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Middle East Cease-Fire Fails; Migrants Sent Back to World's Murder Capital; Dangerous Journey North to the U.S.; Israel Resumes Attacks on Gaza Militants; Secret World of an Alleged Escort & Killer

Aired July 15, 2014 - 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, cease-fire. Or not.

OSAMA HAMDAN, HAMAS SPOKESMAN: It's close to be a joke.

COSTELLO: Secretary of State John Kerry postponing his trip to the region.

Plus, deported.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is the facility where all of the deportees are processed.

COSTELLO: Forty women and children out of America and back in Honduras, landing in one of the country's most dangerous cities.

FLORES: Why did she leave in the first place?

COSTELLO: Our Rosa Flores live from Honduras this morning.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How are you feeling, Tracy?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You look great.

TRACY MORGAN, COMEDIAN: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You look great, man.

COSTELLO: Tracy Morgan speaking out for the first time since that horrible accident.

MORGAN: I feel strong. And I love you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much.

COSTELLO: How long will his recovery be?

And drugged.

JD HILL, FORMER NFL PLAYER: Pills to go to sleep, pills to play, pills to play at halftime. Pills after the game.

COSTELLO: Former Detroit Lion JD Hill on the DEA investigation of the NFL. Did the NFL illegally give them pills to keep them on the field?

HILL: They put me out of the good old boy club, and I was put out of the locker room, on the streets, I'm with my family, I'm still in pain.

COSTELLO: Let's talk, live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Good morning, I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. We begin this hour in the Middle East, where a cease-fire plan couldn't even survive the night.

Just six hours after Israel accepted the deal, it abandoned the plan by launching these new airstrikes on Gaza. Hamas militants there had scoffed at the cease-fire from the beginning and overnight, they fired more than 40 rockets into Israel.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: I cannot condemn strongly enough the actions of Hamas in so brazenly firing rockets in multiple numbers in the face of a goodwill effort to offer a cease-fire in which Egypt and Israel have joined together and the international community strongly supports the idea of a cease-fire, the need, the compelling need to have a cease-fire.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: The region may now be inching toward all-out war. Israeli troops are massed along Gaza's border and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says a much larger offensive grows more likely.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer is live in Israel this morning.

Wolf, is it safe to say the cease-fire proposal is an absolute no-go at this point?

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR, THE SITUATION ROOM: Well, certainly, the Israelis accepted it. Obviously, Egypt put it -- put forward most of the -- most of the Arab countries through the Arab League were accepting it. The Palestinian Authority on the West Bank, led by President Mahmoud Abbas, they welcomed it.

Hamas rejects it right from the beginning, both the political wing of Hamas, the military wing of Hamas, they both ridiculed it, said it was a non-starter. One Hamas spokesman telling me it was a joke, so they rejected it, but they didn't only reject it in terms of their statements they rejected it by -- for six hours or so, firing a bunch of rockets into Israel. So after about six hours, the Israeli government, the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, decided that cease- fire, which was unilaterally being -- kept up by the Israelis was over. Now Israel has resumed its military operations in Gaza. So for all practical purposes that cease-fire is now gone. Unless the

Egyptians and the international community can revive it, looks like we're back to where we were at the beginning, although I anticipate Israeli military operations will even be stepped up a bit further as we go along right now.

About an hour before the Israelis resume their military operations, I spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman, Mark Regev. Listen to what he said about Hamas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK REGEV, ISRAELI GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN: As you've said Hamas itself has said some problematic statements but let's be clear here. Hamas runs the Gaza Strip and it's not a democracy there in Gaza. They rule the Strip with an iron fist. If they want to stop rockets being fired, they can do it. So far they have done not enough.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: And so as I said, Carol, it looks pretty grim right now. The operations by Israel have now formally resumed. They're striking various targets in Gaza and Hamas continues to launch missiles and rockets into Israel.

COSTELLO: All right. Wolf Blitzer, reporting live from Israel this morning.

The first wave of undocumented immigrants has been sent back to Central America and Homeland Security says this is only the beginning of those deportation. The group of 40, including women, teenagers and babies, left New Mexico on a chartered flight back to San Pedro Sula, Honduras, a city known as the world's murder capital. The newly returned immigrants were then processed by Honduran officials and sent on their way.

CNN has been following these migrants' journey to and from the United States. Gary Tuchman is in southern Mexico where the dangerous journey begins. But we begin with Rosa Flores in Honduras where the dream ends for these families.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: We're at the migrant center here in Honduras. Now this is where all of the deportees arrive, that arrived by plane. Now take a look, the center that you see is right next to the airport. So what happens is these deportees are loaded into buses.

