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Israeli Government Meets on Hostage Deal; Bartak Ravid is Interviewed about a Possible Hostage Deal; 55 Million Traveling this Thanksgiving. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired November 21, 2023 - 09:00   ET

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

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[09:00:16]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: A deal to free a significant number of hostages held by Hamas terrorists could come as soon as today. That's the latest word from multiple sources. We have the new reporting on the contours of what that deal could look like.

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN ANCHOR: And Elon Musk, CEO of Twitter, now X, is suing after a report highlighting anti-Semitic content on the site sparked a devastating advertiser exodus.

BOLDUAN: This Thanksgiving could be some of the busiest travel days in years. And now, unfortunately, a severe storm system could be coming at the worst possible time. What you need to know, coming up.

I'm Kate Baldwin, with Omar Jimenez. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

It is very close. That is the word from a U.S. official to CNN. And the word also now from two Israeli sources. A hostage deal could be announced as soon as today. There seems to be a lot of moving parts and a lot of things happening at one in this moment. This is the latest on the urgent and painstaking work to get 50 of the 200 plus hostages released. Innocent civilians who were kidnapped on October 7th by Hamas terrorists and have now been held in Gaza for some 46 days.

Here's what John Kirby said from the White House about all this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KIRBY, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL SPOKESMAN: Obviously we are laser focused on the American citizens that we know are being held hostage and we want them out. All of them. Everybody should be out now. But here we are in a negotiation and we're getting closer to the end, we believe, of that negotiation. So, again, I'm - I'm going to be careful.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: So, the Israeli prime minister's office just announced that the Israeli war cabinet will meet this morning in about two hours about the negotiations. Overnight, the political chief for Hamas claimed that they are, in their words, close to reaching a truce agreement with Israel, however much weight you want to put on anything a Hamas leader says.

Let's start at the White House right now. MJ Lee is standing by with new reporting.

MJ, what's the latest you're hearing?

MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kate, a deal is very close. We are told by sources that an announcement on a deal is on the cusp of being made, and that Hamas would release 50 hostages, women and children, that they are holding in Gaza, in exchange for four to five days of a pause in fighting and that three Palestinian prisoners would be exchanged for every hostage that is released. We are also told that during the pause Hamas would stop flying surveillance drones over northern Gaza for at least six hours a day. And the hostages, we are told, are of various nationalities. U.S. officials are hope that one of the 50 hostages that are initially released will be three-year-old Abigail Edan. She is the youngest- known American hostages whose parents were killed by Hamas. Again, officials are hopeful that she will be among the hostages released.

And Hamas is going to gather up, the idea is, additional hostages, women and children, during the period of four to five days that the fighting is paused. And if they are successfully able to do so, that pause could be extended for a period of time.

Now, as we have been reporting, Hamas has insisted that hundreds of aid -- trucks of aid will be able to go into Gaza. This, of course, has been very contentious because a big part of what they are looking for is fuel. Fuel which is used for its military operations, like ventilating its underground tunnels. So, we will have to see when and if the deal is announced, where things stand in terms of the number of trucks that are able to go in. U.S. officials, of course, and others have been pushing for as much humanitarian aid to go into Gaza as possible. But again, Kate, we've been reporting on these negotiations for a number of weeks. But this morning we are sensing really a different level of optimism with sources saying that this is a deal that could be announced as early as today.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Yes, and the distinction and overarching question is with -- they want as much in humanitarian aid going in as possible, but want it to go to the civilians in Gaza, not to get into the hands of Hamas. Of course that remains part of this. All of this.

Great to see you, MJ. Thank you so much.

JIMENEZ: And the news of this expected deal comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces growing anger and pressure from the hostages' families. Those frustrated relatives clashed with far right officials in the country's parliament last night as they demanded the government do more to bring their loved ones home.

Oren Liebermann is in Tel Aviv for us, Becky Anderson is live in Doha.

So, Oren, I want to start with you.

Israel's war cabinet expected to meet soon on this deal. What more are you learning? What are we expecting from these meetings?

[09:05:03]

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There is a process in place until Israeli law for what it takes to approve a deal like this and for it to approve the release of Palestinians prisoners from Israeli jails. And from what we're seeing here, from a statement from the prime minister's office, that process set to begin here in just a couple of hours.

It is 4:00 p.m. local time. The war cabinet here, which is a very tight-knit circle around Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a small circle, will meet at 6:00 p.m. to discuss an issue. And I'll quote their wording here, "in light of developments on the issue of the release of hostages."

