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U.N. Security Council Vote On Gaza Delayed For Third Time; Six Americans Wrongfully Detained In Venezuela Return Home; E.U. Council, European Parliament Reach Deal On Migration Reform; Macron Defends Controversial Immigration Bill; Trump Appeal Of Colorado Ballot Ban Expected Soon; Nova Music Festival Survivor Reunites with Her Rescuer; Town Nearby Volcano Off Limits Until after Christmas. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired December 21, 2023 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[00:00:22]
JOHN VAUSE, CNNI HOST: Coming up here on CNN, deadly delay. As the death toll in Gaza nears 20, 000, the U.N. Security Council pushes back a ceasefire vote for a third time. Home for Christmas, 10 Americans illegally detained in Venezuela have been released in a prisoner exchange deal with Washington.
And with Donald Trump planning an appeal to a ban from the ballot on Colorado. The U.S. Supreme Court and its six conservative judges might soon be facing a moment of truth.
ANNOUNCER: Live from Atlanta, this is CNN Newsroom with John Vause.
VAUSE: With growing pressure on Israel to scale back its military offensive in Gaza, negotiations for a pause in fighting in return for the release of hostages being held by Hamas have resumed. The White House describes these talks as very serious discussions, but a deal is not imminent.
In the meantime, the Israeli offensive continues, with deadly explosions reported in Rafah in the south and Jabalia in the north. And Israel's Prime Minister says the military objective has not changed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (through translator): We're continuing in the fight until the end. It will resume until the elimination of Hamas, until the victory. All Hamas terrorists from the first to the last are marked for death. They only have two options, surrender or die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: On Wednesday at the U.N. Security Council, the U.S. delayed a vote on a ceasefire resolution for a third time this week. That vote now set to take place in the coming hours. Well, a shortage of almost everything in Gaza, apart from misery, has left close to two million people suffering from extreme hunger. According to the World Food Programme, half of Gaza's population is now starving. CNN's Jomana Karadsheh reports now.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For weeks, this is what we've seen of the war in Gaza. Israel's brutal military might pounding neighborhoods into dust. In Central Gaza's Nuseirat, whole blocks reduced to rubble, seemingly deserted, unlivable.
But there's also this, the near surreal scenes this week in Nuseirat, the hustle and bustle of the street market. It's the story of every war where life doesn't stop. It goes on for those trying to survive.
But Gaza is like no other place. It's where more than 2 million are cramped into this tiny strip of land that now looks like it's been bombed back into ages past, where those who've lost everything have nowhere left but the streets.
That's where Mutnis (ph) is building a clay oven, hoping people would pay him a shekel or two to use it, he says. Maybe then he'll have enough to buy his children cheese or tomatoes.
Our lives are a million years behind. We live in sewage, Mutnis (ph) says. Every time it rains, the sewage overflows. It's cold, there's no food, no water, no warm clothes.
Most here have escaped the bombs only to be trapped in this misery. Disease and starvation, the U.N.'s warned, may soon kill more than those bombs. Half the population, it says, are now starving, people going entire days without eating.
Umahmed (ph) says she collects a bit of flour from here and there to bake bread for her children. We're all thrown into the streets, she says. They said go to the south. We came to the south to die slowly.
Human Rights Watch says Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war. It's a war crime Israel denies and calls it a lie. It accuses Hamas of stealing aid.
In the wake of October 7th, Israel's defense minister announced a siege of Gaza, quote, no electricity, no fuel, everything closed until all hostages were returned. Some aid and water delivery resumed, but nowhere near enough. Much of the blockade remains in place, what rights groups call collective punishment.
Sometimes the lucky ones find more than lentils and bread for the hungry mouths they have to feed. This mother uses a pair of jeans for her fire to boil some chicken wings and bones.
I'm using clothes and cardboard to make fire and cook, she says. The situation is disastrous, but I need to find a way for my children. We're in the street because we have nowhere to shelter.
Fleeing the bombs, scrounging for food, now the people of Gaza desperately wait for the moment they can try once again to live.
Jomana Karadsheh, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[00:05:09]
VAUSE: Ahmed Bayram is with the Norwegian Refugee Council. He joins us this hour from Amman, Jordan. Thank you for speaking with us.
AHMED BAYRAM, MIDDLE EAST MEDIA ADVISER, NORWEGIAN REFUGEE COUNCIL: Hi, John. Thanks for having me.
