Glimmer of hope as Hamas broaches subject of releasing some hostages 43:18

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Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts to get new episodes of Morning Joe and the Rachel Maddow Show ad-free. Plus, ad-free listening to all of Rachel Maddow's original series, Ultra, Bagman, and Deja News.

And now all MSNBC original podcasts are available ad free and with bonus content, including how to win 2024 prosecuting Donald Trump. Why is this happening? And more subscribe to MSNBC premium on Apple podcasts. There really is a lot going on. We are going to be talking a lot tonight about the latest news from the Israel Hamas war. Uh,

But but not only that story, we've had a bunch of important news breaking today internationally and in the United States. There's just just one of those days there is a ton to get to on Israel and Hamas, though. Obviously, this is a huge breaking news within the past hour that President Biden himself will travel to Israel the day after tomorrow on Wednesday. Secretary of State Antony Blinken making that big announcement tonight from Israel.

He announced that President Biden is coming to Israel on Wednesday. He also said this, which itself could be a very big deal. The United States and Israel have agreed to develop a plan that will enable humanitarian aid from donor nations and multilateral organizations to reach civilians in Gaza and them alone, including the possibility of creating areas to help keep civilians out of harm's way. To have the U.S. president heading there himself and then to have what Secretary Blinken just announced there, the U.S. government

announcing that they've got a plan with Israel to get aid into Gaza. These are both very big developments. So we're going to be talking tonight about what this could mean for the course of this war, for Israel, for Hamas, for the civilians in Gaza who have been put in such an impossible situation. We're going to be talking about the potential riskiness of the president's mission abroad and what his visit might be able to change, might be able to shake loose in terms of diplomatic progress.

So there's a lot to talk about that tonight. I will also tell you that tonight we heard from the family of one of the hostages who is being held by Hamas. This is the mother of a young man who's been held hostage since last Saturday. We've stayed in touch with her and her family over the past week since her son was taken. It's really interesting. Late today, we heard from her that her family and other families of hostages have been held

have been contacted by representatives from the Red Cross seeking information about their family members who are being held. Now, in her case, her son is asthmatic. He needs his asthma medications every day. The Red Cross, according to her, was speaking specific and seeking specific information on that. She told us tonight that she and her family are heartened by that outreach from the Red Cross because they're hopeful that it means there's

Some kind of substantive effort underway to try to make contact, to try to establish some kind of connection with the hostages, some kind of care for those of them that need medical attention.

This is her son. Her son is Ron Sherman, young man. He has been held hostage since last weekend, along with nearly 200 other Israelis who were taken by Hamas. That number, nearly 200, is according to the Israeli government. In Ron Sherman's case, his mother tells us that he is a dual citizen of Israel and Argentina. And that dual citizenship factor may be important.

Right after we heard from the family of this young man tonight, NBC's Richard Engel broke in live to our coverage here on MSNBC to report on an interesting new development, a statement from Hamas specifically about the hostages. Watch.

The chief spokesman for the Hamas military wing just issued a statement on camera in which the group is offering to release foreign hostages unconditionally. And I think this could significantly change the way things develop here over the next

several hours potentially, changed the course of this conflict so far. It is on the same channels that Hamas releases its normal videos. I've listened to the audio and verified it in Arabic. They are confirming that among those hostages there are a group of foreigners. He didn't say how many. And he said now they've confirmed that they are foreign nationals, that they are not party to the conflict, that they are being treated, quote, as guests.

and that Hamas will release them, quote, when field conditions are right. This is, I think, it's coming from Hamas, so it's healthy and appropriate to treat it with a great deal of skepticism. But I know from diplomatic sources I've been talking to all day that there has been a lot of effort to try and convince Hamas to release some hostages. I know a lot of work has gone into this because I've been speaking with diplomats

with Arab negotiators all day. They were expecting some sort of news. It could very well be Hamas's attempt to push back a ground invasion, or it could be an attempt by Hamas to not pick a fight with the United States, to say that its fight is with Israel and with Israel alone, so that it doesn't have Delta forces and Navy SEALs landing in the Gaza Strip and looking for this people.

