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Rep. Steve Scalise Wins GOP Nomination For House Speaker; Escalating Tensions In Israel As House Speaker Vote Delayed; U.S. Deploys Military Deterrence; Secretary Blinken Reaffirms Support Amid Ongoing Conflict. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired October 11, 2023 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: A protracted military presence in Gaza by Israel that would likely lead to seemingly be an endless war in insurgent sort of combat in urban landscape with millions perhaps or -- or hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties. Does that concern you?

CON. MIKE LAWLER (R-NY): Let's understand what happened here Hamas a terrorist organization invaded Israel but the express intent of killing innocent civilians children babies beheading babies -- this is a barbaric disgusting vile terrorist regime that needs to be eliminated and Israel has every right to defend itself and it's right to exist and they should take any and all action necessary to do that.

SANCHEZ: Congressman Mike Lawler we appreciate the overtime with you in having a, a very broad conversation. Please keep us posted on whether you plan to support speaker Scalise if you wind up speaking with him later today or not. Thanks so much.

LAWLER: Of course.

SANCHEZ: Still plenty more news to come stay with us. I'm Boris Sanchez live in Washington DC alongside Anderson Cooper who is in Tel Aviv Israel and we're tracking major developments on Capitol Hill and in the Middle East Republican Congressman Steve Scalise has just locked down the republican nomination for house speaker of full vote to determine if he will become the 56th speaker of the house potentially coming up this afternoon. We will of course follow that live. Anderson.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: And here in Israel, a nation readies the next phase of -- of war. One of the largest troop mobilizations in the country's history is underway. We have been witnessing the buildup of forces over the last several days, amassing along the Gaza border and at other sites. The bombardment of Gaza continues. In less than a week of fighting, both Israel and Gaza report over 1000 deaths. Both sides are bracing for thing to get a lot worse. Obviously, scrambling to evacuate civilians from the crosshairs. A senior Israeli official telling CNN that talks are happening to allow U.S. citizens, and Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, to perhaps exit into Egypt ahead of any Israeli ground invasion. The National Security Adviser, Jake Sullivan, intimated in a press conference yesterday. He had talked about diplomatic efforts underway to figure out potential border crossings, but we're still waiting on some sort of resolution on that. Obviously, the Egyptian border - - there's the Egyptian border and the Israeli border. They're not going to be able to enter into Israel. Egypt seems to be the only option at this point if Egyptian authorities can be convinced to allow that to happen.

There's an urgent push to try to find, locate, free hostages taken by Hamas, believed to be more than a hundred, Islamic Jihad also claiming to have around 30. Unknown number of Americans among them. The top U.S. hostage official is with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, about to depart from Israel and I should point out we are expecting to hear comments from Athony Blinken at any moment. We'll try to bring that to you live.

The country of Qatar is also involved, mediating talks between Israel and Hamas regarding the any potential release of women and children. Hamas stated days ago that this is not the time to discuss any kind of hostage negotiation while there is ongoing conflict. That remains to be seen, if any progress on that front with the involvement of Qatar.

I want to go on the ground right now with CNN's Nic Robertson, who I believe, still in Sderot at this hour. Nic, explain where you are, what you have been seeing.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yeah, just a couple of miles from the border fence with Gaza, and in the last couple of minutes, literally two or three minutes, there was a barrage of rocket fire coming from Gaza coming into here. The Iron dome was intersecting, taking them out in the sky above here. And there was so many rockets coming from Gaza that the Iron dome was intersecting from another angle as well. So, several iron domes. You can hear the detonations there. We've been talking about those. The artillery that's being fired onto Gaza as well to try and get those rocket launch sites.

But at the same time as well, another development that you and I were discussing an hour ago, we were hearing all that small arms fire very close to here. That was something unusual. Now that's been confirmed. The small arms fire is over. It really ramped up a little bit later in intensity, a real firefight going on. That was taking place a couple of miles from here, approximately, perhaps a little less over the hill away from where we are. But we found out that that was a couple of Hamas infiltrators that the Israeli defense forces had found, got into a firefight with them, neutralize them, the euphemism they use.

[14:05:32]

That, again, is just indicative to answer the question we were talking about last hour. Are there still Hamas operatives on the loose here? And the answer is very clearly, yes. And relatively close to the to this town of Sderot as well, which, which -- which itself is a couple of miles from the from the border with Gaza. But everything that you see around us, so instructive of the biggest picture, of the big picture, but the rocket fire on Sederot this evening, that was something, you know, we haven't we didn't really see anything of that intensity during the day. I don't think we saw it of that intensity last night, but that was quite a big barrage. Quite a couple of salvos they fired in here, Anderson.