VAUSE: OK, so I want you to listen to the UAE ambassador to the United Nations on this much delayed ceasefire resolution for Gaza.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LANA ZAKI NUSSEIBEH, UAE AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: The overriding objective of this resolution was always to try and positively impact on the ground for the people who need it the most. We have been working overnight, hours, long hours, but we believe today giving a little bit of space for additional diplomacy could yield positive results, and we are going to be optimists and try and do that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: So according to numbers we have from Gaza's Hamas controlled health ministry, close to 20,000 Palestinians have been killed during the first 75 days of Israel's military offensive. On average, around 266 people a day are being killed. The numbers from Gaza do not separate civilians from fighters. Even so, the New York Times reported last month, Gaza civilians under Israeli barrage are being killed at historic pace.
There is also close to 2 million displaced people with very little food or water, no electricity, no sanitation and a whole lot more. And it seems none of that is being reflected by what looks to be a total lack of urgency at the U.N. And the question is why?
BAYRAM: Good morning. I mean, what is happening in Gaza, I think, is a humanitarian crisis is being blown out of all proportions really. What we are seeing on the ground is not just a loss of life and loss of homes, but also loss of hopes of going back home, of going back to normalcy.
I mean, my teams on the ground tell me that all they can get hold of now is some canned food for the children, if they can manage to get that. I think what the -- what we need to see now is, is not just the opening of the Kerem Shalom crossing sustainably, but the -- we need to see a real surge in the number of trucks that make it that make it into Gaza.
There are thousands of them being lined up on the Egyptian side. I think what the -- what we are doing with the U.N. and other agencies is just trying here. I mean, really with the scale of needs and, you know, the compared -- the aid that is coming in, we're barely scratching the surface here.
I think what we're looking at here is probably the worst humanitarian catastrophe that we have seen in the Middle East over the past decade. And, you know, the Middle East has seen what it has seen over this decade. We need some serious negotiations now for a ceasefire. We need serious negotiations for, you know, an upsurge in the number of trucks that make their way into Gaza.
And not just to Rafah, where we, you know, we're mostly centered now, because everyone has been pushed that way. But also to Northern Gaza, where, you know, people have spent 10 out of 30 days without food.
VAUSE: And the U.N. Secretary General, he highlighted the urgent need for a ceasefire. He posted a tweet on X saying, "Intense fighting, lack of electricity, limited fuel and disrupted telecommunications severely restrict the U.N.'s concerted efforts to provide life-saving aid to people in Gaza. Conditions to allow us for large scale humanitarian operations need to be reestablished immediately."
And I guess the point here also is that, you know, when he talks about conditions, he means some kind of significant pause in the fighting. For every day this is delayed, people die. For every day this is delayed, the situation gets worse. As bad as it is and hard to believe it can, it does.
So, that's my point here, is that unless there's something happening with the pause in the fighting, you know, in the next 24 hours, this is just going from bad to worse to worse to worse. Is there, you know, an end here?
BAYRAM: That's what we are asking and that's what everyone is asking, really. I mean, 60 -- I mean, 70 days now with -- of constant bloodshed. Almost everyone. Even -- just say even -- if there was to be a ceasefire tomorrow, do you know how long it's going to take to rebuild all these homes that have been destroyed?
70 percent of the housing stock in Gaza has been destroyed or damaged. And now we're approaching winter. It's getting colder and colder here. That means that these people have no hope of going back home. I mean, we want to see an end to that. Where is that end? No one knows.
And I know that, you know, pressure can come in from diplomatic corridors, from the U.N., from Arab countries, Arab states as well. However, I think what is so disappointing for us, and this is the first time it happens now in Gaza, that we're not able to provide aid, even in conflict times when we used to do that all the time.
And now 50, you know, 50 of my colleagues themselves have been displaced. They hardly, you know -- their children hardly eat. Their children are now intense and there is no hope of going back home anytime soon for these people.
[00:10:16] I mean, it's going to take months to just clear the rubble from all the destruction. We haven't even started talking about diseases that are invisible almost because everyone is busy with, you know paramedics and medical teams are busy saving lives. This is -- again if -- we want to see that ceasefire, and even with that ceasefire, we are looking at years of catastrophe for the people of Gaza.
Life is probably not going to be the same for the elderly again, for the disabled, people with disability, and even for babies, for children who lost their parents. That's why a ceasefire can't come sooner enough, and we hope that pressure will build for a vote in the security council in that direction.
VAUSE: Yes, Ahmed, thank you so much for being with us. It's one of those incredibly frustrating situations for so many people and also incredible misery right now for too many people in Gaza. Thanks for being with us.
BAYRAM: Thank you.
VAUSE: Six Americans, classified as wrongly detained by Venezuela, have arrived back in the United States. Touching down in Texas just hours after the White House announced a prisoner exchange deal. Here's one of the newly freed Americans describing his detention.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SAVOI WRIGHT, AMERICAN DETAINED IN VENEZUELA: I didn't know if I would ever make it out. And it's really scary to be in a place where you're used to having freedoms and you're locked into a cell. Sometimes with four other people. Very tiny cell. And to realize, am I ever going to get out of this? Am I ever going to make it home? How did I get to this point? It's a -- it's very -- it's a very challenging situation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: The U.S. says no other Americans are currently being held in Venezuela right now. A group of ten people were released, includes four others who were not seen, as well as a notorious fugitive who is expected to appear in U.S. federal court in the day ahead.