That report breaking news today from Richard Engel. You can hear what sound like explosions in the background behind him as he reported live in that clip from Israel. We're going to be speaking with NBC's Richard Engel live again tonight from Israel in what is the first potential sign of progress, at least movement,

on these roughly 200 people, 200 Israelis who were kidnapped in Israel and are being held as hostages by Hamas in Gaza. So we're going to be talking with Richard about that. Obviously, the families of the hostages who are being held are hanging on every single word of any potential progress. It has been way too long that all these people have been held, and those families are on absolute tenterhooks in terms of trying to get any news, any word of any progress.

But again, this is major news from the U.S. administration just this past hour. In the midst of this war, President Biden himself will be going to Israel the day after tomorrow on Wednesday. A remarkable decision by the president, unfortunately.

And it joins what is already a large U.S. response in terms of the overall U.S. government response to this crisis. We already know the U.S. is sending a second aircraft carrier to the region. That itself, a remarkable decision.

The U.S. military is also sending advisors from JSOC, from the Joint Special Operations Command, to advise on potential hostage rescue operations. Again, some Americans are believed to be among those people who are being held by Hamas.

Secretary of State Blinken was himself personally back in Israel today working, among other things, on trying to open the Rafah border crossing, which is the one that's in the southern tip of the Gaza Strip, the crossing between Gaza and Egypt. They're trying to arrange an opening of the Rafah border crossing to let aid in, to let civilians out.

Secretary Blinken announcing what appears to be progress on some kind of that front tonight, saying, again, this is just breaking news tonight, that the U.S. and Israel have agreed on some sort of new plan to protect civilians and to get aid into Gaza. We are eagerly looking forward to more details on what exactly that might mean. We'll be talking about that ahead over the course of this next hour.

For what it's worth, though, I thought this was fascinating. There is fascinating new polling just out from Reuters Ipsos that shows that a big majority of the United States, a big majority of the American population views Israel favorably.

And also look at this by huge margins, by both Democrats and Republicans, by huge margins, Americans want U.S. diplomats to, quote, actively work on a plan to allow civilians fleeing fighting in Gaza to move to a safe country. So you've got Americans broadly favorable toward Israel and very strongly in favor of the U.S. working to make sure civilians in Gaza are safe.

So we've got Richard live from Israel tonight. We've got veteran reporter Eamon Mahaldin here with us. We've got a senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee joining us here tonight. That's all to come. There is lots to get to. Now, because of the intense focus on the Israel-Gaza war in American news over the weekend and in today's news, you might have seen, you might not have seen some big news in politics in Europe tonight.

A country that had been flirting with the prospect of maybe giving up their democracy, maybe heading toward a more authoritarian form of government, something more like Hungary or even Russia, has decided not to go that way.

In Poland this weekend, the Polish people turned out in huge, huge numbers. Over 74 percent voter turnout in Poland. That's bigger turnout than what was previously their most important election ever when they voted out the Communist Party in 1989. Polish people turned out this weekend in unprecedentedly gigantic numbers.

and they voted out the hard right party that had been the governing party there, the so-called Law and Justice Party. And so it's just, I mean, whether or not you care about Poland itself and its future, it's an important thing for Europe. It's an important thing, particularly for, say, the European Union's support of Ukraine in Russia's war on Ukraine. But it also helps us

get our arms around this larger international project that even we in our country are subject to right now, right? We have seen authoritarian, anti-democratic movements and leaders rise all over the world in recent years, including here at home.

But there has been electoral pushback, some notable electoral pushback in important countries. We have seen, for example, Donald Trump voted out of office in this country, resoundingly in the United States 2020. We saw Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil voted out of power, resoundingly in 2022. Earlier this year in Spain, we saw the hard right party there rejected unexpectedly by voters in

And now this weekend, we have just seen Poland's very hard right law and justice party voted out. And it doesn't mean that there isn't still rising authoritarianism all around the world, but it does mean that in instances like these, in big, important countries with mature democracies, we are seeing big voter pushback against Trump-type or Viktor Orban-type leaders.

And authoritarians or would-be authoritarians, they don't generally take well to elections voting them out of office. That's part of why they try to undermine democracy full stop. In the case of both Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, we saw mass violence after they were voted out. We saw their supporters storming the Capitol to try to keep them in power after they lost election.