COOPER: Nick, it's really stunning to me that not surprising, but it is still just something to remark on the fact that here we are now. I'm not sure how many hours it has been since the 630 a.m. initial terror attacks began Saturday morning, that there are still Hamas squads on the ground or individuals on the ground around Sderot in that border area. I mean, that's that that says something.

ROBERTSON: It does. And I think what it says is and the and the evidence seems to come in to support this because what the IDF are finding when they are getting on the location of these small groups they find, they're finding the places where they kind of stashed food and water. So, it appears that these, these guys are not recent to come in. They may well have come in on Saturday, maybe late Saturday, maybe Sunday before the border was beginning to be shored up and have gone to ground with that sole aim of getting out and attacking. So, I think this, this speaks to the issue that, you know, when you have 1500 members of Hamas, their fighters coming in here through multiple holes along this long border fence on Saturday morning. If you have 1500 that have been accounted for, then it's logical that there will be some that are unaccounted for and, and the accounting is still going on.

The IDF will be adding another two or three tonight close to here to the tally of Hamas they've found now that I think that they would expect to find more. And I think that's it's it stands to reason you have so many flood in over the weekend that there's likely a few still holding out, hiding out some places.

COOPER: Nick, I don't think we know the answer to this, but I'm going to ask the question anyway. Is it is -- are there any numbers of how many potential terrorists Hamas has? How many potential people do they have willing to -- to die to support Hamas? I mean, if they had 1000 fighters, 1000, you know, militants crossing over the border, some of those with higher levels of training that than others at some point, do they run out of numbers? Or do we know?

ROBERTSON: I -- you know, I think this have one very simple and frank answer to that. And that is that in a population of 2 million people in Gaza who feel as if they absolutely being squeezed to the maximum by Israel, that's their view inside Gaza. There is no shortage of recruits for Hamas, or to the you know, Islamic jihad or, or to other groups. You know, people, young men seem to flock to them because they've got an attractive message fight the enemy. And I think the best analysis is and I don't have the most up to date figures here, but it will be in the 10s of 1000s that Hamas can count on for support. Their challenge is probably giving them all weapons and flak jackets and instructions and keeping any hint of a big operation below the radar. Another detonation there in Gaza. When you when you if you were to try to send too many people across the border, perhaps that leads to disorganization. But I think the idea that they run out of people, you know, I think I

think probably Hamas would probably say no, you know, plenty more recruits. And I think the evidence supports that. We just don't know how much they can, how many weapons they can put in their hands, how many they can really make, make operational.

[14:10:00]

COOPER: Yeah, also the level of training that any of those newer recruits may have would obviously be a consideration on the battlefield. Nic Robertson, appreciate it. Let's go back to Boris.

(CROSSTALK)

ROBERTSON: Yeah, Anderson, I'm just gonna Anderson, I'm just gonna interrupt. The Iron Dome is going up here, so I'm expecting more intercepts. Yeah, so I'm expecting there are more missiles coming. That's the siren. We'll leave the camera rolling. We'll leave the camera rolling. I'll just step into a little bit of cover here and talk you through what we're seeing.

COOPER: So Nic explain the lights that we just saw tracking across the sky, are those from the Iron Dome? Are those the interceptors?

ROBERTSON: That was from the Iron Dome. Those were the interceptors. You saw the interceptors tracking through the sky. And that was very much like the salvo just before, at the top of the hour. They tracked through the sky. I was able to watch them behind, behind John. I can still see the comm trails of where they came up from the Iron Dome launch site. And as soon as I saw those little traces come up that we were catching on the camera, John was catching on the camera. We know because we've seen it for a number of days now, that means there's rockets coming from Gaza.

We couldn't see the rockets coming, but those intercepts, those bangs that you heard, that was the Iron Dome interceptors connecting with the rockets. And again, you can't overemphasize it. In somewhere like Sderot, that's so close to the border with Gaza, when rockets are fired from the Gaza, from Gaza, there are literally seconds, seconds, for the Iron Dome to spring into action. And that's what we saw. And it's remarkable as well, because the Iron Dome was, I would say their interceptor missiles were in the sky two to three seconds before the tannoy across the town here came on telling people, you know, danger close, get to the shelter, stay in the shelter.

So, you know, the best indicator, if you're under attack in this place at least, is to be able to see the Iron Dome taken to the sky. And that, you know, that's what we saw play out here. And I think we're just, I think we may be seeing rockets coming up from Gaza, just seeing another one coming up. So, I think we might get some more. Yep, intercepts coming up.