Then shortly after that, the security cabinet will meet an hour later, at 7:00 p.m. local time. And then the full government at 8:00 this evening.

We would expect Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would, at some point, make a statement, making clear what this is all about. But given the topic, given the issue - given what we're seeing in the schedule and given what we're hearing from multiple officials on the U.S. side and on the Israeli side, this could be the beginning of the process to release Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Israeli hostages held in Gaza.

As MJ said, the first tranche would be 50 - 50 prisoners held by Hamas, women and children. And it's worth noting that that might include citizens from other countries as well who have been taken hostage, in addition to Israelis, in exchange for three times as many, so 150 Palestinian women and children, held in Israeli jails. If that works, there might be an extension of the pause in the fighting and a greater release of hostages held in Gaza, but that would take time. Hamas would have to round up other hostages who are not necessarily held only by Hamas, to see where they are, to find out where they have been, and to bring them out of Gaza.

Meanwhile, we had a chance to speak with the families of the hostages who are frustrated that they only, last night, had their first meeting with the war cabinet. They have demanded answers. And, crucially, they have demanded that the number one priority for the war cabinet is securing the release of the hostages

One man we spoke with who was in that meeting said there was quite a bit of anger when the government wouldn't acknowledge that the war cabinet wouldn't say that issue was number one. Instead they said it is on equal footing with the defeat of Hamas. That is absolutely not what those families want to here, even if an announcement on the release of some of the hostages is imminent. JIMENEZ: And even with this announcement, obviously there are still

delicate procedures to play out. It's expected at this point. And I can imagine, as we look at multiple parties, not just in Israel, not just on the Hamas side, not just on the United States side but in Qatar as well, everybody is trying to make sure that this actually goes -- basically moves through to fruition.

And that's why we have CNN's Becky Anderson with us now from Doha.

So, Becky, can you explain to us what Qatar's involvement is here, and what more are you learning on that end?

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN ANCHOR: Well, Qatar has been involved mediating they talks now for weeks. Of course, Israel and Hamas not in direct communication, Hamas has its political office set up here in consultation with the U.S. That office was set up in 2012, and has been in constant touch with Hamas over those years, and therefore is in a position to mediate these talks. So, the mediators here in Qatar have been working at this day and night. It has been really complicated and really difficult. And at times when I've spoken to mediators here, and to the spokesmen of the ministry of foreign affairs, they've said the fighting on the ground and the uptick in the fighting on the ground, particularly when Israel announced its second phase, its the ground invasion of Gaza, that made things a lot more difficult. And they appealed at times, and spoke to me about the fact that they needed -- these mediators needed a period of calm. Well, they didn't get it, and so these negotiations went on, in what was a very different atmosphere.

But a diplomatic source very familiar with the talks tells me now that Qatar hopes to announce tonight, in the next couple of hours -- some hours from now, let me - let me put it that way -- that a deal has been announced. So, it's 5:00 in the evening here. You've heard from Oren, the information he has on the scheduling off that war cabinet. So, this is all sort of coming together and this aligns. And this would be to support what Oren was just saying, the release of what is seen to be or hoped to be the first tranche of civilian hostages.

Let's be quite clear about this, and in defense of what the hostage families in Israel have been saying and are very angry about, this is not all the hostages being held. There are soldiers being held. There are civilians of serving age being held. We are very specifically, as we understand it, looking at women, children and possibly the elderly, included in what is this first tranche of 50, it is hoped, will be a number of foreigners.

[09:10:06]

And, of course, the Americans will be hoping that includes Americans.

But as we know, there are other foreigners as well, missing, presumed to be being held hostage. And this has been the problem in all of this, presumed to be -- missing, presumed to be being held hostage. It's not actually clear exactly how many people are being held hostage and by whom. But it does appear that Hamas has around 100, that includes Thais, Dutch, possibly people from the U.K., for example, included in those foreign numbers, but also some American hostages.

So, the deal, as we understand it, hopefully to be announced in the next coming hours from these Qatar mediators is 50 in the first tranche over a four-day pause period. A pause in both ground and air operations by the Israelis, allowing for the first tranche, 50 hostages, and that will come at -- those will come in groups, as we understand it. And this won't be until possibly as early as tomorrow morning. But that's as things stand at present.

As I say, the mediators here, they spoke on the record today from the ministry of foreign affairs, have said this has been extremely complicated. This is not a done deal until it's a done deal. But the hopes are very high that we can get an announcement at some point today.

