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Parents Protecting Their Son from Hamas Fire Were Killed; Interview with Sister and Brother-In-Law Killed in Hamas Attack Bar Yuval-Shani; Israeli Shelling Near South Lebanon Border; Israeli Tanks Moving Closer to the Gaza Border; Blinken Will Soon Speak After Meeting with Qatari Authorities; Interview with Former Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired October 13, 2023 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:00]

BAR YUVAL-SHANI, SISTER, BROTHER-IN-LAW KILLED IN HAMAS ATTACK: And the whole family really banded together, we -- from the north to the south of Israel, everybody on the WhatsApp. My brother who is on the job in London, we have a fantastic family, as you said, among us. And I'm not going to mention everybody. Our -- a paramedic, two other social workers trained in trauma, two other daughters together with me a former IDF officer who is now a professor of neurobiology and many, many other more capable people. And we used the time to try to help Rotem through it. But it was terrifying. It was terribly, terribly painful.

We had to attend to making sure that his helplessness and his hopelessness were refrained into something that he was actually doing that was helpful so that we could say, your mission now is to protect yourself and you are doing a great job. And he was. And your mission is to keep us on the phone, keep communicating with us, and make sure that we have the locations so that we can get help to you. That you're in touch with other people. When he said, I can't wait anymore, it was to say, waiting, and I can't do anything. I can't wait anymore. He was losing hope at that point and I was afraid he was going to stand up.

You know, this -- guy who never sits still for a minute, it had been many, many hours. He couldn't stay anymore in this situation. We had to find a way to say, well, waiting is actually doing something. This is doing something. And break down the helplessness, and break down what was that made him feel that he could not do more, so that we could address that. We got a doctor on the phone with us. When he sent a few voice messages, we were -- she was able to listen to his breathing and ascertain what his condition was.

We've sent a picture of himself. She had him checked himself for wounds. And so, we could tell him, you know, you have got to hide. How to stop the blood. Cover your mouth. He was afraid to cough, he didn't cough, but he was afraid he would be found. And in fact, the terrorists did come back three times to make sure that they finished off what they had started.

Yes, so we had to take care of all channels, you know. Mental, emotion, physical -- KATE BOLDUAN, CNN NEWS CENTRAL CO-ANCHOR: You mean all.

YUVAL-SHANI: -- spiritual.

BOLDUAN: And you just -- and you mentioned helping getting him through it for moment to moment. It's -- and those moments are not over for you, for Rotem, for the family. I mean, coming together --

YUVAL-SHANI: No.

BOLDUAN: -- is -- I mean, for the State of Israel, for everyone who's going to need to come together in these moments. Bar, thank you for coming on to speak with me.

YUVAL-SHANI: May I say something else, please.

BOLDUAN: Yes.

YUVAL-SHANI: It's not just for us and for our country, it's for the entire free world. And it is crucial that people not get politically correct about this. There is nothing political and there is nothing correct about massacring, about making a pogrom and massacring elderly, babies, children, mothers, fathers while they laugh. They took pleasure in this. There is not -- it wasn't just killing. They took pleasure.

They laughed as they murdered my sister and my brother-in-law and tried to murder my brother. And we hear these stories from everybody we know. They laughed. They destroyed the house. They put -- they threw grenades and set fires to the houses, to the cars, to everything in sight while they had music on. There is nothing political about this. Thank you.

BOLDUAN: Bar Yuval-Shani, thank you.

YUVAL-SHANI: We need your help getting the hostages out as well.

BOLDUAN: Thank you, Bar.

YUVAL-SHANI: This is not political.

BOLDUAN: Thank you, Bar.

YUVAL-SHANI: This is hate. It's evil. Thank you.

BOLDUAN: Thank you so much.

John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN NEWS CENTRAL CO-ANCHOR: All right. So much pain.

All right. You're looking at pictures now. What you're looking at is a breaking situation, that is the smoke from what we are told is artillery fire from Northern Israel, you can hear some of the blasts there, into Southern Lebanon. All right. Those are the pictures now.

[10:35:00]

Now, let me show you on the map what we're looking at right now. This is the border between Israel and Lebanon, let's go to Southern Lebanon, our Ben Wedeman is standing by there.