So we're here with the first lady of Honduras. A lot of politicians in the United States have been saying that the solution is for all of the kids to be returned, for all the families to be returned to Honduras.

Is that the situation?

What she's saying is that there is no simple solution, there is no simple answer. That it has to be a collaboration between the U.S. and all of the Central American countries to solve this issue, that it's not going to be solved overnight.

We've been standing by this barricade for about an hour and a half and the flow of people has been interesting because only pastors have been allowed in, psychologists have been allowed in, now we've only seen three women come out of this building. And one clue that we've had that perhaps one of these women was a deportee was because her shoes didn't have shoelaces. And we've heard that story before that immigration authorities in the United States remove those shoelaces.

I talked to her briefly, she didn't want to talk us to on camera but she did say that she was ready to take a shower, to get home and put this behind her.

The processing of these 18 families took hours. The barricades that you see behind me, they never came down, we never got access to the actual processing center. Until we actually saw the kids walk out with their mothers, get on this bus. Now the kids received balloons and other goodies, got on this bus and now they are headed back into the communities that they left in the first place, those very same communities that we keep on hearing are filled with poverty and violence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: Now we were able to meet up with one of the women that was in that bus. And she was there with her daughter and she tells us that it was a very difficult journey. Her eyes were swollen. The little girl explained the trek, how difficult that voyage was, how they slept out in the forest, how they saw monkeys and snakes and how it was difficult for them to get to the United States and when they got there, only to be sent back -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Does that mean they will not try again?

FLORES: You know, that particular family, I asked the woman, and she said, you know, I just want the best thing for my daughter. I want her to have a chance. She wants her daughter to get an education. And so a lot of these families kind of -- leave it in the gray, if you will. They don't exactly answer the question. And some of them do, some of them say we don't have another option, we're going to try again -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Rosa Flores reporting live from Honduras this morning.

Whatever danger they now face, their flight home was likely the safest part of a very long and very dangerous journey into the United States. A journey that some may try to repeat.

Gary Tuchman has been on that road north for days now. And he joins us right where it gets really ugly.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is the southern Mexican border city of Hidalgo. We've explained that for people who want to illegally cross into the United States, going from Guatemala to Mexico is relatively easy but this is where the serious business starts. You should walk down these dusty streets, the illegal immigration business is very open.

As a matter of fact, look at this explicit sign. It says in Spanish, "Welcome to the coyote pass." Coyotes are the human smugglers. And this is where people come to find human smugglers to get to the United States border.

There are people up there, when we looked at them, they saw we had cameras, many of them scattered.

(Voice-over): Passenger vans that snake through the border areas are all part of the equation.

(On camera): These vans are often very crowded, this one is, also very hot, there's no air conditioning. Mostly commuters who are going to the city of Tapachula about an hour drive, a bigger city in the southern portion of Mexico, but often undocumented migrants are on this bus. They say they want to go to Tapachula, that's where they can get services, food, medical care, while they plan their journeys up north.

But often undocumented migrants have no money and can't even afford these vans. They then have to figure out how to get to Tapachula to start their journey. And just before we got on this van we found a man who wants to get to the United States but didn't have enough money to get on this van.

This is Luis Moreno, he's 33 years old. He doesn't speak any English but we've been talking to him a little bit. This is a man from Guatemala, he's here in Mexico right now. He wants to go to the United States and as a matter of fact, he has been there. And he's been caught three times by authorities and sent back to Guatemala. But also very interesting about Luis, he's been caught five times here in the nation of Mexico, not on the border but in other cities. Four of the times he was on the beast, that train where so many people get hurt.

He says riding on top of the train, he was tied down so he wouldn't fall off. He was caught four times on the train, one time on a bus. So in eight times, he has been sent back to Guatemala, but he still says he is ready to go back.

LUIS MORENO, UNDOCUMENTED MIGRANT (Through Translator): I want to go to the U.S. and work and help out my family. I can't do it where I'm from.

TUCHMAN: One of the places that migrants come to for medical help here in Tapachula is Iglesia el Berge (ph), this Catholic Church and clinic, but this is when you're seriously hurt or seriously sick. For example, this man right here, you could see his foot. He was in the United States, got kicked out, came back to Mexico and then got hit by a car while crossing. Really messed up his ankle. He says he still wants to go back to the United States but he won't be able to walk for the next couple of weeks.

We also have this gentleman right here and you can see that he is missing his leg. He was also in an accident.

This baby was born here six days ago. And this woman right here, this is Malitsa (ph). She is 20 years old. She is the sister of the baby. And this is her Malitsa's daughter, her mother's here, too. Her mother gave birth to the baby. But they have come from Honduras. They hope to get to the United States someday. That's what Malitsa just told me. But right here, they are here for the medical care of the baby being born, also some food and hoping to get some good shelter for the next few days before they continue.