And so eyes are on Poland now for any kind of potential eventuality like that or any other kind of, you know, authoritarian rule by force shenanigans to try to undo the Polish election result from this weekend. But for now, that is an important result in Europe. It looks like another win for small D Democrats against the admittedly still rising authoritarian tide. Here in our national capital, the leader of the far right,

And the de facto leader of the Republican Party is, of course, on trial for his alleged role in trying to overturn the result of the election in which he was voted out.

It's it's only one of four cases in which Donald Trump is currently facing multiple felony charges. But today there was big news in his federal case in Washington today, the judge overseeing Trump's federal criminal case in D.C., the one about him trying to overthrow the lawfully elected government of the United States. That federal judge in Washington today instituted a limited version of what's generally called a gag order.

that bans him by court order from disparaging the prosecutors or potential witnesses in his case or any personnel who work for the court in which he is being tried. Now, in terms of the exact contours of this court order, we are still expecting the judge's written order. But she did rule verbally from the bench today.

And we got the transcript of it, which is amazing. It was just all day long sort of rock'em, sock'em, rollicking hearing today. And at the very end of it, this was the judge giving part of the verbal version of the gag order, which Donald Trump will now be bound by.

She said this, quote, I cannot imagine any other criminal case in which a defendant is permitted to call a prosecutor deranged or a thug. And I will not permit it here simply because the defendant is running a political campaign. His presidential candidacy does not give him carte blanche to vilify and implicitly encourage violence against public servants who are simply doing their job.

My review of past statements made by Mr. Trump in particular, as well as the evidence that they have led to harassment and threats for the people he has targeted, persuades me that without this restriction, there's a real risk that witnesses may be intimidated or unduly influenced and that other potential witnesses may be reluctant to come forward lest they be subjected to the same harassment and intimidation.

And she says this, quote, Now, let me be clear. Mr. Trump may still vigorously seek public support as a presidential candidate, debate policies and people related to that candidacy. He may criticize the current administration and assert his belief that this prosecution is politically motivated.

But those critical First Amendment freedoms do not allow him to launch a pretrial smear campaign against participating government staff, their families and foreseeable witnesses. No other criminal defendant would be allowed to do so. And I am not going to allow it in this case.

She then concludes with this. The reasons discussed during this hearing, therefore, I find that these measures are consistent with the rights secured by the first, fifth and sixth amendments and that they are both necessary and narrowly tailored to safeguard the integrity of these proceedings, as well as to protect the safety of the people assisting with them.

If any party or counsel, meaning any lawyer, any party or counsel violates these restrictions or the other laws or obligations by which they are bound, I will, either upon receipt of a motion or sua sponte, meaning on my own as the judge, I will consider sanctions as may be necessary. Thank you. We're adjourned. The gavel falls. Accountability.

Judge Tonya Chutkan ruling from the bench today in Washington. We await the written version of this order. Trump already says he's going to appeal it, but as of now, he is bound by it. Meanwhile, Republicans appear poised to elevate Donald Trump's closest major ally in Congress to be Speaker of the House, which would put Congressman Jim Jordan, among other things, third in the line of succession after the president and the vice president.

Jim Jordan, of course, played a key role in Trump's efforts to use Congress to try to overturn the election result in 2020. If he does become speaker, I got to say, it feels like it becomes basically an open question as to whether a House of Representatives under Jim Jordan's leadership would ever certify the election results of an election in which Donald Trump ran but lost.

So we'll talk about this a little bit more later on this hour. Right now, we do not know if Congressman Jim Jordan has the votes to become speaker. Just a couple of days ago, that seemed inconceivable, but he's at least got a real shot at it. The momentum seemed at least earlier today to be with him. We don't know. The vote is scheduled for noon Eastern time tomorrow. And now just one other thing to give you a heads up about today in the news. And then one other thing I want to say.

This week, among all the other things going on in the news, this week, jury selection is about to start for the first of the criminal cases in Fulton County, Georgia. Fulton County, Georgia, is where former President Trump and 17 other defendants are going to face trial in state court for their efforts to overturn election results in Georgia specifically. You see, one of the original defendants has like a little

label on the top of his head there. He's pled guilty, which means that he's no longer a party to these ongoing cases. So now we're down to 18 people total, including Trump, who are charged in this big felony racketeering case. Fulton County starts picking a jury for the trial of the first two defendants in that big racketeering case this week.

