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Palestinian Prime Minister Abbas Arrives in Gaza After Withdrawal

Aired August 19, 2005 - 11:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Civil rights act sift Coretta Scott King is recovering from what her doctor call as small heart attack and a big stroke. The family says King is aware, but she is unable to speak, and she's having difficulty with her right arm and leg. King's daughter, Yolanda, say she's been assured her mother will recover with intensive therapy.
And the former Republican governor of Massachusetts says he's going to try again, this time, though, in New York State. William Weld tells "The New York Times" he'll run for governor in 2006. Weld says that White House political adviser Karl Rove is among those urging him to jump in.

The military, they are known at IEDs, improvised-explosive devices. Just ahead, we go along as U.S. troops try to hunt down these deadly weapons before they claim more victims in Iraq.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: All right. I want to show you some things we're watching. Look at this picture. Is this cool or what? The Space Shuttle Discovery getting a piggyback ride, eventually heading back to Florida. It, as you know, landed at Edwards Air Force Base in the high desert of Southern California, because the weather was bad, when it was supposed it land in Florida. It takes so much fuel to get the space shuttle back. It has to make a stop. You know, when you call and make a flight, and they say it's direct, but not nonstop, yes. They'll be stopping in Oklahoma at Altis (ph) Air Force Base, to refuel, and then eventually making it back to Florida. We'll be watching that.

Meanwhile, we're also watching what's taking place in Gaza. Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas at the closed down, but still international airport in Gaza. He is making an appearance at a celebration of sorts of taking back that land.

Our Ben Wedeman standing by as well as that same site to talk about the tone that the Palestinians are trying to strike with this celebration -- Ben.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, what they're essentially trying to do is tell Palestinians that life is going get back to normal. We just heard a few moments ago the Palestinian president saying that this airport will be reopened. He said it will be better than it was before, and this, of course, was one of the few ways Palestinians could get out of Gaza, because as the system is at the moment, it is very difficult to get from here to the outside world. Israel controls the coastline. It controls the border with -- between Israel and Gaza. The only way out of the Gaza Strip is over the border With Egypt, and that is a chaotic border where not only is there problem of disorganization, on the Egyptian side, but the Palestinians need permits to get in and out from Israel. So this airport represents an opening for them, and this is just one of the things Palestinians hope will become operational again, after the last five years of, of course, the Palestinian uprising, and, of course, the Israeli occupation of Gaza, since 1967.

And, Ben, this is a challenge. This is part of Mahmoud Abbas's challenge in making a statement and making it appear that he is in charge of the Palestinian people and this part of Gaza?

WEDEMAN: Yes. He's made many promises. The Palestinian Authority has made many promises about what it's going to do. The question is, can it do it? Does it have the resources? Does it have the international backing?

Just a few days ago, I spoke with a senior leader of Hamas, the Islamic leadership organization, and he sounded like he an extensive plan to rebuild Gaza himself. So you almost have a situation where you have a parallel administrations. Hamas, for instance, runs school, health clinics, social programs, that, in many respects, are superior to the Palestinian authority. So how Mahmoud Abbas manages to improve the situation through ordinary Palestinians will certainly be critical in the months before the Palestinian elections, legislative elections, scheduled for next January.

KAGAN: Ben Wedeman live in Gaza. Thank you for that report.

Meanwhile, you think the last plane ticket you bought was expensive? How about $1 million? That's what it costs to get the Space Shuttle Discovery back from California to Florida. A live picture as it takes off, piggyback style, heading first to Oklahoma, and eventually to Florida. More on that ahead and other news. Right now, a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: The military calls them IEDs, improvised explosive devices. In civilian language, they are homemade roadside bombs. The explosives are the biggest single killer of American troops in Iraq. By one count, about half of the 1,861 U.S. deaths in Iraq were caused by IEDs. The latest casualties came Thursday, when four U.S. soldiers were killed in Samara.

CNN's Alex Quade spent time with the marines who patrol for these hidden killers. Just a note, the report includes strong language.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) ALEX QUADE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It begins with breakfast at Abu Ghraib Prison and ends with a [EXPLOSIVE NOISE] This is just another day for the Marines of Dragon Platoon, a weapons company from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.

GUNNERY SERGEANT JEFF VON DAGENHEART (ph): Son of a [EXPLETIVE DELETED]. Well, welcome to freakin' Iraq.

QUADE: Their mission started before dawn. Gunnery Sergeant Jeff Von Dagenheart and his men hunt IEDs, improvised explosive devices.

DAGENHEART: So everybody keep their head down.

QUADE: They've hit 22 in two weeks, but only minor injuries so far.

DAGENHEART: There's no freakin' smiling today, all right? Everybody got me! Freakin bunch of weirdos!

QUADE: On patrol, daylight breaks. Gunny Dagenheart is already suspicious.

DAGENHEART: What's in there?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Salaam (ph).

QUADE: This is how his Marines battle the insurgency, searching for hidden explosives. One car, one person at a time. Next on their beat...

