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60 Nations Target Extremists Social Media; Kurdish Fighters Stop ISIS Assault in Iraq; 2004 Photo of ISIS Leader Surfaces; ISIS Fewer Than 200 Miles from Italy; Danish Gunman Tried to Get Inside Cafe; Cop Under Fire for Turning Off Camera

Aired February 18, 2015 - 09:00   ET

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


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: NEWSROOM starts now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, President Obama focusing on new ways to fight violent extremists. Anti-ISIS propaganda, airstrikes, but the attorney general says don't call this a war?

ERIC HOLDER, ATTORNEY GENERAL: We're not in a time of war.

COSTELLO: Plus, young, beautiful, and fighting for ISIS. Why extremist women are so vital to the terror group and how they're being lured to the front lines.

Also --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stop it.

COSTELLO: A St. Louis arrest caught on camera, sort of.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You guys are worried about cameras. Just wait.

COSTELLO: Officers turn off one of the dash cams. Hear what happened next.

Let's talk. Live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.

Some 60 nations are converging on the White House today to combat extremists and their social media campaigns aimed at recruiting tomorrow's terrorists.

In this morning's "Los Angeles Times" President Obama said in this op- ed, quote, "Groups like al Qaeda and ISIL exploit the anger that festers when people feel that injustice and corruption leave them with no chance of improving their lives. The world has to offer today's youth something better." So the U.S. is ramping up its own social media offensive to combat the

90,000 messages per day pumped out by ISIS. Now the State Department is tweeting messages like, quote, "ISIS is not the solution. Its spread has worsened social ills, more homelessness, illness, starvation, poverty and death."

So let's talk more about this. Let's head to the White House and CNN's Michelle Kosinski.

Good morning.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Carol. Yes, I don't know if angry young people out there without opportunities are going to be subscribing to the State Department's Twitter feed or listening to those messages necessarily, but what this government wants to do as part of the summit is they did announce that a segment of the State Department will be used to try to counter those messages.

Not only monitor what's out there because this has become such a big operation. In fact, the president himself said it was social media that has, quote, "turbo charged ISIS." But they also do want to try to counter it.

Here's what the State Department said about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD STENGEL, UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE: This is how these people become radicalized. This is how young men become radicalized, they become radicalized on the Internet, on YouTube, watching these kinds of videos and getting this kind of messaging.

We want to intercede in that. We want to prevent them not only from sometimes getting that messaging but for countering it with our own message and our own story.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSINSKI: And what the president said in that op-ed this morning was that fighting extremism is really at its heart going to be about trying to win hearts and minds, not a military fight. And what that means in the practical sense, what we're hearing from those who are organizing the summit is incorporating youth in communities in trying to counter that. People who are involved with some of these communities, trying to get them to identify to individuals and to intervene.

The social messaging is a big part of it. But also looking at programs around the world, not just within the United States, looking at what works and doesn't.

I think, you know, from a skeptical eye you can look at the summit and say, OK, oh, boy, it's a big government meeting. What really is this going to do? But I guess the premise here is that when you share this information and you really delve into what maybe has made some progress somewhere, we're curious to see how they're measuring progress, that that really can't be a bad thing.

At least it's getting people together who are focused on this problem. So basically we'll see, Carol.

(LAUGHTER)

COSTELLO: As they say, yes, we will see.

Michelle Kosinski reporting live from the White House this morning.

An ISIS assault near the Iraqi city near Irbil now over. Kurdish fighters say they have stopped the assault after hours of heavy fighting and airstrikes killing several dozen ISIS fighters in the process. For weeks now ISIS was making almost daily attempts to break through those Kurdish lines.

CNN contributor Tim Lister is in Irbil, Iraq, this morning to tell us more.

Hi, Tim.

TIM LISTER, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Hi, Carol. Yes. By the standards of this region it was a very substantial battle. 45 ISIS fighters killed according to Kurdish officials. Fighting went on for five hours and they couldn't bring in airstrikes until very nearly the end of the engagement because of -- and because the two sides were so close together that the coalition was worried that they would hit Peshmerga positions and not ISIS positions.