And the reason I'm putting this on your radar right now, amid everything else going on, is because while that Fulton County effort is going to get started in court this week, don't sleep on this dynamic as well. In the legislature in that state, in Georgia, where Republicans are in control of the legislatures,

They are trying already to use a new state law that they just passed to go after the prosecutor who is leading that investigation and who has brought that case in court. This is a new process that Georgia Republicans just newly wrote into law.

And while they were debating it in the legislature, they said they definitely wouldn't use it just for this case. Had nothing to do with Fannie Willis and the Trump case. They definitely weren't doing this just to try to get Trump off the hook. Well, now, sure. Sure enough, as soon as they've passed this law, Georgia Senate Republicans have, surprise, already used it to file a formal complaint against Fulton County District Attorney Fannie Willis.

who is the prosecutor leading the racketeering investigation and the racketeering prosecution against Trump and his co-defendants. They're doing it. Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp has said he's not in favor of them doing this, at least not yet.

And the fact that the power to go after a prosecutor like this is something brand new. Republicans just passed a new law to give themselves this power for the first time this year. That means nobody knows how this process will work or how long it will take or what counts as normal for that process. So there's still a lot of uncertainty as to how this will play out. But I maintain that this is a sleeper issue with national significance. Keep your eye on this.

Keep your eye on this both because this is the first big multiple felony criminal case that Trump is implicated in that is going to trial. Again, jury selection starting this week. This is also a case that he cannot get out of with a pardon because it's not a federal case. But keep your eye on this also because I think it is an underappreciated factor in criminal prosecutions that involve high powered political figures that sometimes inappropriate.

deeply wrong, deeply un-American pressure is brought to bear on the prosecution. And the reason I say that is because I keep writing books about it. I didn't mean to set off to be like the nation's expert on this, but I'm telling you, it keeps coming around. Last week, we just hit 50 years exactly from the time that Nixon's vice president shocked the country by resigning suddenly from office.

He left the vice presidency because these brave young federal prosecutors confronted Nixon's vice president with an indictment for more than three dozen felony charges for corruption, bribery and extortion. Vice President Spiro Agnew was literally taking envelopes stuffed with cash and shoving them into a drawer in his White House office while he was serving as vice president.

And part of the reason I describe these prosecutors as brave is because the Nixon White House and the Nixon-era Republican Party brought all sorts of inappropriate pressure to bear against those prosecutors to try to force them to drop that case against Nixon's vice president.

The U.S. attorney who was overseeing those prosecutors, Republican Nixon appointed U.S. attorney George Bell. His brother was a Republican U.S. senator. His father had been a Republican U.S. senator. George Bell died in the war Republican. He was basically Republican royalty in this country. He had been put in office as a U.S. attorney by by Richard Nixon.

Nevertheless, emerges as a total hero here. He is the one who resisted intense pressure that was put on him by the Nixon White House and the Nixon era Republican Party to drop that case. And George Bell protected his line prosecutors, protected them from that pressure, destroyed his own career in the process. But he allowed those line prosecutors to bring that case forward.

And it forced a sitting vice president of the United States out of office under threat of 40 felony charges 50 years ago this month. And it took incredible bravery and incredible fortitude for them to do it because of the inappropriate political pressure that prosecution was subjected to because Spiro Agnew was a powerful politician.

And I kid you not, it is weird how I'm becoming like a specialist in this stuff. But tomorrow I have a new book coming out. It is called Prequel, an American fight against fascism. It comes out tomorrow. And this book is the story of Americans who sided with the Nazis in the lead up to World War II. Americans who helped the Nazi cause and in some cases who tried to bring about an American form of Nazism here today.

The fact that there was a big, very radical, unnervingly well-connected fascist movement in this country in the lead up to World War II has been a mostly forgotten story in U.S. history. But the details of it I find absolutely nuts, including...

You know, violent ultra right paramilitary groups that got put on trial for sedition and members of Congress who were working with a Nazi agent. I mean, it's it is a story that has mostly been lost to history. Prequel is that story. And it is the story of who fought against those forces, who exposed them, who fought them and infiltrated their groups and prosecuted them in court.