(Voice-over): The journey to the United States is long and dangerous, success is anything but assured.

Gary Tuchman, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: As early as today, two Texas lawmakers hope to introduce a bill that could make it easier to deport undocumented children. Right now the 2008 law requires unaccompanied minors who show up at the border to have a deportation hearing except if they are from Mexico or Canada.

Republican Senator John Cornyn and Democratic Representative Henry Cuellar want to get rid of that hearing, except in certain cases.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. HENRY CUELLAR (D), TEXAS: We're trying to find a solution and we are trying to roll up our sleeves and basically, you know, how do we stem the wave of humanity that's coming over to the U.S. and how do we make sure that we treat the kids with care, but at the same time, stem this wave coming in.

SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R), TEXAS: We want to make sure that all these -- all unaccompanied children are treated exactly the same, so the children from Central America are treated the same way as kids coming over from Mexico and Canada. We want to make sure that if they do have a colorable claim to some immigration relief, let's say asylum, let's say they are victim of human trafficking, that they have an opportunity if they wanted to present that to a judge, an immigration judge on a timely basis.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Ahead in the NEWSROOM, I'll talk with Representative Cuellar about the bill he is proposing. That's about 90 minutes from now, right here in the NEWSROOM. As you might expect that bill has an uphill battle in both the House and the Senate. And in 12 days, lawmakers go on vacation.

We'll talk about all of that with Representative Cuellar in the next hour of NEWSROOM.

But first, violence rages in the Middle East after a cease-fire falls apart in just hours. Are the two sides nearing war? I'll talk with a former State Department official to get his thoughts.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Israel and Gaza now on the verge of an all-out war. The threat comes after Hamas refused to adhere to an Egyptian proposal for a cease-fire, Israel was willing to accept the deal. That deal included the border between Gaza and Israel to be opened for the transport of people and goods, and a chance for the two sides to sit down in Cairo and talk about a longer term cease-fire. Hamas made any such agreement impossible when it continued to launch rockets into Israel.

So, let's talk about what that might me mean.

Edward Djerjian joins me now. He's a former assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs under George W. Bush. He's also a former U.S. ambassador to Israel.

Welcome, sir.

EDWARD DJERJIAN, FORMER ASST. SECY OF STATE, NEAR EAST AFFAIRS: Good to be with you, Carol.

COSTELLO: Nice to be here.

In your mind, why didn't Hamas accept this peace deal or this cease- fire deal?

DJERJIAN: I think there's a serious risk within Hamas with the militant military wing, the al Qassim brigade. They rejected it publicly, the cease-fire proposal.

But the political leadership, a couple of their spokesmen said the cease-fire proposal is still under consideration. I don't think it is a definitive rejection of a cease-fire because of the inner conflicts within Hamas itself.

COSTELLO: Interesting. Still, Hamas is still firing rockets into Israel and Israel has every right to defend itself. If this continues, will Israel have the legitimacy to go into Gaza with ground troops?

DJERJIAN: Well, that's difficult question to answer. The point is that Israel, as you know, under former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, unilaterally withdrew from Gaza. They considered Gaza to be an incredible burden of occupation and a replete with all the problems of having Hamas there. They withdrew unilaterally.

I do not think there is a real strong political will for the Israelis to go in again. That is the last option, to go in militarily and to try to defeat and destroy Hamas, certainly all of its military capabilities. But that would involve untold casualties. It would involve a great international uproar. And so, that's the

last option Israel would want to use. But it is poised, as you know, Carol, they have at least 40,000 to 50,000 Israeli reservists that have been called up and that is the last option that Prime Minister Netanyahu has in his pocket.

COSTELLO: Well, you know, I ask you that question because some feel that this is the time. You mentioned the split in Hamas leadership. So, why not go in and take care of Hamas once and for all?

DJERJIAN: You know, we have seen this film before, 2008, 2012, going in in a full-scale military ground invasion into Gaza is replete with political consequences. And many of them could be negative. It's not -- it's not a decision to be taken easily.

I think what the Israelis want is some sort of tenuous guarantees that after they have reduced, to some extent, Hamas' military capabilities over last week, their military coordinator, Amos Gilad, made a statement that Israelis have achieved some serious damage on Hamas' military capabilities during the last week to 10 days.

What they want san extended period of calm. They want to maintain the status quo. In other words, a cease-fire, calm, without having to go into Gaza militarily on the ground and to really maintain the status quo on the West Bank also.

My personal view on this is that this is a short-term tactical strategy, but in the long term, we are going to see this repeated and one day, it is going to get out of control, with devastating consequences for all sides, the Israelis, the Palestinians and the international community.