Ben, give us a sense of what you are seeing and hearing.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John, in the last few minutes, we heard several large explosions in the mid- distance. Right behind me, what you're seeing is the mountain, on one half of it is Lebanon, the other is Israel, and right below me is the Israeli community of Metula. Now, we heard -- this is a town that's been under -- it's a closed military area for the last few hours.

But as I said, in the last few minutes, we heard several large explosions in the distance. That, in addition to what is going on to the west of here nearer to the Mediterranean along the border where we understand, according to the Lebanese news -- the official Lebanese agency, several rockets were fired in the direction of Israel. They were intercepted by the Iron Dome system. The Israelis later apparently targeted, according to the Lebanese news agency, an army observation point. And we understand that there are ongoing exchanges in that area as well.

Now, this is sort of a change from the pace during the rest of the day. Earlier in the day, it was relatively quiet. In fact, the assumption was that perhaps the worst had passed here. I just heard another explosion. I don't know if you heard that as well. And another one. So, it does appear that things are picking up. I could hear the impact of that one in this direction. There are Lebanese soldiers here observing what's going on.

OK. I'm just going to step out of the way, if you look at the top of that hill, there is a plume of smoke. I believe, but I'm not certain that on that side of the hill is Lebanon. But I can't say with absolute certainty. So, yes, this just began a few minutes ago. We don't know the reason, the cause but certainly the tensions here are extremely high.

Hezbollah, the main, sort of, military force in this area in addition to the Lebanese army has by and large been relatively restrained during -- since the outbreak of fighting in the -- in Gaza. Yes, I can hear another impact. So, yes, you can see those smoke on the top of the hill. It appears multiple impacts up there. What I think that I am hearing is outgoing fire and then moments later, you will hear the impact. There it is right there. John.

BERMAN: Yes, we hear the thuds. We hear the thuds, Ben. And if you can explain, and you know this region so well. We've been so focused on Gaza to the south, if you're looking at the map of Israel. You are, of course, on the northern border between Israel and Lebanon, and the concern there from the Israeli perspective -- we just saw a flash on that hill. I did a moment ago. The concern --

WEDEMAN: Yes, maybe I should step out of the way. Yes. BERMAN: The concern for Israel in terms of what happens in Lebanon is not so much the Lebanese government per se, but it is Hezbollah. Why are they so concerned about what Hezbollah might do and what kind of lines has Hezbollah public drawn? It said, this is one. We'll get involved in this.

WEDEMAN: Well, obviously, John, the Israelis are concerned by the fact that Hezbollah -- and I'm just going to pop into the car and get my flak jacket on while I'm talking to you. The Israelis are concerned that if Hezbollah becomes involved, it is a formidable military organization. It made so -- excuse me, with the help of Iran. And we saw even back in 2006 that Hezbollah was essentially able to fight the Israelis to a standstill. Since then, their capabilities have only improved. Their weaponry has only improved. They have lots of experience in house to house, street to street warfare from Syria.

And therefore, if they become involved, it's a whole different situation than what you have in Gaza, far greater. Yes, I see another impact up there. Now, Hezbollah has, sort of, said that if Israel attacks Lebanon, it will become fully involved. Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah has always made it clear that his Hezbollah will decide the time and place where it will engage in -- with Israel. And that it -- he will not -- that Hezbollah will not be drawn into a war of not of its choosing.

So, basically it does appear that, at least until now, I should stress, that Hezbollah has been hesitant to become involved in this war. Now, this could be simply a passing incident, not necessarily a beginning of something.

[10:40:00]

But it certainly does represent something of a deterioration. John.

BERMAN: An exchange of fire to be sure there. We can see the smoke rising above the hill behind you, Ben. You're back in frame. Now, the smoke rising above the hill. We did see a small flash there. And to be clear, that smoke rising behind you is Lebanon. Those are the impact zones, at this point where things are landing, that is inside Lebanon, you believe?

WEDEMAN: I do believe so, yes. I sort of haven't had a chance to check my coordinates exactly, but I do believe that is Lebanon.

BERMAN: All right. Ben, we do appreciate you being there. Being witnessed to this. Be safe, and please do keep us posted because these developments are so crucial to see if it does escalate even more.

