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women. this is part of the deal that was brokered that would release 50 hostages from inside gaza over the next four days in exchange for some 150 palestinian prisoners inside of israel and also some humanitarian aid coming inside of egypt and some other things around the margins. our understanding is that this process is under way, and it is developing by the minute. and one of things that we are watching is abigail adon who turns 4 years old today, and her parents were killed by hamas terrorists and unclear, we are told that americans would not be part of the exchange today, but it is one thing that we are watching for very, very closely. okay. let's get back to kaitlan collins in tel aviv to get the latest of what you are hearing at this very minute, kaitlan. >> yeah, john. obviously, this process is painstaking. it is developing minute-by-minute here as we watch it happen. what we do know now is that they are in the process of handing over the 13 israeli hostages to red cross, which is the group that we knew would receive them and facilitating their move from there in gaza to where you pointed it out on the map to not far in egypt. once they are processed in egypt, then they will be helicoptered here to israel. but regardless, john, this is what we are seeing now as the process is under way. one of the biggest diplomatic breakthroughs since october 7th. we have seen a few hostages come out before total so far, but this is the largest group so far, and we are also hearing in addition to the 13 israeli hostages 12 thai nationals also held in gaza are also handed over is what we are hearing from the egyptian officials, and so a lot of the tracking developments, and we are tracking them all, and team across the region covering every single angle of this hostage release now under way as we are monitoring it very closely, and waiting to hear confirmation from the israeli officials when they will publish a list of the 13 to be released. becky anderson is tracking this from doha. and becky, you been hearing about this process, and what is the latest that you are hearing? >> so, there is an operations room set up here in qatar, the heart of the mediation of course between israel and hamas not talking directly. qatar is mediating the talks and getting them over the lines. there is an operations room set up here with the members of the mediation team intimately involved with those on the ground and with the icrc, and they are tracking this minute-by-minute, and obligations baked in on both sides and one of those was that the hamas would release the 13 women and children today into the hands of the icrc who will then deliver them to the idf in israel. as we understand it and as we speak now that process is under way and some of the hostages i am told by diplomatic sources have been handed over, but there is still an ongoing process. we have to assume that none of this is going to be easy. there may be slight delays given it is just over an hour since the scheduled departure of these hostages from hamas' hands wherever they were being kept. the deal had baked in a four p.m. release. it is an hour ago, and i have to say that many people who are intimately involved with what is going on is quite surprised it is happening as quickly perhaps as it has. those hostages are now in the process of being handed over. we do not know where they will enter israel from. certainly, they will be coming out of gaza, and gaza-israel or egypt into gaza, that is not clear at the moment. there is proof of concept for this. we have had the release of two sets of prisoners over this, over this conflict. both mediated by the catdres, ad the confidence is why this process is going to work as well, because there is no trust between either of the parties. there were very specific obligations built-in, embedded in the deal on both sides, and they both had to understand their obligation, and when we are seeing the handover of the hostages and indeed the fact they are on safe israeli soil or see the release of the palestinian prisoners, the 39 palestinian prisoners held in israeli jails which is a very impointer point, and exchange of individuals. individuals held by hamas for palestinian prisoners held in israeli prisons. so at this point, i am told by those intimately involved, things are going according to plan, and a little bit of the delay on the humanitarian aid, and that is a very important pillar here, and the activity when this truce was to begin at 7:00 a.m. local time, but mostly, this is going to plan, and this is the part that is so delicate. it includes children. we don't know who. we do know that there is a baby as young as 10 months old being held hostage, and we don't know whether that baby is going to be transferred today. we know that 4-year-old abigail, the american citizen is being held hostage, and we are told by american sources that it is very unlikely that any americans will be let out today, but that is the sense of how delicate this is. there are kids involved in this. women and elderly women. this is a really, a really fragile operation. >> absolutely, and that baby spent a month of his life held by hamas. and so as we get a list of the hostages in doha, we will check back in you, and jeremy diamond is near the israel-egypt border, and kerem shalom which is one of the two locations where we have heard that the hostages could be entering to come in through israel today, and what are you seeing, jeremy, right now? >> yeah, that is right, kaitlan. effectively two locations that once these hostages go into egypt, they could potentially be coming into israel. one of them is a crossing which is further this way over my right shoulder, and the other is the kerem shalom crossing where we know there is a history of deals where going from rafah through egypt and then from kerem shalom, and that is the case of judith and natalie who just a few weeks ago were released on what they called the humanitarian grounds and accompanied by an israeli official via that kerem sha loan crossing. there is a road here where earlier today, we saw buses and vans headed in the direction of the crossing. but i cannot confirm if there is a connection with the hostage release, but if indeed as i have been told