COOPER: Can you explain how the Iron Dome works?

ROBERTSON: Iron Dome? COOPER: Can you explain how it works?

ROBERTSON: Yes. Stand by though. Multiple Iron Domes at work here. Multiple Iron Domes coming in from different directions. Well, that's that salvo over. So, you, Anderson, you were asking me how does.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: So, a lot of that is done automatically? That's done by computer tracking?

ROBERTSON: Yeah, yeah. They pick up instantly. They pick up the trajectory of where it's going, the angle it's flying on, the angle it's going up into the sky. They calculate across the country. They calculate where they think it's going to impact, and they know the best Iron Dome system to intersect with it. And that goes up in an instant. That was interesting because we saw the missiles coming up from Gaza that time before the Iron Dome triggered. Last go round, it was it was the reverse. Although, you know, in situations like this, it's a little tricky to tell the timing.

So, John's looking over my shoulder. So, he sees the missiles coming up and I'm looking over his shoulder. So, I'm seeing the Iron Dome come up. But yes, it's a computerized, intelligent system that calculates the angle of Hamas's rocket, the direction of Hamas's rocket. And it says, okay, this Iron Dome unit is the best one to fire off. And it says, fire off 5, 6, 7, 8, depending on how many incoming missiles they're picking up on their radar systems. It's complex, but, and it's probably relatively expensive, but it saves lives.

Every one of those rockets there, we didn't hear a single impact here just now. So, it shows you here on this occasion right now, not all across today, but on this occasion right now, it appears to have intercepted everything coming in this direction. Clear message from Hamas. They know, perhaps they already know that two of their operatives were picked up, neutralized is the term, over the hill from here this evening. They're firing back in here. This town now is a militarized town. It is, it is awash with troops. And part of the reason it's awash with troops is because there's concerns that there might be more Hamas militants out there. Anderson.

[14:15:09]

COOPER: We should also point out, Nic, that those interceptors from the Iron Dome system, that is one of the things the US has said that they want to provide more of to Israel, both giving them the funding for those and also directly providing more interceptors to bolster the system because it has, just for value for dollar in terms of each of those interceptors going up, it is protecting property on the ground, it's protecting human lives, most importantly on the ground, and allowing people to live their lives to the extent that spending a lot of time in bomb shelters is living in Sdorot, in Ashkelon, and in all these communities around there. So, the use of those interceptors at this Iron Dome system has proved critically important.

And Nic, you talked about rockets still coming from Gaza. It's important to point out, the last time I was reporting from Gaza City during bombardments, during a back and forth between Israel and Hamas, you could see when you were in Gaza City, you could see Hamas rockets being fired from civilian areas, from regular streets, from residential areas, from buildings all around. So, the launch pads for Hamas rockets move around and are also amidst residential buildings.

ROBERTSON: Yes, and Hamas will have dug themselves tunnels and bunkers to store those weapons in, so the missiles, the rockets, they're right there close to that launch location, just a few meters away. So, what they do is they minimize their time on the ground. They'll keep those rocket systems in bunkers under houses. They'll come out into the orchard behind the houses and then set them off and then go back underground in tunnels and into those deep bunkers where they know they can get some safety from the shells that are likely to follow in. And we've just heard a round of explosions coming from Gaza, so it would seem that there was return fire. It sounded like, to me, it sounded like artillery being fired back in.

But yes, Hamas hide among the population. And again, to your point, it is very difficult for the Israeli defense forces to target those launch sites without the risk and actual collateral damage, without civilians getting killed and injured. And that's what we've been witnessing over the past few days, the death toll among Palestinians. --

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Its also

ROBERTSON: I think it was U.N. workers today among casualties, yeah.

COOPER: Yeah. And worth pointing out, those underground tunnels are for Hamas militants, not for civilians to hide in. Those are for the movement of weapons, perhaps the keeping of hostages, but allow for movement under the ground in tunnels of Hamas, not the civilian population to shelter in. --

ROBERTSON: Very much so.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Thanks very much.

ROBERTSON: Very much so. Yeah.

SANCHEZ: Action and a reminder of how quickly things can change in the Middle East. Anderson, thank you so much. We should note we are anticipating remarks by Secretary of State Antony Blinken at any moment. He landed in Israel a short time ago. We're also following breaking news on Capitol Hill, where House Republicans have nominated Congressman Steve Scalise of Louisiana to become the 56th speaker of the House. Let's take you now live to Capitol Hill with CNN's Lauren Fox and Manu Raju. Lauren, first, let's go to you. We're just learning that there was a meeting between Congressman Scalise and Jim Jordan, who he defeated to get the Republican nomination. LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Right. And there's a huge question looming right now, Boris, and that is whether or not Jim Jordan is going to get behind Steve Scalise or not, as there are many of his allies who have already said that right now they want to stand by Jim Jordan on the floor of the House if they were to come up for a vote. And I want to read you a tweet from Thomas Massey. He just tweeted, quote, surprises are for little kids at birthday parties, not Congress. So, I let Scalise know in person that he doesn't have my vote on the floor because he has not articulated a viable plan for avoiding an omnibus.

