and US officials believe Hamas continues to hold hostage a number of women between the approximate ages of 20 to 30 – many of them kidnapped from the Nova music festival – CNN previously reported. Hamas insisted that some of the remaining women they were holding hostage were considered part of the Israel Defense Forces, which Israel denied. 

More on the leaders’ calls: Per CNN’s count, it’s the 16th call between the two leaders since October 7, and the first since November 26.

On Wednesday, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby was asked in the White House news briefing why the two had not spoken since November, Kirby said he “wouldn’t read anything into that.” 

“I just wouldn’t read anything into the fact that there hasn’t been a conversation in recent days. There absolutely will be additional conversations between the two. I have no doubt about that,” Kirby told reporters.

A frame froma v

The Israel Defense Forces on Thursday released a satellite image and video it said showed Hamas rocket launches next to a “humanitarian zone” and United Nations facility in southern Gaza.

Because the IDF satellite image of the rocket location is cropped, and the video is cropped and low resolution, it is not possible for CNN to corroborate its location.

“Hamas is the enemy of humanity and makes itself a threat to the entire world,” the IDF said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Some context: Along with the allegation, the IDF released a map showing the “Al-Mawasi humanitarian zone,” encompassing a large swath of southwestern Gaza. But in a post on X with the same allegation, the IDF posted a map showing a far smaller humanitarian zone, encompassing just a small neighborhood near the UN facility. And in a post on X earlier this week, the IDF’s Arabic language spokesperson referenced the Al-Mawasi humanitarian zone without any map indicating its boundaries.

The Palestinian Authority should be granted the ability to govern both Gaza and the West Bank — but it is still too early to discuss any details, Egypt’s foreign minister said Thursday.

Sameh Shoukry said that it is “a matter that should be addressed by the Palestinian people,” and Egypt believes the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization are the “legitimate representatives of the Palestinian people.”

Shoukry, speaking at an event in Washington, DC, hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that it is still early and premature to decide what will happen in Gaza since the conflict between Israel and Hamas is still ongoing.

His comments come ahead of a Friday meeting between top diplomats from Arab states and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington, DC.  

The foreign minister’s comments echo remarks by US President Joe Biden, who said last month that the Palestinian Authority should govern the Gaza Strip and the West Bank following the war. 

In stark contrast, on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Palestinian Authority assuming power in Gaza won’t happen for as long as he is prime minister. 

“Whoever educates their children for terror, funds terror and supports families of terrorists, could not control Gaza after we eradicate Hamas,” Netanyahu wrote on social media.  

Some background: The Palestinian Authority is a government body with limited self-rule in the West Bank. It was established in the 1993 Oslo Accords, a peace pact between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization that saw the PLO give up armed resistance against Israel in return for promises of an independent Palestinian state. It has recognized Israel and engaged in multiple failed peace initiatives with it. Hamas controls Gaza and presents itself as an alternative to the PA.

CNN’s Catherine Nicholls and journalist Tamar Michaelis contributed reporting to this post.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it is striking targets in Syria and Lebanon after missiles were reportedly launched toward Israel from those countries on Thursday evening.

Two missiles launched from Syria landed in an open area in the town of Buq’ata in northern Israel, according to the IDF.

The IDF also said it identified “a number of launches” from Lebanon toward the areas of Shtula, Malkia and Zar’it also in the northern part of the country. The launches led to sirens sounding in Golan Heights and Zar’it.

The IDF said it is striking the sources of the launches.

Earlier on Thursday, the IDF said that Israel Air Force fighter jets struck an “operational command and control center” in Lebanon belonging to Hezbollah after launches were detected coming from the vicinity. 

 The World Health Organization (WHO) managed to deliver supplies to two hospitals in southern Gaza that have not received any deliveries since November 29, according to the organization’s director general. 

“Today WHO delivered trauma and emergency care supplies to European Gaza Hospital and Nasser Medical Complex in southern Gaza to cover the needs of 4500 patients,” WHO director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a post on social media platform X. 

The WHO chief highlighted the detrimental impact of the “intense fighting” in southern Gaza, saying the fighting has made it “increasingly difficult to run any health operations” there.  

Since Tuesday, the Israel Defence Forces have been engaged in “intense battles” with Hamas fighters in Khan Younis city in southern Gaza.

Video obtained by news agency Reuters on Thursday showed a slew of injured Palestinians rushing into the Nasser Hospital in the city following a barrage of Israeli strikes. 

Ghebreyesus reiterated that his organization remains “extremely concerned” about the thousands of “patients, and health and care workers” in Gaza, stressing that the only way to protect them is by immediately implementing a ceasefire. 

An overnight Israeli airstrike killed 18 family members of Dr. Munir Al-Bursh, director-general of the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry in Gaza, the ministry said Thursday.

Several of the bodies arrived at the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza as Al-Bursh was on shift there Thursday morning, according to the health ministry.

Al-Bursh told CNN his 1-week granddaughter was among those killed. 