that the hostages would be brought to a nearby air force base, and if that happens, it is right over my shoulder. there is a road here that goes north effectively in the direction that they would need to go to get to an air force base. so we could be witnessing that scene here as soon as those hostages are brought into israel and they are sent on their way to that air force base. that is the first opportunity for those 13 hostages to get evaluated medically and crucially to speak with their families who they have not had any contact with for nearly 50 days. so this moment of pain and anticipation and anxiety and just a mix of emotions that israelis across the country have been feeling, but of course, their families. it is now coming to a boiling point, and it is coming to the inflection point here, and we could see that moment happen very soon. >> all right. jeremy diamond, thank you. i also wanted to note that we are hearing from the israeli source right now telling me that all 13 of the israeli hostages are now in egypt. that is a moment that we were watching earlier, and they are being handed over to the red cross in gaza and then transferred to egypt in ambulances and vans, and we are told by a senior israeli official that all 13 of the israeli hostages have made it to egypt, and that is next stopping point before they come here to israel, and wed are waiting to see more and hear more from the egyptian officials and we will continue to monitor that, because one of the places they could come is that the children are in the group of 13, and we have not confirmed it, but the chief international correspondent clarissa ward is outside of the children's hospital near the hel ipad wher some of the children could be sent where you are now, clarissa, and how are the employees now bracing for the potential arrival for the hostages there? >> there is a huge amount of preparation that has gone into theer a rival, potential arrival of these children. and you can see the helipad and the blinking lights and the ambulances pulling up alongside those blinking lights and ambulances, and they are saying the staff has taken care of the specialized unit where they would be brought, these children and mothers. they will not be separating any children who come with their mothers. they said that the main objective as they were making the preparations is to ensure that it didn't look like a hospital or feel sterile or intimidating or frightening. so they have taken enormous pains to create what they called almost a beautiful hotel experience with a lot of toys and a huge amount of staff who they say they have hand picked specifically to make sure that they are the most sensitive, the most experienced and the best psychiatrists, and obviously social workers on site, and each family, and each group of hostages within the 13 who end up here will have their own social worker appointed to them, and the objective is to make sure they have as calm and safe and intimate of space as possible, because as we have been discussing throughout the day, kaitlan, it is anticipated that the children will be exceptionally distressed. they have undergone a huge trauma, and we know and we have seen the guidelines and the comprehensive guidelines that were put out by the ministry of welfare for the idf soldiers who are currently going to be embarking on the identifying the hostages and carrying out a cursory medical search to determine how much treatment they need and which hospital they have been sent to accordingly, but they are going to try to do it in the most sensitive way anyway. they are flagged, do not answer any questions of where is my mommy and daddy, and a lot of the children are orphans, and some don't know about it. and so everybody is whether it is at the hospital or the soldiers on the ground or the ministries are really trying to take painstaking care to ensure that everything is done to be as sensitive to the trauma that these hostages have undoubtedly experienced, kaitlan. >> yeah, it is hard to even imagine, clarissa ward, thank you. cnn's correspondent m.j. lee is also tracking this, because we don't expect americans to be in this group, but you have new reporting of what is happening inside of the white house who is watching this as closely as all of us. >> that is right, kaitlan. the white house officials are watching this release in realtime and monitoring every movement going on right now. the president of course, himself, he is constantly being briefed by the top advisers as well. for u.s. officials there has been such an emphasis on this first day and this first release of the first group of hostages going well, because they believe that the first two days or so will really serve as a testing period of sorts that can pave the way for additional releases, and the additional days that are to come with more hostages hopefully to be released, and even though, kaitlan, last month we saw the two american hostages released successfully, it is an entirely different understand taking that we are talking about, because two people very different from 13 hostages and now how today goes is significantly important for the white house, but they do not believe any americans to be released among the 13 women and children coming out of gaza. that means that presumably, they will be released on day two, day three or day four, and we have no way to know or predict exactly when we will see the american citizens, but again, the white house officials are closely monitoring the situation, and very much hoping that everything is going well without a significant hitch and without a significant delay because they really, really want this to go successfully, and have the americans released for that process to go well as well. >> yeah, it is a template for all of this. m.j. lee and jeremy diamond, thank you all very much. john, obviously, everyone is watching this closely, because this is truly developing by the minute as these hostages are watching this handover under way, and with the ultimate goal and once people will breathe that sigh of relief in israel once they are and the ground which they are not yet, john. >> right, kaitlan. and we will find out what the moves are, and barak ravid from axios said that the hostages were turned over to khan younis. and they