I just want to rewind a little bit back in the room behind me. The House Republican Conference voted to nominate Steve Scalise by a simple majority. That vote was 111 to 99. But that is a far cry from the 217 votes that Steve Scalise will actually need on the floor. So that is what we are watching very closely right now. How does Steve Scalise begin to try to lock up that support? And obviously, Jim Jordan is a big factor here into whether or not he can do that quickly.

SANCHEZ: Lauren Fox live from Capitol Hill. Let's go to Manu Raju, who is also there for us. Manu, you've been trying to catch lawmakers as they've been walking through the halls. What's the latest you're hearing?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEFT CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, we do. We are still uncertain about when the exact timing of that floor vote is going to be to elect the next Speaker of the House. And we're also uncertain about whether or not Steve Scalise can actually get the votes. As you heard Lauren just say, Thomas Massey being one of those members who is still not certain about whether to get behind Scalise. And one member also told me that Scalise will vote for him.

[14:20:09]

SANCHEZ: Manu, we're actually going to interrupt you because Secretary of State Antony Blinken is now giving remarks in Israel. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: On behalf of the American people, and that is that the United States has Israel's back. We have the back of the Israeli people. We have their back today. We'll have it tomorrow. We will have it every day. We stand resolutely against terrorism. We've seen the almost indescribable acts committed by Hamas against Israeli men, women and children. Every day we're learning more. And it is simply heartbreaking.

Not since ISIS have we seen this kind of depravity. And we will continue to stand very resolutely against it. When I'm in Israel, I'll have the opportunity to meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Herzog, other senior officials. I look forward to seeing our embassy teams as well that's been doing terrific work during these difficult days. We're determined to make sure that Israel gets everything it needs to defend itself, to provide for the security of its people. Already significant military assistance requested by Israel is on the

way. That's on top of everything that we've been doing for years, including with the Memorandum of Understanding that was negotiated by President Obama to make sure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself. At the same time, we anticipate there'll be further needs, further requests. We've already been working closely with Congress on this, and we look forward to continuing to do that to make sure that Israel has what it needs.

Second, we will be reiterating, reaffirming the very strong message that President Biden has delivered to any country or any party that might try to take advantage of this situation. And that message is don't. The President has deployed, as you know, the world's largest aircraft carrier group to the region to make very clear our intent to deter anyone contemplating any further aggression against Israel.

Finally, we're of course very focused on our own people, our own citizens. We lost 22 Americans. That number could still go up, and it probably will. At the same time, we have a number of Americans who remain unaccounted. We are working very closely with the government of Israel to determine their whereabouts, and if they have been taken hostage by Hamas, to work to secure their release. So, all of these things are on the agenda over the next day or so with Israel, but the main point is this. We stand with Israel. We'll continue to do so.

UNKNOWN: Thank you. Mr. Secretary, yesterday Jake Sullivan said that U.S. officials were talking to the Israelis about getting civilian safe passage through Gaza into Egypt. Today, John Kirby said they're still talking to officials about this. What is the holdup? What's the obstacle to getting civilian safe passage out of Gaza?

BLINKEN: John, we are talking about that, and we're talking to Israel about that. We're talking to Egypt about that. It's an ongoing conversation. I can't get into the details. Some of this is, needless to say, and understandably complicated, but we want to make sure to the best of our ability, and I know Israel wants to make sure to the best of its ability that civilians are not harmed, but Israel has to take steps to defend itself. It has to make sure that any ongoing threat is dealt with, and I believe it has to make sure that going forward, what happened doesn't happen again.

UNKNOWN: Is the issue more on the Israeli side or the Egypt side?

BLINKEN: I'm not going to get into the details, but it's an ongoing conversation.

UNKNOWN: Following up on that, in conversations between the U.S. and Israel, has the U.S. advocated any degree of restraint in terms of possible ground operations in Gaza, either for the sake of the civilians there or for the sake of hostages there?