JIMENEZ: And if it becomes a done deal, it would be the most significant breakthrough we've seen.

ANDERSON: Correct.

JIMENEZ: Becky Anderson, Oren Liebermann, thank you so much.

BOLDUAN: Joining us now to talk more about this is Barak Ravid, the foreign policy reporter with "Axios."

Barak, I just want to lean on what you're hearing from your sources right now. What's the very latest on this potential deal and if any timing that you're hearing right now?

BARAK RAVID, POLITICAL AND FOREIGN POLICY REPORTER, "AXIOS": Hi. Good morning.

I think that on 1:00 -- at 1:00 p.m. Eastern, 8:00 p.m. Israel time, the Israeli cabinets is going to approval this deal. Then we will have a period of between 24 to 48 hours where the lists of the Palestinian prisoners will be released from Israeli prisons will be published to the public so that people could appeal to court against their release. And after this period, I think we will see sometime during the weekend this deal starting to be implemented.

HARLOW: So this - that - that really - I mean your - and your sources are -- you've got some of the best sources around. This seems that it's - it's hard to say a deal is a done until it's announced, especially when dealing with something so horrifically sensitive as this. But it sounds like it's headed there barring some unforeseen left turn, something that really gets in the way of this?

RAVID: Yes, look, the deal is not done until all the hostages are out, OK.

HARLOW: Yes.

RAVID: And this will happen only sometime next week, OK. But at least at the point that we are in, I find it hard to believe that the deal will not be approved by the Israelis cabinet at 1:00 p.m. Eastern and 8:00 p.m. local time. It's -- I think this is where this thing is going.

BOLDUAN: I want to talk about some of the contours of what your -- CNN has reporting, you have reporting on this as well, of what could be includes in this deal. MJ Lee was talk - working through some of it.

In terms of the - you have a multi-day pause, and also as part of -- one thing that stuck out to me is some of the reporting around this is that during that pause Israel would stop flying surveillance drones over northern Gaza for at least six hours for each day. That really stuck out to me. Why does Hamas want this? Is it as obvious as it seems?

RAVID: Yes, I think what - first Hamas wanted Israel to stop flying drones and stop its aerial surveillance for the entire time of the pause. They got six hours a day. We'll have to see if this is really implemented in reality. But I think that what Hamas said, and I heard it from several Israeli officials, is that they said, you know, you want us to use the pause to go and look for other hostages. Again, Israeli officials think that Hamas knows exactly where those hostages are.

But Hamas says, you know, we don't want you to spy -- spy on us, and then seen where the hostages are, and then just go and get them yourselves and not as part of this deal. That was the Hamas argument. Again, we'll have to see how this thing is really implemented.

BOLDUAN: How much of a role are you hearing the pressure and frustration that the hostage families in Israel has played in this moving forward?

RAVID: Look, it's really, you know, it's quite tragic because within this group of more than 130 families, you have different - you will call it types of hostages. You have the women, the children. You have elderly. You have soldiers. And you have men who are not soldiers but were taken hostage, for example, from the music festival. So, each - each group is a bit different.

[09:15:01]

So, it's not like there are some parents who say, our son was in the military, we don't want you to go and release only the women and the children. We want you to bring our son back. And there are those - the family members of the women and children who say, no, no, no, no, bring the women and children back first. So, I think it's really tragic. And I -- you know, I don't envy any of those families. This is - this is a horrific tragedy.

BOLDUAN: If Hamas agrees to this deal, is that a statement of how much pressure that they're under from the IDF bombardment and operation, or does it say something about how much Hams could be benefiting from the - from the contours in the - in what is in this deal?

RAVID: I think it's the former. At the end of the day, what Hamas gets out of this deal is a breather. That's it. They get four days, maybe six days, maybe if they manage to bring a lot of other hostages and release them, maybe they get eight days. But they're not going to stop the war.

And what I hear from every Israeli official I spoke to in recent days, this is going to be a pause. This is not going to be a cease-fire.

And the Israeli military already approved plans for operations in southern Gaza, in Khan Younis, in Rafah, in areas that they did not operate so far. And I think that this is exactly where this thing will go right after this deal is implemented and right after the pause is over.

BOLDUAN: Real quick on that. I heard you say this morning that you're already hearing about a phase two?

RAVID: Yes. Well, so, this deal is about a four-day pause, but it's a four days plus two pause, meaning that if after those four days, if on day four Hamas comes and says, you know what, we have more hostages we are willing to release, then they can get another two days of pause, but they will have to release at least 20 hostages in those two days. If after those two days Hamas comes again and says, oh, you know what, I have another 20, they'll get another two days. But I don't think it's going to be much more than that.