All right. Ben Wedeman up here on the board between Israel and Lebanon. We're going to down here now to Gaza. I can show you that situation there our Erin Burnett is in Southern Israel, not far, this is the border. This is Gaza right here. This is Egypt here. She's not far from Gaza. She's not far from Egypt. In this region here. Erin, what are you seeing now?

ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR: All right. So, we're just over a ridge from a major staging area for an Israeli tank battalion, John. And basically, they -- this particular tank battalion, they were in on Saturday right after the attack, amongst the first to go in Saturday afternoon. And they're now staging, resupplying, and they say they are ready. And that's really what we have seen because we have been spending time going up and down along this Gaza border.

Right now, we are about 3 miles away from Gaza border itself. And as you and Kate have been saying, we're 10 about or so miles from the Egyptian border. So, right here along the south, where there has been massive staging of the Israeli forces. And, you know, when you hear that going by, those are all military vehicles.

I will say, they're also though bussing in troops on buses, literally coaches. So, if you saying 50 or so of those just even in the past bit, we've seen about 250 troops just coming in. It's just a constant flow in, and if we're going to think that they've been saying that they have 300,000 or 350,000 troops already at this border where we are, they have just been adding in constantly throughout the day. Constantly throughout the day and we have seen a higher state of readiness, not just with the tank battalion that we're looking out here, but also with the troops coming in, wearing their helmets, wearing their protective equipment.

They are ready and there's a state of readiness. And obviously what that exactly means, we can't tell you in terms of how imminent any action might be, but we have seen that shift between today and the past few days. And we continue to hear the outgoing artillery fire followed by those thuds of explosions. In this case, in Gaza, similar to what of course Ben was just showing you live as that artillery was coming into Southern Lebanon.

BERMAN: Hey, Erin, stay with us. I want to give people a sense of the distances we're talking about right now. In red on this map, that is the outline of the space that Gaza would be, that's Gaza. And this is superimposed here on New York City here. And the reason I just want to show people this is so they can see how small of a space we are talking about. This would be the entire island of Manhattan. So, Gaza, you know, twice the length, Maybe, of Manhattan, and that's it.

So, that when we put Gaza up on this map here, and I'll do that again, you know, the distance from end-to-end here is eight miles. This is 25 miles, and the entire length where you are operating is only 38 miles, 36 to 38 miles or so. So, these aren't big distances, not a lot of space, and they're putting a lot of fire power in a small space, Erin.

BURNETT: It's such an important point, and that's how when I say we've been able to go from top-to-bottom, that's how we're able to do it because the spaces are so small. But it's also, John, the context you point, they had said overnight, right, 350,000 or 360,000 troops we amassed along the Gaza border. So, you are talking about just a couple dozen miles, and that is how many troops are there. That is more than double the number of troops that Putin amassed along the Ukrainian border ahead of the invasion. Just think about that, right?

You're talking about incredible amount of fire power. The context though is of course what we're seeing is some of these are battle hardened troops. We have seen special forces units, for example, coming in and out. And then we've also seen reservist. And obviously, there's a very different level of preparation. Some of those reservists may have, you know, they just -- they do training for a few weeks a year, right? They're not at the same level of battle readiness of some of those forward troops. So, there's a real difference. But they are all amassing along the border.

And as the strikes are continuing, right, the Israeli Air Force has said that they have had more strikes in the past six days than they did in the entire conflict 2014. So, that -- we've seen that continual ramp up, and the artillery fire that we have heard up and down the border. And the Hamas rockets coming in and we've all experienced that. I mean, at one point, we had 50 or 60 of them happen to be on top of where we were, not right now but where we were. Hamas is using its outgoing firepower as well.

[10:45:00]

BERMAN: All right. Erin Burnett, again, really going back and forth along the Gaza-Israel border to some 35 miles plus or so. You can see how tight the spaces are there. It's a really important perspective. Keep us posted as to what more you are seeing there.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: All right. We have pictures from moments ago of Secretary of State Tony Blinken. We're going to show you. He's expected also to speak in minutes from now after he's continuing his meetings with leaders throughout the Middle East, and Qatar right now. Stay with us, we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:50:00]

BERMAN: All right. Very shortly, we're expecting to hear from the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken who is meeting with the prime minister of Qatar right now. You're looking at pictures there of Blinken in Doha meeting with the Qatari leaders. He is pushing them to get involved to pressure Hamas. We've heard people say that actually some of the leaders, the political leaders of Hamas live in Doha, live in Qatar. Qatar has influence over Hamas, and the U.S. wants Qatar's help in releasing, trying to get released to some 100 plus hostages there.