BLINKEN: Well, again, I'm not getting into any of the operational details of what Israel may or may not do. I think you heard the President speak to this yesterday in his very, very strong and forceful comments. And, of course, what separates Israel, the United States, and other democracies when it comes to incredibly difficult situations like this is our respect for international law and, as appropriate, the laws of war. We do everything we can to make sure that in these situations we avoid civilian casualties. That is in direct contrast with Hamas, which uses people as human shields. It actually seeks to put Palestinian civilians in situations where they could be harmed. This is very much part of their game plan.

[14:25:49]

This is very much part of their game plan. So, we know that Israel will take all of the precautions that it can, just as we would. And again, that's what separates us from Hamas and terrorist groups that engage in the most heinous kind of activities. Thank you.

UNKNOWN: Thank you.

BLINKEN: We'll have a chance to talk later. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: That was Secretary of State Antony Blinken at Joint Base Andrews as he departs for Israel. A number of notable comments from the Secretary of State reiterating the United States' continued support of Israel. He talked about the almost indescribable acts that were committed by Hamas and notably the Secretary of State reiterating something the president said yesterday, noting that any party or state that would seek to exploit the situation in Israel should stay away. He talked about carrier groups by the United States being put into the region. Clearly a tacit message to not only Hezbollah and Lebanon, but Iran as well.

He did talk about determining the number of Americans who were still missing and perhaps being held hostage by Hamas. And he talked about working closely with Congress to provide aid for Israel. We'll of course keep monitoring the Secretary of State's trip. But on that last note about providing aid to Israel from Congress, a lot of breaking news on Capitol Hill. We want to get straight to Manu Raju. Manu, there were some questions about whether we would see a vote on the House floor today, potentially to confirm Steve Scalise as the 56th Speaker of the House. But that vote we've learned is not happening today. And also, we've learned that he will likely get support from his rival in the nomination process, the congressman from Ohio, Jim Jordan.

RAJU: Yeah, that's right. We are not expecting the House to vote this afternoon. This coming from a source who told our colleague Melanie Zanona that the House will actually come in at 3 p.m. this afternoon and recess for the day. And we do expect that Congressman Jim Jordan, who has been coy about whether or not he would actually support Steve Scalise after they battled it out behind closed doors and he lost the nominating contest to Scalise. Well, he plans to nominate Scalise on the floor of the House to be the next speaker.

This is a welcome news for Scalise, undoubtedly, because he will need Jordan support, the backing of Jordan allies in order to get over the finish line. But that doesn't mean that he will have the votes to be elected. In fact, there are a number of members who are simply not there. Some of them are saying that they will potentially vote for another candidate altogether on the floor or they want to hear more from Scalise, want to have meetings from him asking for potential deals, potential concessions, things that we saw Kevin McCarthy have to do to win the ballot after win the speakership after 15 ballots back in January.

And in a very in a warning sign to Scalise, one Republican member told me that Scalise will, quote, never be elected speaker. That was the words of this one Republican member. We'll see if that's actually comes out to be true. But a sign of the challenges that the speaker nominee Scalise faces here because of the same issues that Kevin McCarthy faced, a narrowly divided Republican majority where any five members can scuttle your plans and can push you out of the speakership. Now, Scalise will have to figure out behind the scenes how to appease those critics, what deals to make with them in order to get the votes to be elected speaker, because until that point, nothing will get done in this house.

It will remain paralyzed as it has been since the ouster of Kevin McCarthy last week until they elect another speaker. No aid to Israel, which the president has called for as soon as next week. No aid to Ukraine, which has been stalled for some time and no action towards avoiding a government shutdown by mid-November. All key issues Republicans say they want to start to tackle. But without a speaker, nothing can be done. Scalise will have to get the votes. Can he get there? Huge questions ahead for us. Boris.

SANCHEZ: And they will not be answered today. Again, the news, no vote coming on the confirmation of a house speaker later today and the potential for Jim Jordan to endorse Scalise as speaker as well. Manu Raju, please stand by. Keep us posted with what you learn. Let's expand the conversation now with CNN's Dana Bash, Jamie Gangil and Jeff Zeleny. Dana, what does it say to you that there is not going to be a vote today?

DANA BASH, CNN HOST: He doesn't have the votes. I mean, he doesn't have them. When you get the votes, you go and you take them. And we were asking and Manu was asking our entire Hill team. We're trying to figure out whether or not, even in the face of not actually having 217 locked up, he would try to push the vote and make it happen on the floor. And very clearly, the way that the leadership inside the Republican Conference right now is seeing this is as a situation where they don't want to have the spectacle. Manu just said this. They don't want the spectacle that we had in January, where McCarthy just did it on the House floor and we had 15 rounds, particularly not just because it would be an illustration.