CNN's Ed Lavandera has more details now on the prisoner exchange, including the prisoner the Biden administration gave up to make the deal happen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ten Americans who've spent months and years imprisoned in Venezuela are now back in the United States. Six men who were officially listed as wrongfully detained by the U.S. government touched down in San Antonio, Texas, Wednesday night. Among them, Joseph Cristella, Eyvin Hernandez, Jerrel Kenemore, and Savoi Wright.
ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We have no higher priority than doing everything we possibly can to bring our fellow citizens out of harm's way.
LAVANDERA (voice-over): Also included in the deal is Leonard Francis, the infamously corrupt military contractor known as Fat Leonard. He was the mastermind of the largest bribery scandal in U.S. naval history. He fled to Venezuela after his conviction in 2015.
The U.S. had eased some economic sanctions against Venezuela as the country took steps to open its elections and agreed to return Alex Saab, an ally of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Saab was facing prison time in the U.S. on corruption and money laundering charges.
The Venezuelan government is also releasing 20 political prisoners, some seen leaving prison by a CNN team in Venezuela. The Biden administration says this deal is a sign of improving relations between the U.S. and Venezuela, and part of its effort to push the socialist dictatorship toward more democratic reforms.
But the deal comes as the Maduro regime is threatening to take over part of a neighboring country. Guyana sits just east of Venezuela, and Maduro wants control of the small country's oil reserves. And a senior administration official says Maduro still faces criminal charges in the U.S., including drug trafficking and corruption.
President Biden is vowing to keep the pressure up on the Venezuelan president.
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Venezuela, thus far, is keeping their commitment toward the democratic election. But we're going to hold them accountable.
LAVANDERA (voice-over): But this deal sparks renewed frustration for families of some other Americans imprisoned abroad. Paul Whelan has been held in a Russian prison for nearly five years. His brother recently telling Out Front his family is growing frustrated with the Biden administration.
DAVID WHELAN, BROTHER OF PAUL WHELAN: Unfortunately, I don't see that the government is any closer to bringing Paul home than they were a year ago.
LAVANDERA (voice-over): But President Vladimir Putin so far is refusing to make a deal for his release.
VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): We want to negotiate.
LAVANDERA (voice-over): The Russian president said last week, we want to negotiate and the agreements must be mutually acceptable and satisfactory to both sides like the one made to release Brittney Griner more than a year ago in exchange for an international arms dealer. But the hope for these other American families is that the U.S. could strike another deal to bring their loved ones back home.
[00:15:02]
LAVANDERA: The release of these American detainees unfolded so quickly on Wednesday that their families didn't have time to make it to Texas to watch them walk off the plane. Two of the American detainees spoke after they arrived. They said they were grateful to the Biden administration for negotiating the release and that they were grateful to finally having the chance to reunite with their own families.
Ed Lavandera, CNN, San Antonio, Texas.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: The E.U. has announced a far reaching overhaul of its controversial and fractured migration and asylum system. Five E.U. laws covering all refugees and migrants are screened and processed are at the center of the review. E.U. countries would individually be responsible for accepting and sharing the 30,000 migrants the bloc is expected to accommodate per year based on a country's population and GDP.
The president of the European Parliament says it may not be the best solution, but it's an improvement.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTA METSOLA, EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT PRESIDENT: Now, we are aware that there is no perfect solution. It is not a perfect package on the table, and it does not look at the solutions to all complex issues. But what we do have on the table is far better for all of us than we have had previously.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: But Amnesty International says this deal will only increase suffering for asylum seekers, refugees and migrants. Any formal agreement still needs to be approved by all 27 E.U. members, then ratified by the Parliament, where it still faces some opposition.
In the meantime, French President Emmanuel Macron is defending his country's controversial immigration bill, which passed Tuesday, calling it, quote, the shield that we lacked. The bill would make it harder for migrants to get state benefits and restricts them from moving relatives to France.
An initial version was rejected by lawmakers on both the left and the right. But this new bill, revised bill, rather, was backed by both Macron's party and most notably the far right.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EMMANUEL MACRON, FRENCH PRESIDENT (through translator): Fighting against illegal immigration is, I think, hard to consider as a strictly right wing policy. And when I see the popular electorate, they are in favor of that. When you live in working class neighborhoods, you have security difficulties, sometimes immigration that is not well controlled, the consequences of which you experience. Well, you are in favor of this law.
