it's good to be back with you in this second hour of chris jansing reports. at this hour, the dramatic rise in antisemitism on college campuses after the october 7th attack left one student at m.it asking quote, when can i go back to being a student. what we heard from top university leaders and the students on capitol hill today. inside israel. the heartbreaking stories trickling out from former hostages and their loved ones about what it was like being held in hamas captivity. the nightmares they're still having at home. also, the new details on what rudy giuliani's defamation case against ruby freeman and shaye moss could look like when it goes to court. and the elephant not in the room. donald trump. four of his rivals will get a chance to make their case against him at tomorrow's primary debate. who made the cut and what to expect. our nbc news reporters are following all the latest developments. i want to begin on capitol hill where we heard from leaders at top universities about the rise of antisemitism on college campuses. we heard from students at the school today about what it's like inside and outside the classroom on those campuses. what did we hear? >> that's right. earlier today, the house education workforce committee held a hearing called holding campus leaders accountable and confronting antisemitism. it featured the presidents of harvard, mit and u penn. the chair said quote, each of you will have a chance to answer and atone for the instances of hate filled antisemitism. she told the committee she's deeply troubled and is taking steps to combat it including enhancing security in student residences, launching a new training program for students, faculty and staff. just last month, we learned the department of education had opened an investigation into harvard after claims of antisemitic incidents on campus. also today, speaker of the house, mike johnson, was joined by four jewish students from multiple universities and colleges who talked about the prevalence of antisemitism on their campuses. let's listen to one student. >> let me go back to being a scientist, a student. i don't want to have to keep advocating for jewish student safety on campus. it's not my job. it's your job. this is not just harassment. this is our lives on the line. >> and they took aim at university leaders for failing to do enough in their view to combat this. it's worth emphasizing when we talk about antisemitism here, we're not talking about disagreements or criticism. actions of the israeli government. s in this is about incidents where jewish or israeli students were targeted simply for being jewish or israeli. >> i want to go back to our reporting from last hour, which is that tommy tuberville has lifted his hold on hundreds of military promotions. we just heard while you were talking about the students from chuck schumer, the democratic leader. he says the plan is to move on these promotions asap. he also said all this was unnecessary but i understand we now have heard directly on camera from tommy tuberville. is that right? >> that's right. this is a major retreat for tuberville, the alabama republican senator who had placed a hold on what became hundreds of military promotions since february. he has now lifted that hold on promotions for three star and below. four stars and above will still have to get votes in the senate. he talked about this. i'll play what he had to say. >> i'm releasing everybody. i've still got a hold on i think 11 four star generals. everybody else is completely released from me. >> and that means the senate can now vote in one instant by unanimous consent to move forward with those hundreds of promotions that tuberville blocked since february. it's not 100% of release of his holds. there will be some, 11 four stars and above that will get votes in the senate, but a major development and the pentagon is not changing its abortion travel policy as he initially demanded. >> thank you. for the families of hamas hostages who have been released, the joy of reunions are often tempered by the horrific reality of their time in captivity and the trauma that they're dealing with now. many of them children. we've spoken with the uncle of three girls abducted with their parents on october 7th. they were released last month. what are they saying? >> it was a joyous occasion for two of his sisters and their children released last week in the prisoner hostage exchange. their husbands though remain in captivity. maran, and we're starting to piece together what it was like for these hostages held by hamas for many, many weeks as their families agonized about whether or not they were healthy and when they would be released. this is what he said about how his family was held hostage by hamas. take a listen. >> food was not a given. they weren't sure when they will be given food. or how much. i understood that they were arguments between the hostages around water. >> so we're not hearing directly from the hostages but little by little, we're hearing family members describe what their loved ones told them their time in captivity was like. it's important to note these two hostages who were released, their husbands are still in captivity and their kids were very small here. we're talking about daniella's daughter, 6 years old. sharon, 3-year-old twins as well. they're safely out of hamas hands but there are many more still detained and their husbands still as well in captivity in hamas somewhere in the gaza strip, chris. >> thank you for that. rudy giuliani was expected in court today for a pretrial hearing in a civil defamation lawsuit brought by georgia poll workers but the only problem is his lawyer apparently didn't tell him to show up. ryan riley has the latest. do we know what happened here? >> well, his attorney sort of was asked whether or not he was falling on his shield but the attorney said he had just misread the order but the judge really laid into the attorney saying it really sort of set the tone for the trial in questioning how could you have missed that or did you miss it. asking if he misread the order. the lawyer really took responsibility for it saying it was his fault and rudy was back up in new york. so some of