That is the thing that I'm most excited about in this new book because I think it sort of gives us lessons. It gives us kind of an instruction book as to how to effectively stand up to fascism when you are confronted with it today. But I swear, I kid you not, embedded in that story is the fact that not once but twice fascism

Members of Congress who were implicated in this plot with a Nazi agent, who were themselves implicated in this case that put all these paramilitary groups and pro-Nazi groups on trial for sedition, those members of Congress inappropriately pressured the Justice Department to fire the prosecutor who was leading that investigation and leading that case. And twice in that era, the U.S. Justice Department did it. They did it. They succumbed to that political pressure and they fired the prosecutor.

who was leading the investigation and leading the case. It happens twice in this story in my new book, Prequel, about the fight to stop American fascists and the lead up to World War II. Republicans also tried it in a previous book I wrote about the Spiro Agnew prosecution, Backman. And now I'm telling you, as a de facto expert on this subject, never meant to be, but here I am, now I am telling you they are trying it in the state of Georgia.

where Republicans are trying to get prosecutor Fannie Willis ousted somehow to remove her as prosecutor as she brings former President Trump to trial on felony racketeering charges. Anyway, I've been working on this for a long time. Books comes out tomorrow. I'm really, I have to say, I'm really proud of it, actually. So if you read it, I hope you like it. I hope you get something out of it. The story gives me a lot of hope. It gives me a lot of ideas about how to stand up to what we are up against today.

Anyway, but there's tons going on right now. There's lots of news still to get to tonight. We got Richard Engel joining us live in just a moment. Stay with us. There are some football feelings you can only get with BetMGM Sportsbook. That's right. Not just the highs, the ohs, or the no, no, nos. It's the feeling that comes with being taken care of every down of the football season. The feeling that comes with getting MGM Rewards benefits or earning bonus bets.

So, whether you're drawing up a same-game parlay in your playbook or betting the over on your favorite team, the BetMGM app is the best place to bet on football. You only get that feeling at BetMGM, the sportsbook born in Vegas, now live across the DMV. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only, subject to eligibility requirements. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

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As I mentioned at the top of the hour, there have been some significant developments tonight in the Israel-Hamas war. This past hour, we learned that President Biden is going to personally travel to Tel Aviv the day after tomorrow on Wednesday. He's expected to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli officials. The president will also go to the neighboring nation of Jordan, to Oman. Jordan is, of course, a key ally for the U.S. in the region.

There's also news tonight, first broken on our air by Richard Engel, that Hamas is now stating that it has between 200 and 250 hostages in Gaza. Hamas also releasing a statement that they are looking to release some of the people who they took hostage, people they describe as foreign nationals.

who they say are being held not as hostages, but as their guests. They say they are looking to release them when field conditions permit their release.

We don't know what that means, but this is an important advance, at least in the story of what has become of these, again, 200, maybe more people who are being held by Hamas. NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel tonight is reporting from near the Israel-Gaza border. Richard, I'm happy to lay eyes on you. Thanks for staying up to join us. What do you make of the statement from Hamas? Why they're doing it? What do you think it means?

Well, I think it's very significant, Rachel. I think it means that there's movement on this issue after hearing nothing from Hamas. Hamas said that it is holding 200 hostages. It said that other groups, however, in the Gaza Strip are holding more hostages. So they're talking about Hamas with 200, the military wing of Hamas, and then another 50 or more, according to the spokesman of Hamas, inside the Gaza Strip total.

And among those 200 that Hamas says it is holding, it says there are an unspecified number of foreign nationals and that it is willing to hand them over, that it wants to hand them over, that it doesn't believe that they are party to this conflict and that it has no issue with them.

and it will hand them over when the conditions are right. As you said, what does it mean when the conditions are right? But also a few hours ago,

Just slightly before Hamas issued that statement, Iran's foreign minister said that Hamas is expressing a willingness to release hostages when Israel or if Israel stops its airstrikes into Gaza. So we're hearing similar messages both from Iran and from Hamas about releasing hostages, talking about fighting.

field conditions at the same time. So there is movement on this issue. The issue is, however, they're only talking about those hostages who are dual nationals or foreigners. And they also said that any hostages

of people who were taken, any hostages that were taken that were fighting, even if they are Americans or French or they didn't mention nationalities, but foreign nationals, but were serving in the Israeli military or serving in a fighting capacity, they wouldn't be considered for this arrangement. They would be considered combatants and they would be treated like

