Williams and Gibson in Israel

Brian Williams and Charles Gibson have traveled to Israel to anchor their evening newscasts from close to the Mideast violence, television’s sign of the importance given to the story.

It was Gibson’s first such trip since taking over as sole anchor of ABC’s “World News Tonight” in May. He interviewed an Israeli commander for a story on Sunday’s newscast and was to anchor Monday’s broadcast from Jerusalem.

Williams, from the top-rated “NBC Nightly News,” also appeared on the “Today” show and was anchoring portions of MSNBC’s coverage on Monday. He last left New York to anchor from New Orleans at the beginning of hurricane season last month.

“CBS Evening News” anchor Bob Schieffer was in New York Monday. Chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan was to co-anchor the broadcast from Haifa. New CBS News anchor Katie Couric starts in September; she was in San Francisco on Monday.