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00:00and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
00:02They're both here.
00:03Welcome, everybody.
00:04I'm Neil Cavuto.
00:05Let's go first to Alex Hogan in Tel Aviv
00:07with the very latest.
00:08Hey, Alex.
00:10Hi, Neil.
00:11So Hamas says it will not return
00:13to negotiations tomorrow in Doha,
00:15but the State Department today indicated
00:17that either way, plans are in place
00:20for talks to move forward.
00:22So as I said yesterday,
00:24our Qatari partners have assured us
00:26that there will be representation from Hamas,
00:30and I will let them, of course, speak to that.
00:36The goal is that a ceasefire would deter Iran
00:38from attacking Israel, bringing down tensions in the region,
00:41but mainly to bring an end to the war in Gaza
00:43as the death toll nears 40,000 people.
00:45Among the dead, one man who today says
00:47he left his newborn twin babies with his wife
00:50to pick up their birth certificates,
00:51only to return and find that the twins,
00:53his wife and mother-in-law, all had been killed in an attack.
00:57Now, sirens tonight blaring in northern Israel
01:00amid the continued cross-border attacks
01:02that we have been seeing week after week
01:04and month after month between the IDF and Hezbollah.
01:07Today, U.S. Envoy Amos Hochstein arrived in Beirut
01:10meeting with Lebanese lawmakers,
01:11urging them quick de-escalation
01:13and that no one wants a full-blown war.
01:16Hezbollah has promised retaliation,
01:18even if it acts without Iran.
01:21Now, it was last that we saw a ceasefire.
01:24The last ceasefire ended in December,
01:26so it has been 258 days of people in Gaza
01:30living in a war zone, 258 days for the families here in Israel
01:35wondering if their loved one,
01:36their hostage loved one might still be alive.
01:39So while there is a tremendous amount
01:40of international pressure, Neil,
01:42for both Hamas and Israel to strike a deal,
01:45there is an incredibly amount of personal pressure
01:49here within Israel on the Israeli government
01:51for the government to strike that deal as well.
01:53Neil.
01:55Thank you very much. Please be safe, Alex.
01:57Alex Hogan, in the middle of all of that,
01:58as she has from the very beginning,
02:00I want to go to Major General Patrick Ryder right now,
02:02the Pentagon Press Secretary.
02:04General, always good to have you.
02:06These talks to find a ceasefire,
02:11even though Hamas won't be participating directly in them,
02:15do you have any understanding
02:16that it would affect Iran's decision
02:19to strike Israel regardless?
02:22Yeah, well, first of all, Neil, thanks very much for having me.
02:25And look, you know, I'm not going to speak for Iran.
02:29We're obviously watching and monitoring the situation
02:32extremely closely right now.
02:34As you know, we've deployed some additional capabilities
02:37into the region to protect our forces,
02:40but also support the defense of Israel.
02:43Certainly, you've seen the U.S. government
02:45work very closely with partners in the region
02:47to try to make a ceasefire possible
02:50and, most importantly, get those hostages released.
02:53But from a DOD standpoint right now,
02:55our focus is on ensuring that we can defend Israel
02:59if it is attacked and ensure that our forces
03:01have the firepower they need to be protected themselves.
03:06I mean, it seems very apparent
03:07from just looking at the naval presence
03:09we have, General, in that neck of the woods
03:11that it's substantially bigger than it was
03:13the last time Iran attacked Israel,
03:16helping mightily stop 300-plus missiles
03:21from killing anyone.
03:22And I'm wondering, the beefed-up operations,
03:26U.S. presence around the region,
03:28it seems like you are taking it as a given
03:31that Iran will act at a similar heft.
03:36Well, look, you know, I'm not going to, again,
03:39speculate on what they may do.
03:40We know what they've said publicly,
03:43and we know that they've indicated
03:45that they will retaliate.
03:47So we've got to take that extremely seriously.
03:48We've got to make sure that we have the capability
03:51and capacity to protect our forces,
03:53to defend Israel should it be attacked,
03:55and also to send a very loud and clear message of deterrence.
04:00So the immediate threat,
04:02and the ones who have constantly acted,
04:04regardless of what Iran was thinking or doing,
04:08is Hezbollah.
04:09Hezbollah has all of those missiles to the north.
04:10It has used them repeatedly, even just today.