then go to the egyptian side of the rafah crossing and then we believe they will go to the south to the nitsyana crossing and then cross into egypt and then taken by helicopter here to the air force base, and so from here to here, and that is where matthew chance is, and they will be flown to hospitals around the country from there. that's the sense of this journey, this odyssey that these 13 hostages that we do now understand are on egyptian soil right here. that is what they will be doing through. and again, they have been in captivity for some 48 days, and some of them are children, and so this is quite an ordeal for them. let's get to retired air force colonel cedric leighton, and if you can comment on this movement of these people, and the logistics of, this and the psychological terror, and how excruciating it has been for the people of israel to know they were a few miles away this whole time. >> yes, john. from a psychological standpoint, to know that if you were a hostage and capture and spent so much time with these hostage takers and with the families and everybody involved trying to get these people out, it has been excruciating for many, many people from many, many country, and from the logistical standpoint, john, you are seeing the movement that is intricate, and ground movement from khan younis and then when you get into the rafah crossing, it is the egyptian responsibility, and then into the buss to the nitzana crossing, and then to the haretzim air force base, it is going to be a triage situation from the psychological situation where the people will be put into the area where they can be in essence see or feel the presence of the israeli military there. the air force base is legendary air base. it is the very first air base that israel built from the ground-up in the late 1960s and it has f-15s and 16s and the air force academy is there, and it is a major place for them to be basically reintegrated into israeli society, and kind of through the military mechanism there and hopefully it is going to give them the feeling that all of these people, you know, in the military side and on the political side and the diplomatic side have been working with them to try to get them out, and trying to work this process and hopefully that is going to help them to reintegrate into israeli society. >> cedric, as we are watching this, and again, the primary concern today is for the welfare of these 13 individuals and hopefully the dozens of others who will be released over the next few days, but there is an intelligence and military aspect to what is happening right now, because they know where they are, and they know where they were, and they were in khan younis and moving south here, and how much without drones flying can israel see of this from the intelligence standpoint, and what kind of intelligence can they gather from the turnover of these hostages? >> well, that is going to be really considerable, john. depending upon how much they can glean from the hostages as they are going to be debriefed, that debriefing is critical. as the things are happening, the israelis have mechanisms to monitor this without drones. they might even have access to satellites overhead that can provide some degree of coverage. there are also some other mechanisms that they may have, if they have sources in any of the areas to monitor things as well. from a distance, the israeli forces that are positioned within gaza can also have a way of looking at some of the this, and they may see movements on the ground that indicate whether it is the red cross where they are, and where hamas is moving the hostages to and from which is the most sensitive part of this, because hamas is going to make every effort to make sure that the israelis do not know where the hostages were before they were transferred at khan younis and that is going to be the challenge from the intelligence perspective on the israeli side, and of course from the hamas perspective, they want to keep it under wraps and minimize the degree of knowledge that the israelis will glean from all of the activities. but all of the activities have a signature, and that something that the intelligence agencies will be looking at very, very carefully. >> and keep in mind one of the hamas demands is that israel would not fly drones over southern gaza during this release, because they don't want to know where hamas is, and hide the hundreds or dozens of hostages remaining there. and so, cedric, of the 13 people turned over and moving somewhere along the egypt and israel border there, i want to talk about the military operations. near al shifa hospital, there has been more and more videos released of the tunnels they found underneath that hospital. they say it is a hamas command center there underneath, and how much can they do in searching these tunnels as a military pause is under way in the next few days? >> they might be able to do quite a bit, john. because as far as i know or understand the agreement, there is no prohibition of the israelis to go through the areas they control, and the area underneath the al shifa hospital is one that the israelis are reporting and showing video of all of the tunnels they have found there. so what they will be doing is a lot of the basically equivalent of the forensic analysis. looking at the videos, you can tell the construction that was used in the building of these tunnels. you can see some pretty sophisticated rooms that are laid out just like you would lay out, you know, rooms in a house or apartment building. and it is something that will give some degree of an indication as to how thesem radios or tunnels were used, and that is something that is going to be critical from the intelligence perspective for the israelis, and we will see more videos like this. >> colonel leighton, thank you very much. the news this minute, is that the hostages have been moved from khan younis and now in egypt through the rafah crossing and we believe they are headed back over the border to israel very shortly. we will bring you the very latest information. our special live coverage continues right after this. all right. we are following breaking news at this hour, because right now, we are told that the hostages, the first ones to be released by hamas as a part of the deal