getting out of gaza, hundreds of people have now been able to evacuate gaza. americans are now getting out as well. on the list to get out today, possibly 400 names of u.s. nationals. there's a lot of action at the rafah crossing. we'll take you there. >> israeli forces say they have broken through the front lines of hamas fighters and are at the gates of gaza city. don junior back on the stand. the former president's season is headed back to court soon. what he is and isn't saying about how much his family is worth. i'm kate bolduan with john berman. sara sidner is off. this is cnn "news central." all right. happening now, the first americans are getting out of gaza. down here, part of the stream of people we've seen moving through the rafah crossing. we've seen ambulances lined up there, people on foot moving through the crossing itself. ultimately they end up on the peninsula and are processed through makeshift hospital and warehouse here. this is part of the deal to get maybe thousands of foreign nationals and some wounded out of gaza. this deal was brokered by qatar, israel, hamas and egypt. hamas israel refused to let people out, egypt refused to let people in but right now the doors are open. let's get to melissa bell in cairo with the latest on this. melissa? >> reporter: i think the framing is right, everything was blocked at the rafah crossing until it wasn't yesterday and again today a great deal of activity at the southern border of gaza with egypt. as you mentioned a moment ago, the list has been published overnight of some nearly 600 names of those given clearance to get out. we understand we have confirmation from egyptian authorities that 7,000 people are leaving the gaza strip over the coming days and they're doing that in batches. 600 more names have been cleared to get out, including 400 americans. and i think what's been one of the most interesting things of the last 24 hours or so, as we've begun to see the foreign nationals leave gaza is to hear their stories. no journalists can get into gaza, the ones there were there before october 7th. we keep trying with the egyptian authorities but no one is getting through. but the few journalists that are able to function, the stringers. >> producers with whom we work, but these first hand accounts from foreign nationals who are stuck there are very appreciate in -- precious indeed. dr. barbara zim was one of the first two americans to come and this is what she had to say about her ordeal. >> in the beginning we were in gaza city we were told to move south there was intensive bombing in gaza city and there was. but moving south there was still a lot of bombing. so there's really no safe place for the gazan people. we ended up for two and a half weeks in basically a parking lot that was wardened off from the rest of the gazans staying there. we were relatively lucky but running out of food and water also. >> reporter: running out of food and water. nowhere in gaza is safe. these are the stories we're likely to hear in the coming days from those getting out of there. we've been hearing from the u.s. children's agency unicef about what's happening. it said by its count 400 children have been wounded or killed each day in the 25 days of this war so far, a situation they say can cannot continue calling for an urgent humanitarian cease-fire in order to get some aid in. it's been just a trickle so far. as you were hearing from dr.dr. dr. zin, people don't have enough water or food. and unicef speaking to what's happening at the refugee camp this week, hit two days in a row by the israeli strikes, many hundreds are feared dead but it's difficult to get a death toll because of the difficulty of getting through the rubble and trying to get to those who may or may not have survived. >> melissa bell in cairo, thank you so much. keep us posted. an idf commander is declaring israeli troops are at the gates of gaza city. according to photos and videos cnn obtained and verified this is what the israeli ground strategy has looked like so far. israeli troops moving into gaza at three main locations. two from the north of gaza city and one looking at coming from the south under gaza city. an idf spokesperson now says hamas' defensive lines are continuing to collapse. jeremy diamond is in southern israeli joining us with more on this. what are you learning about what the idf is coming up against as they are moving deeper and gaza headed towards gaza city? the. >> reporter: as you just mentioned, kate, the idf is moving towards gaza city from three axes, one from the north, two from the south. and even as they say that and the troops are approaching gaza city there's still very much active fighting behind me in the northeastern most city in the gaza strip. right behind me here you can see the smoke in the distance and the last hour or two, we have been hearing constant battles between idf soldiers and hamas militants. we've been hearing small arm fires, artillery and other explosions in the background. it's clear as the forces move deeper into the gaza strip they're still confronting hamas fighters closer to the entry points in the north. part of that is because of the tunnel system that hamas has. the idf said this morning overnight they were ambushed by hamas militants and that they engaged in a battle with hamas fighters for several hours overnight. so it's clear this fighting is intense and ongoing. and israeli military generals have been trying to prepare the israeli public for a long, drawn out battle and one that will be costly. we have seen that at least 16 israeli soldiers have been killed in the last six days of fighting and that is also something that the israeli politicians and the israeli prime minister are taking