It is over now. I don't think there was ever any chance that ISIS would have made it here to Irbil, the capital of Kurdistan. It's a very well protected, well-defended city. But what it does show is that ISIS is constantly looking for opportunities along this vast front, 1,000 kilometers long, to try to weaken or divert Kurdish forces. They want to divert these Kurdish forces from Mosul, which is now surrounded on three sides.

This is the prize for ISIS. They want to hold Mosul at all costs. Anything they can do to distract the Kurds from that prize they will do, and they are doing on an almost nightly basis along this front, Carol.

COSTELLO: Are the Kurds armed well enough, Tim?

LISTER: They would say not, and the evidence we've found visiting the front lines in six or seven different positions in the last couple of weeks is they're probably right. ISIS is well armed because it seized a lot of weaponry, heavy weaponry, mortars, Humvees, all sorts of things from Iraqi military bases when ISIS took those bases over last year.

The Kurds really have very little in the way of automatic weapons. They have very little in the way of heavier fire power such as mortars. They're beginning to get the occasional anti-tank missile which is really important for them to take out these mobile IEDs that's a specialty of ISIS. We went to one front line where they've taken out one of these Humvees

that had been packed with, get this, 8.5 tons of TNT. Luckily it was disabled before it reached that frontline position. But this is what they're up against. An enemy that's determined, well-organized, communicates well, is capable of complex attacks and is very disciplined and very determined to try to break the Kurds down, Carol.

COSTELLO: Tim Lister reporting live from Irbil in Iraq. Thank you so much.

As ISIS pushes forward across Syria, rebels trying to stop them will soon get new help from America. The U.S. -- a U.S. Defense official tells CNN some teams of rebels will soon get communication and GPS gear along with pickup trucks and machine guns. But the U.S. is still considering whether or not those rebels should get the equipment needed to call in U.S. airstrikes.

Even if those rebels get the gear there would be no U.S. airstrikes without confirming intelligence separate from Syrian rebels.

The leader of ISIS is as reclusive as he is dangerous. So we want to share this image of him with you.

This is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. It was obtained by CBS News. This picture was actually snapped back in 2004. For 10 months, al-Baghdadi was held at a U.S. military prison in Iraq. And Washington now wants him back in custody dead or alive.

CNN has learned that al-Baghdadi tops a secret kill list of key ISIS operatives.

CNN's Barbara Starr has been working her sources. She's live from the Pentagon this morning.

Good morning, Barbara.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Why we are essentially referring to this as a kill list. Look, what the U.S. is doing very clearly is targeting top ISIS officials, al- Baghdadi number one on the list, but the U.S. isn't capturing anybody on the ground obviously. There aren't the U.S. troops on the ground to do that, either in Iraq or Syria.

They're only in Iraq as advisers. So with nobody there to capture, it is essentially does become, frankly, a kill list. About two dozen people, al-Baghdadi number one on the list. They've already killed, they believe, about a dozen top ISIS top operatives. But obviously people are added to the list as they fill in essentially jobs that have become empty due to U.S. airstrikes.

The list, as we are told, focuses on really trying to go after the top operatives, the ones that if they are taken off the battlefield essentially could make a fundamental difference to ISIS' capability.

There are thousands, tens of thousands of ISIS fighters. But right now what this is focusing on is going after those who might make a real difference if they are no longer there. But I have to tell you that the U.S. officials we are talking to say the intelligence very tough to come by. Nobody's very cheery about the whole thing. They get intelligence but it's spotty.

And it's very difficult for them, they say, to really understand still at this point ISIS' own command structure to really identify who the top leaders are. This is all an effort to go after that -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Barbara Starr reporting live from the Pentagon. Thanks so much.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Iraq, Syria, Libya, now ISIS could be on Italy's doorstep. Italy is now calling out the troops. We'll talk about that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Just under 200 miles. That's reportedly how close ISIS fighters are to the shores of Italy's southernmost island. So concern is growing about security and just how to stop ISIS from advancing into that country.