You can see them sitting down to begin that meeting. This is a whirlwind trip for the U.S. secretary of state. Earlier today -- you know what, we're going to take a quick break from that. We want to go right back to Erin Burnett who is seeing more Israeli troop movement. Erin.

BURNETT: I don't know how long you're going to want to take this but I'll tell you what we saw. (INAUDIBLE) have been in there, Merkava Israeli tanks, there's another one that's going to come here. All these guys are basically restaging and getting ready to go in. And we have seen today along the border checkpoint, a much, I would say, higher state of readiness than we've observed over the past few days.

I'm going to move from this one just a little bit. OK. All right. I mean, it gives you a sense of the terrain here. And John and Kate, I'll tell you right now, we're a few miles from the Gaza border. We've been all the way up and along this border, watching the state of readiness that you obviously can see right here. We're also about 10 or so miles from the Egyptian border down here. So, we've been all the way up and down that Gaza border and seen the readiness.

Today, sort of, mix of, obviously, full troops like you can see in these tank battalion, also reservists coming in who are getting ready to go in. And I wouldn't say a higher state of readiness even at checkpoints, John and Kate, you know, helmets on, bulletproof vests on. They are ready to go. I had a chance to speak to one member of the IDF, actually he was from Long Island. He had grown up there. He's been here the past four years. And he had been part of collecting bodies from one of the kibbutz just a few miles from where we are. And, you know, I --

BERMAN: Erin's shot just went down there. Again, just to give you a sense of where she is, that's the border between Gaza and Egypt, Israel and Egypt. This is the border between Gaza and Israel. Erin, down here watching Israeli troops move up and down this 36-mile border between Gaza and Israel. She's been up and down that border all day, and she's much greater activity than she has seen in recent days. The Israeli troops seemed to be positioning for what could be the ultimate ground offensive into Gaza.

We'll get back to Erin when she gets her shot back up. In the meantime, we were just talking about Qatar right here, that is where the U.S. secretary of state is right now. He began the day here in Jordan where he met with the king of Jordan, as well as the Palestinian authority president, down to Qatar. He's going to Bahrain later, and then ultimately will end up in Saudi Arabia. A whirlwind day of diplomacy for the U.S. secretary of State.

Let's get to Alex Marquardt right now to get a sense of what the secretary wants to accomplish with this diplomacy today, Alex.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, we just found out about Bahrain. We -- this really speaks to how fluid this situation is, how critical it is because the secretary of state keeps adding stops. As you know well, when they plan trips, they usually do it long in advance, you know, very well what's going to happen, where he's going to be on a certain day. That is not at all the case when it came to this trip where we learned earlier this week that he would be going to Israel and Jordan, and they've been tacking on all these different stops.

So, he's in Qatar right now. We're expecting to hear from him and the Qatari foreign minister in just under 40 minutes times. The focus with Qatar, and each one of these countries really has a different focus in terms of what they can bring to the table to help America achieve some of its objectives. The Qataris, as you noted, they have been hosting senior leaders of Hamas for a year. So, they are a direct conduit to Hamas when it comes specifically to the hostages. We've reported several days ago that the Qataris had reached out to Hamas about the hostages. We don't know how effective that outreach has been, how successful that outreach has been.

John, there are -- the U.S. is in a pretty precarious position right now where they are trying to and are very vocally expressing the support for Israel, and what they are about to do in terms of retaliation against Hamas. But also, at the same time expressing a significant level of concern about what is going to happen next, and specifically what is going to happen to the Palestinians who are in Gaza. Where they can go. Whether there are safe areas that can be setup within Gaza for those Palestinians to go to.

[10:55:00]

Remember, we've heard this evacuation order from the Israelis today. Calling on everybody in Northern Gaza to flow to Southern Gaza, that's over 1 million people. It's something that the White House has called a tall order. Something that U.N. has called horrendous. And then there are questions, and this is why Blinken will be going to Egypt is whether a humanitarian corridor can be set up so that those Palestinians can go into Egypt, exactly where you are -- you're pointing to on that map with Erin where she is.