04:15Is it your sense, as well,
04:17that if Iran does respond,
04:21it will do so through its proxies and on its own?
04:25In other words, it'll be everybody involved.
04:27It'll be Hezbollah.
04:28It'll be the Houthi rebels, you know,
04:30hitting commerce and shipping in and around the Gulf,
04:35to say nothing of Hamas, that they'll all be involved.
04:38Yeah, well, that's certainly a potential.
04:40And of course, as you well know,
04:42Iran frequently uses its proxies
04:45to carry out operations,
04:47to enable their policy.
04:51And so that's something that we, again,
04:52have to take very seriously.
04:53And so we've seen Lebanese Hezbollah
04:57conducting missile strikes against Israel since October 8th,
05:01since shortly after Hamas's vicious attack against Israel.
05:05And so, you know, we've been working very diligently
05:08along that area, as well, to reduce tensions.
05:11Look, the bottom line is no one wants to see a regional war,
05:15and that's why you see this full court diplomatic press
05:17to try to prevent that from happening.
05:19But should Israel be attacked,
05:21the United States military is prepared
05:24to help Israel defend itself,
05:25just like we were on April 13th, as you highlight.
05:30General, we recently speedily approved
05:33a $20 billion weapons package for Israel.
05:36Can you detail what was part of that weapons commitment?
05:41Yeah, Neil, I really can't go into those details right now.
05:44As you know, we have a longstanding
05:47security relationship with Israel.
05:49In particular, since October 7th,
05:51we have rushed billions of dollars of aid to Israel
05:55to enable them to defend their territory
05:58and prevent these kinds of attacks from Hamas
06:01from happening again.
06:02So, you know, we're gonna continue to stay after that.
06:05And as you've heard Secretary Austin say,
06:07our commitment to Israel's defense
06:10is ironclad, and that's not going to change.
06:13How are relations these days between yourself,
06:16not directly, sir, but the administration and Israel?
06:20We were told, and a State Department spokesman
06:22had kind of concluded and agreed
06:25that Israel didn't give much of a heads up
06:27when they wanted to take these Hezbollah
06:30and Hamas bigwigs.
06:32I don't know whether that was just out of fear
06:33of word leaking out,
06:35or things are that tense between us and Israel.
06:39What do you think?
06:40Well, you know, operations aside,
06:42and I won't speak for Israel's specific operations,
06:45I think our actions speak for themselves
06:47in terms of our relationship with Israel.
06:50You know, the fact that, again,
06:52we rushed billions of dollars of aid,
06:54we rushed capabilities into the Central Command
06:57and European Command theaters of operations
07:00after Hamas's attack, again, to deter potential aggression.
07:04And the fact that we continue to stand by Israel's side
07:08when it comes to potential attacks from Iran,
07:11and in the case of April 13th, actual attacks,
07:14and we demonstrated clearly that that commitment
07:17to help them defend themselves is ironclad.
07:20So again, that is not going to change.
07:22We will continue to support Israel in its defense.
07:26Very quickly, too, I wanted to get an update from you.
07:29Ukrainian President Zelensky is appealing to allies
07:32to continue to allow long-range strikes
07:34on targets inside Russia.
07:35They've been very successful in these strikes
07:37as they've been, and even taken a number
07:39of Russian soldiers prisoner and making great headway there.
07:43How do you feel about that?
07:46Well, Neil, right now, our policy hasn't changed.
07:49As you know, we have discussed
07:52with our Ukrainian counterparts the ability
07:55to be able to use U.S.-provided munitions
07:57to conduct counterfire strikes,
08:00defensive strikes across the border into Russia
08:03to fend off attacks, but as it pertains
08:06to long-range strike inside of Russia,
08:08our policy hasn't changed.
08:10But I do want to say that we speak
08:13to our Ukrainian counterparts on a near daily basis.
08:16In fact, Secretary Austin just spoke
08:17to Minister Umarov, his counterpart, today,
08:20and our commitment to helping Ukraine defend itself
08:23and to take back its sovereign territory hasn't changed.
08:26So we'll continue to work closely with our allies
08:29and partners to ensure they have what they need going forward
08:32to defend their freedom and defend their sovereignty.
08:36General Patrick Ryder, thank you very much.
08:38Good catching up with you.
08:40Likewise. Thanks, Neil.
08:42All right. In the meantime, I do want to take it as...