Barbie Nadeau is the Rome bureau chief for the "Daily Beast." She joins me live.

Good morning.

BARBIE NADEAU, ROME BUREAU CHIEF, THE DAILY BEAST: Good morning. It is very troubling here. I think, you know, people are mostly worried about this influx of illegal migrants that have come into Italy. We had 170,000 last year but so far this year since January there's been a 64 percent increase. 4,000 people have come over from the shores of Libya since Friday, for example.

And there's just a change in tactics. So many of these smugglers are now sort of armed and dangerous, wrestling the boats back to bring more migrants. And the Defense Ministry here is very worried that these boats will be infiltrated with jihadi fighters. And that is the concern right now, Carol.

COSTELLO: So Italy has deployed troops in country, correct?

NADEAU: Well, no. There are -- there are no troops in -- there are 500 extra police forces right now protecting some of the most sensitive tourist sites in Rome, things like that, but there are no troops on the ground to protect Italy from any sort of ISIS invasion certainly at this point.

The Italian Navy is regularly on patrol to try to get the migrant ships and save lives. That's an entirely different thing than a defensive combat mission, and there are only about 5,000 troops available. Italy's military is very much a peacekeeping military. And they're spread all over the world right now on various missions.

There are, from the Defense Ministry. only about 5,000 people who could even contribute to any sort of real mission and that is worrying as well.

COSTELLO: That is worrying. I know Italy has approached the United Nations. What is it asking for?

NADEAU: Well, they're asking for a United Nations-led mission, a mandate in order to get maybe France involved as well in some sort of mission that would just help protect the Italian shores if there were to be any sort of invasion, any sort of strike against Italy.

Of course, Lampedusa, the tiny island off of Sicily, is just under, as we said, 200 miles away. Sicily, the much larger island is only 500 miles away. It's very, very close and it is within striking distance.

You know, many several years ago, Gadhafi was able to launch a missile that hit Lampedusa. So, this is not something that is unheard of here. And the Italians are very, very worried and they're asking for help.

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi is addressing parliament tomorrow to lay out a plan and they're hoping that the United Nations will pay attention and say that it's a threat to the country. A threat to Italy is, of course, a threat to all of Europe.

COSTELLO: Barbie Nadeau from "The Daily Beast" -- thanks so much for joining me this morning. I appreciate it.

The gunman who opened fire at a Copenhagen cafe and synagogue killing two people may have pretended to be as drunk to get as close as he could to his second and final target. The head of the Jewish Society of Denmark says surveillance images show suspect Omar Abdel Hamid El- Hussein staggering towards the synagogue on Sunday.

Later that day in a gun battle, police fired up to 30 shots at him dropping him to the ground. Now, the gunman did not get inside the synagogue or the cafe and that may have saved many lives.

CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson has more for you.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: What we're learning here in Denmark is that the death toll at the cafe at the freedom of speech venue could have been far higher. Police say the gunman tried the back door, the side doors to get inside but there was a crowd of about 50 people. He was only able to spray the windows from the outside, 28 bullets used there.

Now, police are looking at surveillance video from outside the synagogue later that night, and they say the gunman appeared to act drunk as he approached the policeman and the guard outside to try to get close to them. He shot at them there using two pistols that he had.

We're also getting new details from the French investigation to the attacks there. Cherif Kouachi sending a text message barely an hour or so before he attacked the "Charlie Hebdo" cartoonist sending a text message to Amedy Coulibaly, who two days later then attack the kosher supermarket. Apparently, according to this report, the two men had met in the early hours of the night right before 1:00 a.m. in the morning, in the day of the attack, at the "Charlie Hebdo" cartoonist.

The French authorities now getting a much closer look at how those two attacks were connected. And apparently, the attack on the "Charlie Hebdo" almost didn't go ahead because one of the Kouachi brothers apparently had stomach flu.

Back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: All right. Nic Robertson reporting.

Checking some other top stories for you at this morning at 17 minutes past, more Americans are opting for Obamacare. The White House is unveiling its latest enrollment numbers for 2015, 11.4 million people signing up this year. That tops the administration's prediction of 9 million.