Video from the hospital shows Al-Bursh kneeling on the ground before bodies wrapped in sheets. At least five covered bodies can be seen in the video.

Al-Bursh uncovers the face of one of the deceased, an adult male, and touches his face, the video shows.

He said the man is his nephew, a university professor with a law degree, days shy of obtaining a doctorate in international law, who “everyone knows for his kindness.” 

He said his father is the Undersecretary of the Hamas-run Ministry of Justice in Gaza.

At least 634 people crossed into Egypt on Thursday through the Rafah border crossing, officials said, including more than 400 dual nationals.

This is a breakdown of who exited Gaza into Egypt on Thursday, according to the Rafah Crossing Authority:

It added that a total of 70 aid trucks have entered Gaza, including a load of 79,000 liters (nearly 21,000 gallons) of fuel.

There are “promising signs” that the Kerem Shalom crossing linking Israel to Gaza may be opened for humanitarian deliveries, according to UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths.

“We’re still negotiating,” he said, adding that the crossing has been a “feature of discussion these many weeks.”

“There are some promising signs now that that may be able to open soon,” he added.

What is Kerem Shalom: Before the war that started in early October, Israel had two crossings with Gaza: Erez, which is for the movement of people, and Kerem Shalom, for goods. Both were heavily restricted and have been shut since the war began. During the brief truce between Israel and Hamas, the Kerem Shalom crossing was used to transfer Israeli hostages from Gaza to Israel.

During the two-month conflict, the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt has been the strip’s only entry point to the outside world. Aid to Gaza has trickled through this crossing. It is the only Gazan border crossing that isn’t controlled by Israel.

Take a look at where the Rafah and Kerem Shalom crossings are located:

Israeli forces in recent days have arrested and questioned hundreds of suspects in Gaza allegedly involved in terror activities, an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson said on Thursday.  

He also said that Israeli forces are “advancing the fighting” in Hamas strongholds in the southern and northern Gaza Strip.  

On the Israel-Lebanon border: Following the death of an Israeli civilian in northern Israel from an anti-tank missile from Lebanon, Israeli fighter jets struck “a series of terror targets” of Hezbollah on Thursday — in which several operatives of the militant group were killed, he claimed.  

Israeli military is on a “high alert” in the country’s border with Lebanon and “will severely respond to any terrorists act against Israel,” Hagari said.  

Trucks carrying aid are seen on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing, waiting to cross into southern Gaza on Wednesday, December 6.

The United Nations aid chief has said that the organization’s operation in southern Gaza is unable to function properly.

“Our humanitarian program is no longer a functioning one. It is one of response to opportunity,” UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths stressed Thursday. 

Meanwhile, the pace of the Israeli military operation is a direct “repeat of the assault in northern Gaza,” Griffiths said.

Since Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forces has been operating in the southern city of Khan Younis, engaged in “intense battles” with Hamas fighters. Video obtained by the Reuters news agency Thursday showed a slew of injured Palestinians rushing into the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis following a barrage of Israeli strikes.

“None of us can see where this will end. None of us can see where the people crammed into that southern pocket of Gaza will go — those 2 million people,” Griffiths said.

Sinwar attends a rally in support of Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque in Gaza City on October 1, 2022.

The Israeli prime minister said Wednesday that Israeli forces had surrounded the house of Yahya Sinwar, potentially closing in on the top Hamas official in Gaza – and the man most wanted by Israeli authorities.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Sinwar was not in the house and was believed to be hiding underground in Gaza, but a senior adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that it was “only a matter of time before we get him.”

Israel has publicly accused Sinwar of being the “mastermind” behind Hamas’ terror attack against Israel on October 7 — though experts say he is likely one of several — making him one of the key targets of its war in Gaza.

A longtime figure in the Islamist Palestinian group, Sinwar was responsible for building up Hamas’ military wing before forging important new ties with regional Arab powers as the group’s civilian and political leader.

He was elected to Hamas’ main decision-making body, the Politburo, in 2017 as the political leader of Hamas in the Gaza branch. However, he has since become the Politburo’s de facto leader, according to research by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).

He has been designated a global terrorist by the US Department of State since 2015 and has been recently sanctioned by the United Kingdom and France.

Early days: Sinwar was born in 1962 in a refugee camp in Khan Younis, southern Gaza. His family was displaced from a Palestinian village during the Arab-Israeli war.

He joined Hamas in the late 1980s and became one of the founders of its feared internal intelligence apparatus, known as the Majd.

He was convicted in 1988 of playing a role in the murder of two Israeli soldiers and four Palestinians suspected of collaboration with Israel, and spent more than two decades in Israeli prison.

Sinwar later said he had spent those years studying his enemy, including learning to speak Hebrew.

Back in Gaza, Sinwar has risen through the ranks and quickly became a key player within Hamas. He became known for his brutality and the violence he inflicts on anyone he suspects of betrayal or collaboration, said Harel Chorev, senior researcher at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University.

Learn more about Sinwar and why Israel calls him a “dead man walking.”