into account as they look at the next steps of this battle. >> jeremy, what more are you hearing and what are you picking up about the aftermath and what's being learned after the strikes on the refugee camp and the overall civilian casualty? the scope of it and what you're hearing? >> reporter: yeah, yesterday, kate for the second time in as many days, israeli jets striking targets in the refugee camp. this is an extremely densely populated camp with more than 100,000 people living there and the scenes of the destruction after an israeli jet struck it yesterday as well as the scenes from tuesday, is devastating. you can see apartment buildings levelled to the ground, a mass i have crater remaining in their place. yesterday the director of the nearby indonesian hospital, told our colleague that at least 80 people were injured -- sorry, at least 80 people were killed and hundreds of people were injured. and you can see in the people being pulled from the rubble, women and children and this just comes as we have watched as the toll of this war on children has just absolutely mounted in devastating ways. unicef, kate, is now saying that about 400 children have been killed or injured every single day since the start of this war on october 7th. the idf maintain they struck a hamas command and control center in the refugee camp yesterday on tuesday they said they killed a senior commander responsible for the october 7th terrorist attacks and maintain hamas is responsible for the civilian deaths because they embed in residential buildings and build their tunnels under residential buildings. but now there's the specter of war crimes from these strikes. kate? >> jeremy diamond, thank you very much. with us now retired colonel cedric leighton. good to see you. in a way, this is the troops surrounding gaza city. how would you judge the relative success of this operation so far? >> at the moment it looks really good. but here's the problem. they are going to run into -- the idf forces are going to run into active resistance throughout all of the urban areas they're going after. so what they'd probably do is there might be a siege, at the very least an encirclement of gaza city and as they move into the areas they have to clear every building they encounter. and many of the buildings as we've seen from the videos we've shown recently, many of those buildings are destroyed or at least partially damaged. and that, of course, will give snipers a chance to find a place to shoot from, make it easy for them to place things like ieds and it's going to be tough going for the israeli infantry forces. >> in so far as -- another way of looking at it, a satellite map here. they've come from this direction, the northwest, northeast, and south, what's worked and hasn't worked? in. >> as far as we can see, what has worked so far seems to be the movements -- actually all of the them have seemed to have worked quite a bit. it's all relative at this point in time because the population centers are, of course, in the north and that also means the centers which hamas is going to defend are also there. so when they move their line of defense, and everybody is focussing on that right now. when they move that line of defense, that is going to look like it's a victory for the israeli forces. but we shouldn't look at that as being the final thing at the moment, the final statement of what's going on, because those hamas forces are going to withdraw into the urban areas. so as far as success right now, probably the one from the southeast but also the ones from the north are achieving a degree of success and depending on how far they go and what objectives -- localized objectives they have set for themselves they may be able to sustain those operations for some time. >> i want to ask you about what we've seen at the refugee camp. just so people understand, this isn't tents. this is a city built up since the 1940s with people who moved there in the 1940s. this is satellite imagery from before the air strikes and you can see after the air strikes here. you can see this area here. simply gone. twofold here. number one, given that israel knew there were civilians here they say they have taken out, eliminated key hamas terror leaders but there have been civilians killed as well. is this the type of air strike that would have happened had the united states been running things? this. >> probably not. and the reason i say that is, we take a lot of precautionary measures when it comes to striking areas where there are large civilian populations. of course, there have been civilian deaths in places like iraq and afghanistan and that's our most recent relative example to what's going on in gaza, but we probably would have waited to catch the leaders at a moment where they are isolated from -- or at least in relative isolation from the surrounding population. and so what that means is, there's a patient waiting game, in essence, it's not really a game for them, but we wait for them to come out of their hiding places for whatever reason and that's when we go after them. that's our modus operandi throughout the war on terror in both afghanistan and iraq. and that is something that the israelis probably don't have that tactical patience if you will, because they're under pressure to move very fast and achieve goals very quickly. we are sometimes under that pressure as well. but it's very different for us because we look very carefully at the collateral damage impacts and the possibility of that collateral damage. >> one of the reasons the israelis feel they have to move fast is they say there are 240 hostages still being held and this is their 27th day in captivity. colonel, thank you very much. kate? next for us, donald trump