A dramatic rescue in New Jersey. A 14-year-old girl is recovering this morning after falling into the icy choppy waters of this bay. Rescuers trudging through the huge trunks of broken ice to move her to safety. The girl and two others were walking on a pipeline when she fell into the waist deep water.

Meet Miss P., the 4-year-old beagle winning top price at the Westminster dog show. The hound is now embarking on a whirlwind media tour. Highlights include a walk on part in pinky booths and, of course, a meeting with Donald Trump because, why not.

No deal, no goods. Container ships filled with things including fruit, electronics and auto parts are stuck off the California coast. Failed contract talks at West Coast seaports are to blame. Officials estimate the impact of a full strike could cost nearly $2 billion of international trade a day. On Tuesday, the White House stepped in, sending Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez to try to negotiate a deal.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a dash cam recording as officers confront a passenger and his driver but it's what you don't see that's causing a big controversy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: A man in St. Louis is suing the city's police department for excessive force and the incident is caught on tape, sort of. It all went down three months before the events in Ferguson, Missouri. And just like in Ferguson, the officers were cleared of any wrongdoing except for one. That's because one of the cops is accused of turning off the dash cam recording during the incident.

Alina Machado was following the story for us.

Good morning. ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol.

The officers involved say their actions were justified and yet the case was thrown out all because of an off switch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MACHADO (voice-over): This is St. Louis police dash cam video from April 10th, 2014. An officer says the driver made an illegal U-turn in the middle of the street and pulled him over. According to the report, police say they smelled marijuana and saw a handgun. They ordered the passenger out of the car and handcuffed him. And after about four minutes of the driver's refusal to get out -- officers finally pulled the man out.

OFFICER: Get down! Get down! Get down! Now!

MACHADO: Joel Schwartz is suing the St. Louis City Police on behalf of his client, Cortez Bufford. They used excessive force including kicking Bufford and using a taser.

Also on the video, Officer Kelli Swinton who was named the 2013 officer of the year. She stands watching and then walks away towards a dash cam. Listen to what she says.

OFFICER: All of you, hold up. Hold up. Everybody hold up. If you guys are worried about cameras, just wait.

MACHADO: The officers look up, pause, the audio dies, then the camera shuts down.

JOEL SCHWARTZ, ATTORNEY: They're worried about cameras and they don't want anyone to see what they're doing, so they turn the tape off.

MACHADO: Schwartz alleges they didn't have the right to order the driver out of the car.

SCHWARTZ: Our client wasn't speeding. He didn't make an illegal U- turn and he didn't abruptly pull to the curve. Those were all figments of the officers' imagination.

MACHADO: And according to the police report, officers did find marijuana and a fully loaded gun in Bufford's pocket and only used a taser and a foot strike to keep him from reaching for the weapon. A police union lawyer who represents one of the officers on the video calls the police response justified.

BRIAN MILLIKAN, ATTORNEY: The use of force that was necessary in this case was a direct result of the defendant's actions or the suspect's actions.

MACHADO: An internal affairs investigation did clear the officers of using excessive force and disciplined the officer who turned off the dash camera.

(END VIDEOTAPE) MACHADO: Now, that officer is appealing her punishment, and because the camera was turned off, again, all charges that were filed against Bufford were thrown out.

Now, the St. Louis City attorney, Winston Calvert, issued a statement saying, in part, I want to read it to you. It says, "There were two police cars at the sight of this incident and the camera was shut off in one of the police cars. The other car dash cam was still rolling. The second dash cam shows the officers did their job, took the suspect into custody, the suspect was found with a .9 millimeter semi- automatic pistol."

The statement goes on to say, "The officers did what had to be done to protect themselves" -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Alina Machado, reporting live for us this morning -- thank you.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM: Republican voters giving their support to a new favorite in the 2016 campaign. That would be -- well, I'm going o tell you after a break.

And say it ain't so, Joe. Another incident of Biden being Biden caught on tape.

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