DAGENHEART: Roger one two (ph) request permission to enter friendly lines.

QUADE: Abu Ghraib Prison. We go inside the wires, behind blocked barriers and under watch towers I talk with Dagenheart while his Marines go to chow.

What is it that you're checking for? What is the danger?

DAGENHEART: The vehicle borne improvised explosive devices.

QUADE: And what is that?

DAGENHEART: It's usually just like they pack the wheel wells full of C-4, TNT, maybe a couple of 155 shells or 125 tank round shells.

QUADE: So the actual vehicle become a bomb?

DAGENHEART: Is a bomb. We've ran across three here in the last week.

Roger. We just left Abu Ghraib. This is where all the bad stuff originates around here.

QUADE: The Marines call this area a car bomb factory and say insurgents blend in with the locals.

DAGENHEART: Perishnicof (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

DAGENHEART: How many?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One.

DAGENHEART: Show me.

QUADE: They search house to house.

DAGENHEART: Check upstairs.

You know, don't trust anybody. Even if they're nice and offer you tea, you go up on the roof and you find 50 weapons.

QUADE: Because this nice lady has offered some tea already.

DAGENHEART: Yes. You go into some of these houses and see pictures of Osama bin Laden and you're like, oh, OK. Or Zarqawi. You start checking a little bit more.

QUADE: He hopes his platoon's presence keeps bomb builders off guard.

DAGENHEART: Open the hood. Trunk. Open them up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, salaam.

QUADE: Without a translator, it's volume and just . . .

DAGENHEART: Hey, what's your hurry? What's your hurry? Freakin' slow down! Slow slow down.

QUADE: It may seem funny, but it's deadly serious. This crater is from an IED, improvised explosive device.

DAGENHEART: That hit us yesterday. Good training, huh?

QUADE: Which is why the Marines also train Iraqi recruits.

DAGENHEART: Lots of bombs lately. Bomb! Bomb! Twenty-two in two weeks. Twenty-two. Language barriers. It's all good, right?

QUADE: They race to where something has been sighted.

DAGENHEART: Well, fasten your seat belts, gents! Oh, (BLEEP). Johnson (ph), keep your eyes down. Hey, Hawk (ph), look to the left. White bag or possible shell. Look hard left. I'll look right. Shell, shell,. Find me a shell.

QUADE: Between here and those cars may be an IED.

DAGENHEART: Find me a green bag. Keep your head down. (BLEEP). No hole dug, no nothing. But the trig man is going to be to our right over here and I see a car. Let's go ahead and eyeball that and have your gunner scan to the right see if you see a trigger man.

QUADE: They see something between the traffic.

DAGENHEART: There's a dude standing right where that supposed IED is. Can you tell if he's got anything on him? What's he holding there, Smith? Can you see it? I don't know, what's in his gut? He's in his pocket right now. Watch him. Watch him.

QUADE: Dagenheart zeros in on him.

DAGENHEART: See how he's holding his freakin' shirt!

QUADE: His finger on the trigger.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's (INAUDIBLE)

DAGENHEART: Yes, he is.

QUADE: Turns out to be just a shepherd.

DAGENHEART: A guy playing shepherd over here with some sheep and he's standing right where the IED, where the supposed IED is.

QUADE: This typical day is only halfway through.

Gunnery Sergeant Jeff Von Dagenheart and his Marines have hit 22 IEDs, improvised explosive devices, in two weeks.

DAGENHEART: I took some shrapnel in the leg, and thank God for gear, because I took a piece here, then in my holster and then I got shrapnel across my leg. It's healing up now. It's all good. My helmet, you can see my helmet, my eyes through here.

QUADE (on-camera): Good thing you had these things on.

DAGENHEART: Yes. Yes.

QUADE (voice-over): Some in his platoon bought extra protection on their own.

DAGENHEART: He's not playing around. It's sappy here, sappy here.

QUADE: Everything helps, since their daily mission is hunting for bombs.

DAGENHEART: But you get used to, you know -- I guess when we first got here, it was like, you know, paranoid, you know, where's the holes? My God. And now it's just like, if it's going to happen, it's going to happen.

QUADE: It does, on the important main supply route between Falluja and Baghdad. DAGENHEART: We've got some (EXPLETIVE DELETED) here. I can -- go ahead and hold everybody off. Abandoned vehicle. I don't know how freaking one missed it. Go ahead, hoop a loop on this (EXPLETIVE DELETED). No license plate.

QUADE: Dagenheart's Marines secure the area.

DAGENHEART: We're just looking for trunks that are ajar, windows that may have been shot, doors welded shut, keyholes that are taken out, ignition wires that are ripped apart, wires coming out of the vehicle.

QUADE: They don't see anything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you want to go check it? I don't know, boom! Yes, I don't know.

QUADE: They decide to push it off the convoy route with an up- armored Humvee when it happens.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (EXPLETIVE DELETED). Get out! Get out!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get out! Get your ass back! All right, get your ass back!

QUADE: This is what the military calls a vehicle-borne IED. Translation: car bomb.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look for a trash man. Are you OK?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They said they saw somebody running down there.