jr. back on the stand. and republicans in the senate seemingly to have had enough with senator tommy tuberville's months long block of military promotions. what his colleagues are saying as they call him out from the senate floor and how he's responding as well. and more out of israel, cnn is at the northern border with lebanon where idf troops are training for potential battles with hezezbollah. what would be a nightmarare scenarioio. we'll l be right b back. don junior denied any involvement in inflating his family's net worth. kara is outside the courthouse. eric and don junior have entered the courthouse together. what do you expect to happen today? >> reporter: these two are going to be the men of the day. they just entered the courthouse together a few moments ago. donald trump will be back on the stand testifying when court begins at 10:00 a.m. and he'll continue to answer questions posed by the attorney general's office. he was on the stand for about 90 minutes yesterday and during his testimony he denied any involvement with these financial statements at the heart of this investigation. and he said that the accountants work on them, that's what we paid them for. so he's denying any connection to that. they also asked specifically about the financial statements in had 2017 that matters because that's the year he took over as trustee of the family business when his father became president. he distanced himself then that had he known -- he may have provided information to his internal accountants but he didn't know how they were going to use it. but this line of questioning just began. so we're expecting to hear a lot more questions about the financial statements, about his roles at different properties and how they were valued in the statements as he continues to testify for we're expecting a couple of hours today. his lawyers are not expecting to ask him any questions when the attorney general is done with him, the attorney general will then call eric trump. he had involvement with golf courses, a couple of them at the center of the case. we expect him to be on the stand longer than don junior his testimony could carry over into tomorrow, kate. and then looking into next week when former president trump will be taking the stand on monday and his daughter, ivanka trump is scheduled to testify on wednesday. kate? >> cara, thank you so much. with us defense attorney shannon wu and senior legal analyst and former u.s. assistant attorney for southern district of new york, elie honing. don junior on the stand yesterday he said wasn't my job to deal with the financial records. that was for the accountants. he is a witness for the state. the plaintiffs put him on the stand. what is it now today they want to get from him? >> they're not going to get him to just collapse and admit he ordered the code red. he's not going to say you're right, i knew it was a fraud, you wore me down. now you're trying to do two things if you're the ag's office, if you have documents that contradict him, confront him with that, internal emails, memos, accounting statements you confront him, didn't you say this, sign that? the other thing you do is lock him into his testimony, this was for the accountants and not me, then attack it later through other witnesses. hopefully in the ag's case you would have witnesses to say he knew what was going on, i explained it to him. that's what we're looking for. >> i think we heard that his attorneys -- don junior's attorneys, trump's attorneys -- all the attorneys working for the trumps are not questioning don junior. why wouldn't you? >> because you don't want to create an opportunity for further damage. he's basically distancing himself entirely from any knowledge, i'd say note to self, don't put him in charge of your business if he runs things that way. a graduate of wharton who says he doesn't understand basic accounting things. so you don't want to put him up there and do any further damage. you want to isolate him the way he is. and ideally he's presented as being irrelevant really to the case and probably everyone is going to take that position. so ultimately you put the judge in an interesting spot which is the judge already determined there is liability here. the question is how much. yet everyone is going to be saying we don't know what was really going on. so who did know? >> so don junior and eric today and tomorrow. donald trump, former president, current presidential candidate, on the stand on monday. how will that be similar or different to what we're seeing today? >> donald trump, the former president, has an interesting decision to make. is he going to actually testify or take the fifth? he has the option to take the fifth. don junior and eric had that option -- >> but you have taught us that's important and that has impact in a civil trial. >> absolutely. if you take the fifth in a civil trial it can be used against you. the judge can say so and so has taken the fifth i'm allowed to assume the worst of their testimony. donald trump, the former president, was deposed in this case. the only question he would answer was his name before, so when donald trump gets into court on monday he will have to take the stand. will he change course and say i'm going to answer questions will he do that or stick by the fifth amendment. >> do you think he'll be as disciplined a witness as don junior has been so far? >> no way. don junior is giving responses but not going on rants, expecting a different environment on monday. >> thank you both so much. i want to get back fo israel ri -- back to israel right now with our colleague jim chute tt sciutto. >> reporter: this is a live fire exercise to be clear but a serious exercise. these are israeli idf special