So it seems what Hamas is trying to do is create a division, create a wedge to say that its fight is with Israel and Israel alone and not with the United States, not with the rest of the world. And this comes amid a lot of international diplomacy, a lot of efforts by the United States and other countries and its allies to try and get movement on this issue and to try and get stability.

those hostages out, hopefully just as a start. And Richard, I don't want to get too far ahead of the story or to imagine sort of too much nitty gritty here that we can't get at. But it seems to me like even if they are trying to establish some sort of divide between different types of hostages, the release of any hostages is

is both good for those people who could then potentially be saved, but also potentially strategically important for getting all or even more or potentially all of the hostages out, because presumably the people released could help in terms of finding the rest of them, couldn't they?

One hundred percent. You take the yes. If the Hamas is willing to to give up hostages and not asking for any specific thing in return, except for potentially even just a temporary halt in in the bombings. We don't know exactly what Hamas is asking for. We're not party to those conversations between Hamas and Hamas.

different negotiators. But what they're publicly asking and what Iran is also suggesting is they're talking about a stop of the airstrikes. Then, yes, get those people out and then see what they know. See where they were taken. What is the mentality? How are they being treated? What do they know about the other hostages? Absolutely. They could lead to more intelligence, more leads and

and provide tremendous relief to the hostages themselves who may be injured, absolutely terrified, and their families. I was a hostage myself in the Middle East, not by Hamas, but by another group. And I can tell you the amount of stress that it puts on the people who are taken and their families. So absolutely, it would be good for them and potentially good for the rest.

And Richard, I was interested to hear you say that you were in touch with people involved in a number of Arab countries who have been working on trying to negotiate something, trying to make some contact, some progress on the hostage issue. We heard from a hostage's family member today about having been contacted by people in touch with the Red Cross and other...

other nonprofit NGO groups that are trying to work on this issue. Do you sense that, I mean, from what you're hearing from Israeli officials and American officials and other people in the region, do you think this is a live thing that's being worked on right now? Is this something that there's, it's not just, you know, individual forays and individual statements, but there's actual person-to-person negotiation happening here and that we might get movement soon?

Yes, there is motion on this and there are contacts that are happening and they are happening in real time. That is certainly the case. There is a lot of effort focused on this. There is effort focused on this around the world. I don't believe this statement was issued in isolation, that it was something that Hamas just threw out there.

Yeah, this is a concerted international effort, and I believe it's the result of some diplomacy. Now, what will happen with it? Will it come true? There's so much that can go wrong here. This is still an active war zone. You can hear where I am right now. There's the loud buzzing of Israeli drones overhead. We have been hearing some continued strikes into Gaza.

So we there is a there is an opening. There is movement here, but there is there is no guarantee of success at this stage. But to go back to your original question, was this the result of some concerted international effort? I believe it was. Richard Engel, chief foreign correspondent for NBC News. Richard, you are never allowed to be taken hostage again. And you must stay safe. All of us aged many decades over those times, over those days that you were gone, my friend. Thank you for joining us.

All right, we've got much more ahead here tonight. Eamon Moyaldine is going to be joining us here tonight. We've got a senior member of the Intelligence Committee joining us. Lots still to get to. Stay with us. There are some football feelings you can only get with BetMGM Sportsbook. That's right. Not just the highs, the ohs, or the no, no, nos. It's the feeling that comes with being taken care of every down of the football season. The feeling that comes with getting MGM Rewards benefits or earning bonus bets.

So, whether you're drawing up a same-game parlay in your playbook or betting the over on your favorite team, the BetMGM app is the best place to bet on football. You only get that feeling at BetMGM, the sportsbook born in Vegas, now live across the DMV. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only, subject to eligibility requirements. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

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So there's been some important breaking news tonight on the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. First of all, as we've been talking about for the last hour or so, President Biden will visit Israel. He will visit Tel Aviv on Wednesday. In announcing that tonight, though, Secretary of State Antony Blinken also said this. He said that the United States and Israel, quote, have agreed to develop a plan that will enable humanitarian aid to

to reach civilians in Gaza. He also talked about this plan involving some plans for keeping civilians safe inside Gaza. This, of course, is front of mind for many, many, many observers of this conflict and has seemed like an intractable problem in which there had been basically no progress over recent days. Joining us now is my friend Eamon Mahaldin. He's a veteran reporter of the Israeli-Hamas conflict and host of