And, honestly, I find it hard to believe -- I hope I'm wrong, but I find it hard to believe that we will see, in the immediate term, a phase two of this deal. I think that, for now, it will only be this 50.

BOLDUAN: Barak, thank you so much for jumping on. Your reporting on this continues to just be stellar. Thank you.

RAVID: Thank you.

BOLDUAN: We're going to continue following this all morning long. As you can tell, things are moving at a fast pace, and we're going to bring you all of those developments.

JIMENEZ: And we're continuing to follow some other headlines as well across the country here in the United States. The Thanksgiving travel rush has begun. And a number -- a record number of Americans could be on the move this week. But severe storms could create a holiday headache for travelers. So, we're tracking that.

Also, former President Trump hosted current House Speaker Mike Johnson at Mar-a-Lago last night. Why Johnson was there and what the two discussed.

And Elon Musk is suing after a report highlighting anti-Semitic content on X, formerly Twitter, sparked a major advertiser exodos.

Stay with us.

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[09:22:19]

BOLDUAN: Today kicks off one of the busiest weeks of travel of the year. And this time it could also be running right up against mother nature. From Alabama to New Jersey, a huge line of storms is threatening to disrupt Thanksgiving travel for tens of millions of people. AAA is predicting this will be the third busiest Thanksgiving travel period in over two decades.

Whitney Wild is standing by at Chicago's O'Hare Airport, a hub and stopover for so many people this Thanksgiving.

Whitney, what are you seeing there so far?

WHITNEY WILD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kate, it is very smooth here. We've seen some crowds, but the lines seem to be moving really quickly. Luckily, when you look across the country, compared with how bad it could be, O'Hare only has 16 delays, one cancellation so far. And nationwide, 250 delays, four cancellations. So certainly it could be worse, even though the weather system is here over the Chicagoland, even though it's been raining all morning.

We have spoken with several people who all had the same plain, hurry up and wait. Many of them leaving early, leaving lots of time, leaving at least two hours from the time they got to the airport to when their flight leaves because they were so concerned about crowds because people know that this is some of the busiest travel you'll see all year. Typically, Kate, Tuesday, Wednesday, Sunday, around Thanksgiving, are the busiest days surrounding that holiday. So, again, people leaving lots of time.

Here's one mom I spoke with who's headed to Orlando, talking us through her travel weekend.

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BRITTANY MEANS, MOM TAKING HER FAMILY TO DISNEY WORLD: So, we left with about an hour. So -- but I didn't know what to expect because travel here is always so crazy. So, yes.

WILD: You left plenty of time today?

MEANS: Yes. Yes. We -- we left with plenty of time. And we have Clear, so, we figured we'd be OK, but we just wanted to pad the time a little bit.

I'm feeling really positive. This is the first time that we've ever traveled for Thanksgiving. We had some family move to Orlando, so I'm excited.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILD: And she was traveling with two little boys. So, luckily, they had Clear so they could sail right through. But even if you didn't have it, and you came to O'Hare right now, Kate, the security lines are pretty thin. So, travel here looking very, very good. We're in a bit of a lull right now.

Again, this is a major travel weekend. AAA expecting 55 million travelers throughout this weekend. And then further, just here at O'Hare and Midway, which is the other airport on the other side of this city, in total they're expecting 1.65 million travelers. That represents a little bit of an uptick from the 2022 numbers, Kate.

BOLDUAN: I always say, when we can report good travel news, let's just stay there, stop there and hope for the best. So, we're going to stop.

It's good to see you, Whitney.

[09:25:00]

Thank you so much.

JIMENEZ: Coming up, House Speaker Mike Johnson went to Mar-a-Lago to talk with Donald Trump last night. What we know about their meeting.

Plus, a gag order on Donald Trump in one of the cases he's facing is in limbo right now. We'll tell you what a three-judge appeals panel is indicating it will do.

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BOLDUAN: House Speaker Mike Johns took a trip to Florida and met with Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago yesterday. That's according to a Republican source familiar with the meeting. It's not clear exactly what the pair talked about, but the timing sure is fun. It's just a week after Speaker Johnson publicly endorsed Donald Trump for president, making him the highest ranking Republican to do so, so far.

[09:30:04]

Alayna Treene is following this. she's got more on it for us. She joins us now.

Alayna, should people read this as Mike Johnson acknowledging that.