forces taking part in a live fire exercise with tanks and combined operations. they are part of 70,000 israeli soldiers deployed to the northern border, and the golan heights, which borders syria you can see it over my shoulder. and in this direction due north is where lebanon is and the concern is and the reason you have the training and the show of force is this war might expand and iranian proxies inside lebanon and syria might be ordered to by iran and others that control them locally and from afar to enter the war in a proactive way. here comes some of the special forces soldiers by me here. let me make way for them. here they come. these are the idf's most elite troops comparable to u.s. special forces. try not to get in the way as they're doing this because they're taking this seriously. again this is an exercise for folks at home watching this had, but it's an exercise meant to make sure their skills are sharp if this war expands to the north but also given the proximity here. the proximity to the borders, i think you can say this is a show of force as well. to show they 'ready, kate. and a lot of attention to tomorrow because the head of hezbollah, the leader of hezbollah is going to give a speech tomorrow afternoon. a lot of concern in this country that he's going to order hezbollah forces into this war. >> we just want to make sure people understand as jim has said, this is an exercise. this is a live-fire exercise. seeing the israeli special forces in training in golan, in the golan heights, and one of the stunning things about golan, if you go there you can see syria, lebanon, the threats that israel perceives from anywhere you stand. >> the bigger, broader threat that could be coming. >> jim talk more about the hezbollah leader, who will speak tomorrow. is israel -- the idf, the people you're with, are they going on any kind of high alert? how are they approaching that moment? >> well, you see, one of israel's -- israel's tanks they're participated in this live fire exercise. they're taking this very seriously. that's why we're seeing an exercise like this one -- a reminder this is an exercise, but a live fire exercise involving israeli special forces and tanks in the golan bordering syria. we don't know what hezbollah is going to do in this war. i'm going to let them do their work here. we don't know, israel doesn't know, u.s. intelligence doesn't know if hezbollah is going to order their forces into the war in numbers. but the reason you're seeing this is they're taking that threat very seriously. >> jim, we could assume this is also, you know, as a show of force and also an attempted deterrent because if hezbollah enters this war, that is a nightmare scenario for israel, and that also has big implications for u.s. support and involvement in what this would expand into. >> reporter: it does. listen, hezbollah has a lot of ways to strike israel. it can strike via ground operations. they've been trying over the last couple of weeks since october 7th. in small numbers. they can do ground operations that they tried before. but they can also do it with missiles. hezbollah has built an arsenal with thousands of missiles some of them long rage with the capability of reaching tel aviv. they have enough if they fire enough in numbers they could conceivably overwhelm israel's missile defenses like you saw hezbollah with their rockets from gaza if they fire enough in a concentrated period of time you can get some through. the concern is hezbollah would do the same in the north, and their missiles longer range, higher danger to the residents of israel. >> jim can we assume -- >> if i can give you a sense -- sorry, john. i'm having trouble hearing you over the gun fire. if i can give you a sense what they're up to. these are special forces you can see them with the flag there advancing in what's called come wined armors. you have armor, fires from a distance and then ground forces moving together on the ground, oftentimes there will be aerial cover as well, though not in this particular exercise. they're training for the real deal. you don't move 70,000 forces to the northern part of this country without considering the threat very seriously. >> absolutely. and knowing you have 70,000 forces to the north of up while the ground operation happening, as we speak, into gaza, showing training and action happening at the same time. really an example, as jim says, of preparing or engaged in the real deal. >> again, a very deliberate, i think, show of force from the idf with jim there. i think they want the world, perhaps want hezbollah to see this today on the eve of the hezbollah leader speaker. come back soon jim because that's fascinating to see. we'll be right back. is it possible my network could take my business to the next level? it is with comcast business. powering all your devices with gig-speed wifi. and you get fast downloads and uploads. pick it up! pick it up! oh we got this! because it's powered by the next generation 10g network. more speed for your business? it's not just possible. it's happening. get started for $59.99 a month for 12 months. plus, ask how to get an $800 prepaid card with a qualifying internet bundle. comcast business, powering possibilities. new this morning, israeli defense forces are moving closer in toward gaza city saying hamas' lines of defense are collapsing in northern gaza. as the israeli ground operation intensifies, president biden is reiterating his call for a pause in fighting in the hopes of allowing more hostages who have now been held for 27 days by hamas to be released. this happened, biden's latest remark, happened in a closed door fund-raiser yesterday where he was confronted by a rabbi sitting in the crowd to call for a