the questions potential jurors are going to face include whether or not they listened to giuliani's podcast. that gets underway on monday. not a really great start. a pretty rough start for giuliani here, chris. >> a lot of people seem to know he was expected there but maybe not his lawyer. ryan, thank you for that. just four candidates will be on stage tomorrow for the final republican presidential debate and for the fourth time, donald trump will be elsewhere. dasha burns joins us now. we can say this is their last best chance to have an audience of this size. not a lot of movement has happened necessarily after these debates. how are candidates viewing this debate? >> well, look. it's always a great opportunity to get your message out but i got to tell you as i've been out there, folks are not necessarily excited for this fourth debate. the interest has waned as we've gone on here and there's been less and less movement. right now, the eyes are going to be on nikki haley and ron desantis. those are the two duking it out. desantis has slipped in the polls. haley has risen. it's great for her, but not for the part of the republican party looking to turn the page on former president trump. because the fact you still have two people that are locked in this battle at this point in time where we're so close to the iowa caucuses that there's still not consolidation behind one person, that is a problem because the window on any chance to beat trump in this primary is closing. he's not even holding counterprogramming to this debate as he has for the last few. he's holding a closed door fund-raiser at the same time instead. that just shows you he doesn't think this is enough of a show to counterprogram for. so this is a good opportunity for them, but will it move the needle? will they even go after the guy they're trying to beat instead of one another? we looked for that in past debates. it hasn't necessarily happened so we'll see what happens on the debate stage, chris. >> thank you for that. today, the families of three black people murdered by a racist gunman are seeking justice. new details on the major lawsuit just unveiled by their attorneys in 60 seconds. unveiled by theis in 60 seconds. your shipping manager left to “find themself.” leaving you lost. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. indeed instant match instantly delivers quality candidates matching your job description. visit indeed.com/hire whenever you're hungry, there's a deal on the subway app. buy one footlong, get one 50% off in the subway app today. now that's a deal worth celebrating. man, what are you doing?! get it before it's gone on the subway app. ♪♪ the family members of three black victims of a racially motivated shooting at a dollar general store in august are now suing. while the shooter killed himself, the families have just filed a lawsuit against the store's owner, operator, and security contractor, claiming that lack security led to their loved ones' deaths. guad, what more do we know and are we hearing from the families? >> it was a very emotional conference for the families with the attorneys. the attorneys speaking about what happened that day, saying the shooter had stopped at other stores before and they say that because those stores had security guards, they moved on to this store that did not have a security guard. also pointing out the fact that violent incidents have registered at other stores owned by the same company. of course when the family members spoke, there was a lot of pain and they believe that if perhaps a security guard would have been present at the store, that could have been the difference. let's hear from one of the brothers of the people that died at the store that day. >> he's my baby brother. he's supposed to bury me. not me burying him. you know, it, the -- we were raised to do the right things. you know, go to school. don't be in the streets. don't sell drugs. guess what aj did? he followed it and this is what he gets for repayment? to go to work and die? >> for other family members, it was an opportunity to share personal stories to tell what it's been like for them to lose someone. how their life has c. all of them saying the security guard could have been the difference maybe if the brother in this case or the other family members would have been at one of the other stores where there was a security guard, they would be alive today, but just an opportunity for them to share what it's been like as the attorneys announce this legal action they have taken, chris. >> you can feel that pain. thank you so much. i want to bring in civil rights attorney and msnbc legal analyst, charles coleman. good to see you. the argument in this lawsuit and how likely is it to hold up? >> i think the argument in this case does have a lot of credence based off of what we are learning about the shooter's actions before the incident at the actual store. the fact this shooter went to other stores where the security guards were present and that seemed to have been a deterrent suggests that dollar general was ultimately negligent in not having a security guard to essentially enforce and protect in the same way at the location of the shooting. that is a significant deal. and when you couple that with the notion that there were reports of other violence which had been taking place, it also suggests there should have been measures put in place not only to protect customers but also workers as well. so what you're talking about is a standard of care that exists in certain places that has not carried over to the actual location where the shooting occurred and that discrepancy is going to be something attorneys are going to harp on in terms of building their case and trying to establish liability on behalf of the plaintiffs here. >> it's not just the company, charles. the gunman's family is also named in the suit. we're told he had texted his father. told him to check his computer and then the dad found a suicide note. he found racist writings so the family notified authorities but too late to stop the shooting. will that phone call to police make it tough to claim the parents are responsible? >> i do think that what you're talking about