QUADE: Someone watching and waiting for the right moment, the Marines say, detonated it remotely.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Son of a (EXPLETIVE DELETED). Well, welcome to freaking Iraq.

QUADE: Amazingly, nobody was seriously hurt.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hurry up before the .50-cal starts cooking. Leave it there. Hey, leave it there, because that's .50-cal ammo, and everything's going to start cooking.

QUADE: Ammunition can blow, causing casualties, or be salvaged by insurgents.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ammo. Ammo.

QUADE: Dagenheart worries there may be a second bomb timed to target the recovery.

DAGENHEART: We're going to have a secondary if we don't get the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) out of here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just count up all the Marines.

DAGENHEART: Just count up our Marines.

QUADE: Humvee driver Lance Corporal Jason Hunt (ph) tells me he thought he was going to die, then walks by me to pull security while his platoon deals with the situation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pretty close. I consider myself lucky.

QUADE: Gunny Dagenheart says it's just another day hunting for bombs and bomb builders.

DAGENHEART: We're going to eventually kill them, at least in this little piece of the pie. I don't know how we're going to get them, but we're going to get them. I'd rather have a vehicle blown up than a Marine.

QUADE: Alex Quade, CNN, near Abu Ghraib Prison, Iraq.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAGAN: Absolutely intense. Lucky enough to have with us Alex Quade, who put together that piece. You went, you shot, along with your shooter. Let's give credit to your shooter.

QUADE: Yes, David Albritton (ph), my cameraman, who, as you can see probably from the video, when the blast happened, he was blown back 12 feet, had a little shrapnel burns. When that happened, I saw that he got up, that he was OK, and I grabbed my camera and tried to shoot a little bit, too.

KAGAN: Absolutely. I want to ask about the personal side of that in a second. First, the troops that are out there. What's the biggest challenge that they face? Psychological or physical?

QUADE: I think it really is -- it's just, it's the not knowing. It's the things that they can't control. It's the incoming mortar, the rockets, things like this. The IEDs, the improvised explosive devices. That thought that even if they're in a support position, if you're just driving a convoy down the road, something, anything, could blow up.

And the insurgents are making bombs out of just about anything. From -- they can make a bomb out of a cell phone. They can hide things in animal carcasses. They'll put things into potholes and pave the potholes over. Garbage. So the marines -- the -- and all the other troops, they'll be driving down the side of the road, they'll see anything. And their alarm bells go off. And so it's just this constant sense of having to be vigilant.

KAGAN: Every single day. Now on a personal note for you, to go into a situation like that -- I sent you an e-mail when we aired part of this early this week -- aren't you scared, when you go in and do something like that and you see this for yourself? QUADE: This might sound like we, as journalists, think we're ten-foot tall and bullet-proof, but usually I'm just -- I'm so focused on trying to get the story, on trying to be there, trying to witness what's happening in front of us. And something like this, I mean, this is happening right in front of us. And, of course, my mother's scared. You know, she sees this...

KAGAN: Yes, I was going to say, I hope your mother's not watching.

QUADE: She hates this. But it might sound a little naive, but when we're with the troops, we're surrounded by all of these men and women with weapons who -- they don't want to die. They're going to be watching out for each other, and I tend to feel like, well, if they're watching out for each other, then we're in the right place. But on the other hand, we're also targeted, as you saw here.

KAGAN; Well, it's a great thing that you're bringing us the stories and great what the troops are doing there. Alex, thank you. Look forward to a lot more stories.

Alex Quade, thank you.

Well, do certain jobs put you at a greater risk of developing Alzheimer's or Parkinson's? If you're a hairdresser or a teacher, you're going to want to hear the results of a new medical survey story. That story coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: An illness outbreak linked to a water park in Upstate New York tops our daily dose of health news. The park in Geneva, New York was closed yesterday after tests showed contamination from a common waterborne disease. A local health director says the reported cases of illness has risen to about 1,500. The disease can cause diarrhea, nausea and fever that can last weeks. Many of the people sickened by the outbreak have already recovered.

A jury resumes deliberations in the nation's first Vioxx trial. The widow of a Texas man is suing a drug company, the drug company Merck in fact, in a lawsuit seeking at least $40 million. She blames Vioxx for her husband's death. Merck says the drug did not cause the man's death, and the company acted responsibly when it pulled Vioxx off the market. The suit is the first of thousands of cases to go to trial.

A study suggesting that a wide range of jobs may be tide to brain diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Researchers examined more than two million death records in the U.S. They found jobs ranging from farming, to hair dressing, to teaching were associated with an increased risk of brain diseases. In some cases, the link may be a result to more exposures to chemicals. But researchers also point the limitations of studies based on death records.

For you daily dose of health news online, you'll find the latest medical stories, special reports and a health library. The address is CNN.com/health.

(WEATHER REPORT)

KAGAN: That's going to do it for me this hour. The news continues here on CNN. I'm Daryn Kagan. I'll see you on Monday morning.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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