cease-fire now. priscilla, biden's comment at this closed door fund raiser and confronted by this person at this closed door fund raiser, it really does kind of show and lay bare the tough dynamics at play for the biden administration in this. >> it does, kate. the president's comments were in line with what the white house has urged, which was a humanitarian pause for the release of hostages held by hamas in gaza. but what was noticeable is the setting. it happened at a campaign dinner yesterday afternoon. the protester saying they were a rabbi and calling on the president to call for a cease-fire. and the president saying i think we need a pause, to get time to get the prisoners out. this as we see more images of destruction in gaza and the dire humanitarian crisis there, under scoring how difficult it is to politically navigate it for the president and a push for a humanitarian pause. again the president has addressed this before including in a press conference last week and suggested that he has raised it with prime minister benjamin netanyahu as well. but so far it appears that israel has rejected the idea of a humanitarian pause. so all of this coming together in this moment just yesterday where the president was confronted in close range with the protester who was calling for the cease-fire as we have seen those calls grow rampantly across the country. kate? >> priscilla thank you so much. john? happening now, senators head back to the floor after a contentious, angry debate overnight on military confirmations. this was republicans going off on republicans. so what's next? next hour, senators are heading back to the floor after things pretty much exploded last night over the months long hold and fight over military promotions. this was all ignited by republican senator tommy tuberville blocking hundreds of nonpolitical military promotions over an issue that -- over than issue having to do with a defense policy on reproductive health care. yesterday it became clear that fellow republicans had had enough. >> no matter whether you believe it or not, senator tuberville this is doing damage to our military. i don't say that lightly. >> to under mine the safety and security of the american people during this time doesn't make any sense to me. >> if each senator felt empowered to hold up all promotions in the military unless we got our way on one of those issues our military would grind to a halt. >> lindsey graham, todd young, mitt romney, we heard from joni ernst as well. all republicans speaking up and saying it's time to be done with this. despite all of that, be tuberville is not backing down and now christophuck schumer is considering going around him but that will suck up a huge amount of time on the congressional calendar and the senate floor schedule. sunland, this has been simmering for months now boiling over. what's going to happen today? >> reporter: it's clear that senator tuberville is not backing down here, he's standing strong in the face of frustration from members of his own party and he intends to keep this blockade up, we expect to see the same wrangling potentially on the floor later today but the dust is still settling from last night, that dramatic four-hour confrontation on the senate floor where we saw republicans stand up and object to his blockade and we saw the senator stand up on his own and block one by one each of the proposed nominees, it led to dramatic moments and here's how the senator responded in the moment last night. >> i have to respectfully disregard -- disagree with my colleagues about the effect of my hold on readiness. my hold is not affecting readiness. but i will keep my hold in place until the pentagon follows the law or the democrats change the law. every day this continues is a day that democrats think abortion is more important than the nomination and our military. >> reporter: now this process of confirming military promotions is typically very routine process, but this has been playing out for many, many months. nine months now. here that he's had this blockade up and a lot of senators on capitol hill saying now given what's going on in the middle east, we have to get these people through, and that's why you're seeing republicans, members of his own party standing up and saying do not do this anymore, we have to get these people through. notably, tuberville, the intention behind the bill because he has an objection to a bill at the pentagon that expanded access and support for service members and their families who intend to get an abortion. many republicans not against the policy per se but against what tuberville is doing in the their approach, holding up unrelated nominations for unrelated policies. >> i'm interested to see where this goes today. john? >> with us is congressman rich mccormick, a member of the house armed services and foreign affairs committee. you don't get a vote you're in the house not the senate but you are a former marine corps pilot, naval commander. i'm wondering if you agree that this is compromising safety and readiness? >> it is. but there's two sides to the story. first of all, it can be simply fixed if they do follow the law, the secretary of defense decides to go with what congress has passed that we don't use federal funds for abortion. so i understand tuberville's point i also understand the necessity to have the right people in had place for the right time. the common dant is in the hospital right now for the marine corps we don't have a plan in place for ploim. so i can see both sides. i think it's easy by reversing the policy. >> in addition to everything else, you are an emergency room physician as well. we have seen images coming back from gaza, from the air strikes over the last