COSTELLO: So, the U.S. secretary was about to go into the region to try to broker some sort of cease-fire, he changed his mind and sort of left it up to Egypt. Was that the right move?

DJERJIAN: Well, I think he thought, probably Secretary Kerry thought that the Egyptians had made some real progress on getting the parties together to discuss -- to agree to a cease-fire in the beginning and to discuss the terms. As it turned out, that was not the case. So, he may very well reconsider his trip.

But let me make one point, Carol, before all of this happened, in April, Secretary Kerry's very sustained initiative to get the Israelis and Palestinians, Netanyahu and Abu Mazen, to come to a peace agreement, just floundered and ended, unfortunately, in failure.

When there is no hope for a piece peace agreement -- and we have seen this consistently in recent Middle East history -- when there's no hope, bad things happen. After that, we had the kidnapping of the three Israelis and their murder, and then the murder of the young Palestinian boy. Then, we had -- Israel did some military activities against Hamas target necessary the West Bank. Hamas started lobbing its rockets, lobbing its rockets against Israel and the whole situation escalated. That is sort of the immediate context where we're at. But this is not sustainable in the long run. If all that's going to happen, and I hope what happens is a cease-fire, we have to get onto a long-term solution to the problem, which is really, as improbable as it seems, an Israeli/Palestinian peace agreement.

COSTELLO: It does sound impossible, but I hope there's -- I don't know hope springs eternal, right? I don't know though.

Mr. Ambassador --

DJERJIAN: It's not impossible, but it's -- it's not impossible, but it's the only long-term solution and if there is -- if we don't have that, we are going to continue to see this film replayed and replayed.

COSTELLO: Mr. Ambassador, thanks for your insight. I appreciate it.

Still to come in the newsroom, the secret life of an alleged high- priced escort, the woman suspected in the death of a Google executive describes herself as a model who loves poetry and monkeys. Friends say she was a drug addict and on a dangerous downward spiral.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: The secret life of an alleged high-priced escort, drug addict and killer. Until now, not much has been known about Alix Tichelman, but former friends and online profiles are offering a glimpse into the world of a woman who's been linked to two fatal heroin overdoses, including a Google executive found dead on his luxury yacht.

CNN's Dan Simon has more for you.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is my understanding that --

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Years before she wound up in this courtroom charged in the heroin overdose of Google executive Forrest Hayes, Alix Tichelman, model and call girl, was already showing a pattern of self-destructive behavior.

MARIYA ARMARIO, ALIX TICHELMAN'S FORMER ROOMMATE: She clearly was like way gone on her addiction.

SIMON: Mariya Armario shared a house with her in San Francisco. It was 2010 and Tichelman, she says, was working as an exotic dancer and abusing drugs.

According to authorities, Tichelman met Hayes through the Web site seekingarrangement.com, and Armario says her former roommate has long used the Internet to meet potential male clients.

(on camera): Did she tell you why she did it?

ARMARIO: For the money. Lots of money, she said. She said that they would just pick her up, take her on dates and buy her things, and give her money. I asked her if she had to sleep with them because I was curious. She said she never did, but that's what they all say.

SIMON (voice-over): According to her social media profile, Tichelman studied journalism at Georgia State University but never graduated. Her father, Bart Tichelman, is the CEO of SynapSense, a California technology company. But she was living a very different life, slipping into prostitution.

The 26-year-old had once claimed to be a makeup artist and had posted this video on YouTube.

ALIX TICHELMAN, MODEL/CALL GIRL: It's going to take a little bit on a fluffy brush.

SIMON: As we now know, authorities are investigating whether she played a role in a second death. This one outside of Atlanta, where Tichelman's then-boyfriend Dean Riopelle also died of a heroin overdose. It was ruled accidental, but authorities are reopening the investigation.

KHRISTINA BRUCKER, DEAN RIOPELLE'S FORMER NANNY: Dean hated smoking. He hated drinking and he most certainly hated drugs. I -- he was a man that was, you know, skeptical to even taking aspirin, let alone heroin. So do I believe that Dean injected himself with heroin? Absolutely not.

SIMON: That's Riopelle's former live-in nanny who says she left her job because of Tichelman's drug use and frequent outburst.

BRUCKER: I really truly believe that Alix may have something to do with this and I'm very happy that they reopened this investigation.

SIMON (on camera): No word yet from Tichelman's public defender. She will next be in court on Wednesday where she will be arraigned on numerous charges, the most serious, of course, felony manslaughter.

Dan Simon, CNN, San Francisco.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, the first wave of illegal immigrants deported from the United States, but will this help bridge the gap between lawmakers who think President Obama isn't tough enough on immigration? We'll talk about that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)