Amen on MSNBC. Amen. It is great to see you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. Obviously, the devil's in the details here. Is there anything else more that we can say? Do we know anything else about

this plan that Secretary Blinken alluded to? Well, I think we have a little bit more clarity on what is happening behind the scenes on the diplomatic front. I think it's safe to say, and I've been speaking to a lot of sources across the region throughout the day today, there are now two tracks that are emerging simultaneously on the diplomatic front. One has to deal with the hostages that is being coordinated mostly out of Doha. It is a

Qatar, U.S., Israeli negotiation with Hamas, not directly, but as you can imagine, through all of those parties. And then the second one is the humanitarian one. And that involves more of the Gulf countries that include Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt with the United States and Israel on how to get those supplies. So those two tracks are happening simultaneously. There are serious obstacles to the humanitarian effort right now about why Egypt is not yet able to go ahead and deliver supplies.

The aid, as we know, a lot of aid is being diverted right now to the Sinai Peninsula, the airport there. But it is not yet able to get inside Gaza for both security and logistical challenges. Well, yeah, let's talk about that, because obviously the Gaza Strip, just geographically, it's about

25 miles long. It averages about five miles wide. There is a northern crossing into Israel that is closed. There is a southern crossing into Egypt that is a question. So it would seem from a 30,000 foot perspective that it's up to Egypt whether or not there is flow either direction through that crossing.

But you've said that you feel essentially that Egypt is constrained. Egypt feels constrained as to what it can do, not just what it wants to do. Exactly. And again, even within the discussion around humanitarian relief, there are two components to it. One, letting Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip. And even within that one, are you talking about

the dual citizens, the dual nationals, or are you talking about hundreds of thousands of Palestinians? So in each subcategory, Egypt has a different position on what to do and how to do it. But in terms of getting aid into Gaza, which is right now the immediate concern of the Egyptian government and international community because electricity is out,

Water is out. Food is out. Medicine is out. Food is running low. They're trying to get that in. However, as we saw today, there was an Israeli strike on the border on the Palestinian side of the border with Rafah that complicates things. Egypt has asked for security guarantees from Israel to allow the delivery of aid into Gaza.

Israel maintaining operational tempo and saying we are in control of the battlefield has not given, as I understood it from sources I've spoken to, has not given a clear assurance that anything going into Gaza right now would slow their operations down. Well, is that the piece of it that the U.S. may have had a breakthrough on in terms of Secretary Blinken saying tonight that the U.S. and Israel have agreed to a plan to allow humanitarian aid in? If Israel is the party that needs to say yes there,

then if the U S has been able to achieve that, then yeah, I can't speculate on that right now. And we'll have to wait to see what the announcement is from the Israelis and the Americans when that does get announced. But I know from what the Egyptian officials and the Arab officials that I've spoken to is the logistics of getting it in depend on the security conditions on the ground. And as we even heard with Richard about the possible release of any foreign hostages, uh,

Hamas has said that depends on the field conditions. And as right now, as we've seen, the conditions of the battlefield remain very challenging for Palestinians leaving from the north to the south and even trying to get out. Today, we saw, as I said, the Rafah crossing with hundreds of American citizens on the Palestinian side, as well as other dual nationals, get struck by Israel. And this was according to the Egyptian Ministry of Health. Wow.

And, of course, with President Biden himself planning to travel to Israel in two days now, that opens up all sorts of questions as to whether that may shake some things loose. Eamon Mahaldane, veteran reporter with lots of experience in this region and also my dear friends. Good to have you here, my friend. Congratulations on the book. Thank you. All right. More to come tonight. Stay with us.

Told you it was a busy night tonight. Joining us now live here in studios, Congressman Jim Himes, Democrat of Connecticut. He is the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, which is always important. But days like this, it's crazy important. Congressman, it's nice to see you. Good to see you, Rachel. Do you think that President Biden's personal plans to visit Israel the day after tomorrow are going to be the same as the President's?

are indicative that there has been some sort of major breakthrough that he wants to be there to take credit for? Or is him going there something that will hopefully shake loose those kinds of diplomatic advances that we haven't yet seen?