is going to be considered a mitigating circumstance. so whatever degree of liability would be imputed to the parents in a case like this is going to be mitigated by the fact they did upon learning this, make the attempt to actually reach out to authorities. ultimately, is it going to give them zero liability? that remains to be seen and is likely going to be a question decided by a jury, but yes, that is going to be a factor people will weigh and likely will, if they are found to be liable to whatever degree, lessen their degree of liability as something that is considered under the law to be a mitigating circumstance. >> charles, thank you for that. i want to go to tel aviv where we have some breaking news. prime minister netanyahu is talking about the hostages and the meetings he's had with families. take a listen. >> translator: is filled up with happiness and that's quite a lot in such a day and age. we've managed to bring back home 110 hostages through the condemnation of a lethal military effort as well as an ongoing diplomatic one. i'd like to tell you this is the only way to bring back the hostages that are still held in captivity by hamas. we are committed to do so. hamas tried to break us apart but we are breaking it apart. many of the murders came from the batallion. they broke through the fence and entered israel and committed their atrocities and this is why we targeted and killed the commander of this batallion at the beginning of this week. he commanded these atrocious murders as well as in others. so far, we've managed to kill off half of hamas commanders. we are settling the score with anybody who was involved, who was a partner to this. anybody who burned, raped, and murdered our brothers and sisters. we will not forget, we will not forgive. and we've instructed with the idea to continue with the war. our troops are expanding the ground operations against hamas everywhere in the gaza strip including the south of the strip. just last night, we operated there with great intensity. the land shook in ewe nis and jabalya. we circled both places and we've also taken over the general security base of hamas. our brave soldiers are fighting fiercely against these murderers. they are conducting face-to-face battles and they are killing so many terrorists around the clock and in every battle, we come out victorious. we are fighting till the very end until we achieve absolute victory. our soldiers, our troops, are the epitome of resilience of this nation. but all that comes with a price with such a heavy price. every loss pierces our hearts. ben was killed in action this week in the battlefield in gaza. he was from combat engineering unit and he was an outstanding athlete. the salt of the earth and full fledged soldier fighter. and together with him, four other soldiers were killed from the high school he went to. the high school in jerusalem and -- who was from the brigade who saved so many lives after he managed to throw back seven grenades and unfortunately, we also lost his friend, an officer from the core field man. troop from the paratroopers, who also was a paratrooper. i say today to the families of these fallen soldiers and i say to the beloved families of all of those who were killed in action, your loved ones who are our loved ones, did not die in vain. we will fight together. we will win and we will obliterate hamas and we are going to fight until we reach victory, until we reach all of our goals which is to bring back all of the hostages obliterating hamas and guaranteeing that hamas will never again impose a threat on the state of israel. we will make sure there's no one who supports terrorism, finances terrorism. one more thing about the day after hamas. gaza has to be demilitarized and for gaza to be demilitarized, there's only one force that can ensure this. and this force is the idf. no other international force can be responsible for that. we've seen what happened in other places where international forces were brought in for purposes of demilitarization. i will not turn a blind eye and accept any other agreement and i once again call upon the civilian population in gaza to leave the combat area, the war zone with hamas and i'm saying from here to our friends in the world who are pressuring us to speedily put an end to this war. the only way to end this war and to end it quickly is to use overwhelming power against hamas and to completely obliterate it. if our friends want to help us to shorten this war because this is also their war against the -- which is threatening to take over the world. they simply need to stand firm next to us. i say that in english and every other language. >> netanyahu, who is making it clear that even once hamas is to use his words, obliterated, as they move into the south, a place where many palestinians have gone at the direction of israelis and are in fear of their lives, that he will not allow any other force to go in to make sure of demilitarization. he says only israeli defense forces can do that. for some, it raises the question of occupation. for many, it raises the question we've been hearing throughout the day today after israel admitted that for every member of hamas that they have killed, two civilians have died. and again, the questions about their actions in the south and how many more are being put at risk. we're going to continue to listen though to prime minister netanyahu as he makes his case for the ongoing war which he clearly believes they are having a lot of success. he say they've killed off half of the hamas batallion commanders. still ahead, a new move by hunter biden's legal team angering the special counsel investigating him. plus, what we can expect when donald trump's son takes the stand tomorrow at the civil fraud trial. stay with us. tomorrow at the ci fraud trial. stay with us that whatever we did here would be an emblem of what small communities can achieve. trying to give a better life to people that don't have the means to do it. si mi papá estuviera vivo, sé que él tuviera orgulloso también de vivir de esta viviendo una vida como la que estamos viviendo ahora. es electricidad aquí es salud. 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