couple of days on the refugee camp, as an emergency room physician, i'm curious what types of injuries you think that civilians are most likely sustaining here? >> you can have -- we saw this in everything from haiti to afghanistan, iraq. you can have crush injuries which are horrible, limbs lost because you get what's called compartment syndrome where tissue is so damaged it swells and injuries the nerves. you can lacerations, burns, burns are difficult to deal with, especially in these conditions. it leads to infections. any wound that's open, any burn, can lead to massive infections which can creating e toxicity t your body and kill you. there can be traumatic brain injuries. this is war. every single war results in the this. war is a whole thing. this should have never happen. gaza and israel were in relative piece until one people decided to attack another people now that has to be rooted out and this is a result. >> president biden last night repeated something that he's been saying for a little while now. is that he would support a humanitarian pause in order to help get hostages out and aid in. what's your assessment of that. >> i've seen this before, and first of all, why do you think they took the hostages in the first place? they used them as cheelds and bargaining, this is what people do, in this vietnam, if you study history, whenever we started to win, they would sue for peace and use that time to reinforce and reintrench and make it more difficult for the next round. they're not done. hamas is not going to sa y the fact that is that hamas is using the weapons to shield their children and i feel sorry for the palestinian people, because they have been use and abused and it is a small fraction of people who are violent and evil. they are giving everyone a hard time in this horrible death and destruction. if congressman rich mccormack ran the world, would emergency aid to israel be connected to anything else including irs funding which is what you are going to be voting on later today? >> yeah. my preference would not be that, because it is fairly unprecedented to attach emergency funding to something like defunding irs. it is going to get a negative cbo score which hurts my heart, too, and i don't want more irs agents, because i am not in favor of strengthening the irs because it is biased and misuse and weaponized, but i would like to see hr-2 to come out of it which is popular to control the border and democrats and republicans want to get it done and that is a good leverage point, and that would have been my preference, but stand alone is the best way to do it, because it is an emergency fund to be released for an emergency purpose. >> i want to ask you one campaign-related question. you have endorsed governor ron desantis for president, but the south carolina governor nikki haley is feeling it right now, and she is bumped up in the polls, and she is feeling it so much that she went on the "daily show" and joked about ron desantis's shoes. >> are you wearing bumped up heels next week so you can look taller than ron desantis on to stage? >> i don't know, but i can tell you that i have always talked about my high heels, and i have never hid that from anybody and i have always said, don't wear them if you can't run in them, so we will see if he can run in them. >> why do you think that governor haley has gained on him? >> she is a very well rounded candidate, and she has been an ambassador and very smart and a number of things, but the reason i support desantis is that he is a military guy and the things this he has done in florida. i can't wait for the next debate in atlanta, and wasn't to cam p -- compare it from states of florida to other states, and see what has been done. >> thank you, congressman. come back again. >> thank you very much. kate? >> that is interesting. coming up, classes canceled at cornell university because of the threats to jewish students on campus. we are grocery outlet and we are your bargain bliss market. what's bargain bliss? you know that feeling you get when you find the name brands you love but for way, way less? that's bargain bliss. it's grocery outlet's 20% off wine sale going on now through november 7th. we have hundreds of wines sure to pair with any gathering. so act now because this deal won't last long. stop in and save today. cornell university is still reeling from the anti-semitic threats against jewish students made by a follow student. so much so, classes are canceled tomorrow. that student patrick dye faced a judge yesterday after he allegedlyalleged ly threatened to kill and injure jewish students. omar jimenez is joining us, and what do we know about more threats yesterday? >> yes, the president said that there was another concerning crime alert that came across yesterday which was unsubstantiated, but it added to the stress of what seemed to be a tense campus, and it is part of the reason that the university is canceling the classes friday to acknowledging how tense things have been there, and including as you have said a student accused of federal charges making the online posts threatening to kill and injure jewish people on campus. in response, the university president outlined many things to try to do to help the anti-semitic threats on campus, and including responding rapidly and forcefully to threats and responding to anti-semitism experts on campus to prevent doxing which is to sdisseminate private information of people. and so we have seen not just at cornell, but a rise across the country in islamicphobic incidents. >> it is not going to be over any time soon. thank you. and donald trump jr. has arrived at the new york courthouse and he is about to take the stand in the fraud case against his family.