I don't think there's anything to celebrate just yet. And based on the contact I've had over the course of the last week or so at the White House and State Department and elsewhere, I think what this is largely about is just indicating his personal and the United States' commitment to keeping this war from getting regional, from getting bigger. You know, two carrier strike groups in the region, the movement of a couple of air wings and the president of the United States visiting not just Israel. And by the way, if you saw his statement today, visiting Israel to support Israel, as we do, but also saying, you know,

There is a huge difference between Palestinians, especially innocent Palestinians and Hamas, but also going to Jordan, also going to Egypt. That says to Iran, it says to Hezbollah, it says to terrorist elements in the West Bank, don't do it. And that's really critical. Absent that kind of full court press that you're describing, political diplomatic military from the United States, do you think that we would be at real risk of a regional conflict?

Very much so. Very much so. No, and, you know, it's not even close to a done deal yet, right? And this is one of the reasons, apart from the moral reasons for encouraging the Israelis to be very careful, abide by the laws of armed conflict, et cetera, et cetera, and apart from the important moral reasons,

you know, Hezbollah faces politics, too. And if the images coming out of Gaza of a military operation were as brutal as Hamas would like them to be, you know, Hezbollah might feel like they've got no choice but to jump in. And today, if that happened, it would be very, very bad. Had that happened a week ago when Israel was caught on the back feet, it could have been a true crisis for the state of Israel. What about our allies in the region, countries like

Jordan, where the president's going to be visiting. The issue of leverage and diplomatic skill when it comes to nations like Qatar trying to intervene in the hostage issue. Those thorny questions that I was just discussing with Eamon about Egypt and its own interests in the Sinai Peninsula, the crossing with Gaza, what it's being asked to do, what it feels like it can do.

What do you make of our diplomatic effort right now? How much effort's being done there and what else could be done that hasn't already happened? Yeah, well, apart from what we were just talking about, trying to keep it from the conflict from widening Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia. These are rulers who very much worry about their own heads. And right now they're thinking, you know, our street is.

And this is certainly true of the King of Jordan. It's true in Egypt where they have massive economic problems to begin with. Saudi Arabia is a little different case. They're worried about their own survival. And so they, too, have an interest in this conflict not widening. They also have an interest. And this is why so many of them release statements that were pretty aggressively, uncomfortably, shall we say, pro-Palestinian. By that, I mean no problem being pro-Palestinian. But pro-Hamas takes us to a whole other world. They really worry about their own survival.

In terms of what the U.S. response can be, we expect that there'll be an emergency aid request for Israel. Obviously, nothing goes through the United States House when there is no United States House. Do you think that the Republicans are going to elect Jim Jordan?

Jim Jordan to be the speaker of the House tomorrow. It's it has been for many reasons been a difficult day, but I just never imagined we'd be at a point where we were talking about a speaker, Jim Jordan. And I'll come back to your question. But I mean, nobody I think nobody did more to justify and to back.

and to paper over not just Trump's misbehavior, you know, not a good idea to tell Zelensky that you're not sending military aid unless he gives him dirt on the Bidens, right? You know, but also after January 6th, I mean, you know, he refused a congressional subpoena of a commission that was trying to figure out how big the plan was to stop the peaceful transfer of power. And Jim Jordan was right in the mix of that.

Back to your question. The White House is, I think, at least when I heard a couple of days ago, they are going to submit a package to the Congress that will involve both Ukraine aid and aid for Israel. That's going to make an awful lot of Republicans pretty angry. But I know that my party and the Senate, both sides of the aisle, care a lot about doing both. And so I think you're going to see that from the White House to the Senate. And then, you know, if we just happen to stumble upon a speaker in the House, maybe we take it up, too. Wow. I can't believe that this is like.

This is the hand we have to play at this exact moment. Had to be now, right? Congressman Jim Himes is a Democrat of Connecticut. He is the ranking member, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. It's always good to have you here. Good to see you, Rachel. Thank you very much. All right, we'll be right back. Stay with us. All right, that does it for us tonight. My new book prequel goes on sale tonight at midnight, both the print version and the audio book version, which I recorded. I'm very nervous about that, but it's happening. Whether or not I'm nervous.

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