BERMAN: Yes, again, you know, it's -- the Rafah Crossing right here is the only way out south for people inside Gaza. That has been closed. That is closed. And of course, if the secretary is going to Egypt, perhaps he may be working on some way to get at least aid in if not the people out. But a whirlwind trip, and as you point out, Alex, everywhere he's going from Qatar, to Bahrain, to Saudi Arabia, to Egypt, earlier to Jordan, maybe something different from each location that he is after. Very good report there, Alex. Thank you so much.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Let's talk more about exactly this. Joining me right now is Michael Oren, the Former Israeli Ambassador to the United States. Ambassador, it's good to see you again. Thanks for taking a moment to speak with us. Talk to me about all of these diplomatic --

MICHAEL OREN, FORMER ISRAELI AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED STATES: Hi, Kate.

BOLDUAN: -- moves that we're seeing, especially Blinken in Qatar right now. What role -- how big of a role, do you think, Qatar can, should, and will play especially when we're talking about the hostages?

OREN: Yes, good to be with you, Kate. I'm just listening to CNN and hearing these -- the accounts made by people who escaped Hamas terror, those who love -- lost loved ones to Hamas barbarism. And it's difficult to make that switch to talk about from crystal (ph) pain to a strategic thinking. I'll do my best, how's that?

Qatar plays a very problematic role in the Middle East. They tried to play both sides. When I was an Ambassador of Washington, I had a very nice relationship with my Qatari counterpart. But Qatar was also supporting terror around the world, certainly supporting Hamas terror, and at odds with some of the -- our future friends in the Gulf region, the Saudis and the Emiratis.

So, I'd be very, very careful with dealing with the Qataris. And during the 2014 operation against Gaza, Secretary of State John Kerry tried to bring the Qataris into the mediation and Egypt and Israel and our other allies in the Middle East sort of turned him away. We didn't want to deal with the Qataris. They were part of the problem, not part of the solution.

I don't know specifically what Secretary Blinken is doing in Qatar. I suspect it has to do with releasing American hostages that are held by Hamas, and hoping that Qatar can bring its influence to bear on Hamas leaders in securing that release. I do not believe that Israel is interested in having Qatar meeting -- mediating any simpler way here.

We have used -- with that, we have allowed the Qataris to infuse the Hamas with cash. And here we get into very murky waters, Kate. We've gone through five rounds of fighting with Hamas, and each one ends pretty much the same way. They shoot thousands of rockets at us. We bomb them from the air for the most part. And at the end of the day, the Egyptians come in and mediate some type of ceasefire.

And basically, I hate to say this in a more -- in a less crass manner, we sort of pay off Hamas. We let them -- workers come in to Israel, about 20,000 Gazan workers were coming in every day in the hope that that would give Hamas something to lose. And we let the Qataris infuse Hamas with huge amounts of cash. Huge amounts of cash. A payoff.

It didn't work. Hamas wasn't interested in the workers. It doesn't care about the people of Gaza, and so it doesn't care about money. It cares about money only for one purpose and that's to buy weaponry. It didn't work. So, what now would be the role of Qatar in negotiations with us? I don't think there is one, but I understand why Secretary of State Blinken might be there in order to secure the release of those hostages.

BOLDUAN: Yes, I mean, talk about complicated and -- complicated is -- there is no word for how complicated and challenging the next steps really are going to be. You talked about the challenge and we've seen this over and over in our conversations with folks and -- since Saturday. And seeing it even just earlier this hour when I spoke with a woman, Bar Yuval-Shani, separating the kind of looking forward and the -- as you were saying, kind of, the personal -- I don't know, the personal and the practical if you will. And it's personal for you as well, ambassador.

OREN: Yes, it's very personal. We all know people who have been killed, people who have been captured, people who have been tortured, who have lost loved ones. Earlier today, the two sons the rabbi who buried -- who married my daughter and my son-in-law, both those sons were buried today, Kate. They were both reserve officers. They're married with children. As soon as they heard there was fighting, they put on their uniforms, they went down south, they did not come back.