(END VIDEO CLIP) VAUSE: Meantime, the head of the French Communist Party says this bill is directly inspired by the anti-immigration policies of far right politician Marine Le Pen.
With that, we'll take a short break. When we come back, U.S. President Joe Biden weighing in on Donald Trump's ballot ban in Colorado. We'll have a reaction from Trump's Republican rivals and what this actually means for the Supreme Court.
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VAUSE: Donald Trump's appeal to the Supreme Court over his Colorado ballot ban could come any day now. In the meantime, the twice impeached, four times indicted, one term president, is fundraising off the ruling, which says he's disqualified from running for another term of president because he participated in the 2021 insurrection, Article 14 of the U.S. Constitution.
CNN's Omar Jimenez reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
[00:20:18]
OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): First came the ruling, now, the fallout. "A sad day in America," Trump writes, as he reacts for the first time on social media since the Colorado Supreme Court's decision to keep him off its state's 2024 Republican primary ballot.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And I'm thrilled to be back in your incredible state.
JIMENEZ (voice-over): And with just 28 days until the Iowa caucuses, every major Republican presidential candidate is coming to Trump's defense.
GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL), U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: They basically just said, what, you can't be on the ballot? I mean, how does that work?
NIKKI HALEY (R), U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I will beat him fair and square. We don't need to have judges making these decisions. We need voters to have to make these decisions.
CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think he should be prevented from being president of the United States by the voters of this country.
VIVEK RAMASWAMY, U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Unelected judges are not going to decide willy-nilly across the state who ends up on a ballot and who doesn't.
JIMENEZ (voice-over): Even as they defend Trump, his rivals are still campaigning to beat him in the GOP primary, with time running out until the first contest in January. DESANTIS: It'll give Biden or the Democrat or whoever the ability to skate through this thing. That's their plan. What they don't want is to have somebody like me who will make the election, not about all those other issues.
JIMENEZ (voice-over): The Biden campaign says it's ready for any of the Republican candidates, regardless of the courts.
BROOKE GOREN, DEPUTY COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, BIDEN-HARRIS CAMPAIGN: We're not going to comment on ongoing litigation. What I will say is that the president looks forward to defeating Donald Trump or whoever else emergence from the Republican primary on the ballot box in November in 2024.
JIMENEZ (voice-over): The court's ruling is based on the 14th Amendment, which disqualifies anyone from future office if they engaged in insurrection.
BIDEN: Whether the 14th Amendment applies, I'll let the court make that decision. But he certainly supported an insurrection.
JIMENEZ (voice-over): The court's decision will now most likely end up at the United States Supreme Court.
JIMENEZ: Now, as we've seen with many of his legal cases during his presidential campaign, Trump is already fundraising off the Colorado State Supreme Court ruling based on the us versus them theme that has become a staple during his campaigns.
Outside of the politics of it all, Trump is still on the ballot for now because essentially this court decision is placed on hold until January 4th, a day ahead of the deadline for the state to be certified as a candidate and pending Trump's appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which could settle this issue for the country.
Omar Jimenez, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
To Los Angeles now, Ron Brownstein, CNN's senior political analyst and senior editor for The Atlantic. Welcome back.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Hi John.
VAUSE: OK, so this appeal makes it to the Supreme Court, could be just a few days. It could also be a moment of truth for the six conservative judges. As the New York Times points out, "They emerged from the conservative legal movement which values methods of interpretation known as textualism and originalism.
Under those precepts, judges should interpret the Constitution based on its text and publicly understood meaning when adopted over factors like evolving social values, political consequences, or an assessment of the intended purpose of the provision."
So how much of a test would this case be not just for those six judges, the six conservative ones, but for the credibility of the court itself, given how politicized it's become in recent years?
BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Look, I mean, there have been, you know, people are far more expert on the 14th amendment than I am, who have made the case that the Colorado decision is powerful, both in fact, and logic and in its plain reading of the statute, which -- of the amendment, which was written specifically to prevent insurrectionists from holding positions of high office.
Now, you know, this is a Republican appointed majority that over the years has been very sensitive to the interests of the Republican Party, and it may be in politic to say so. But it is hard to imagine these Republican appointed justices, including three that were named by Trump himself, you know, moving themselves into a position to disqualify the frontrunner for the Republican nomination.
On the other hand, John Roberts, as the Chief Justice, has always had an eye on the political reputation of the court, which is essentially in tatters at the moment. And you've -- I've got to think that if he does defend Trump on this front, it might make it more likely that the conservatives would join in an effort in what is probably even more significant to deny him, his claim of absolute immunity for all actions that he took as president and to allow the trials against him to move forward.
VAUSE: Well, the Supreme Court has been down kind of a similar road before more than 20 years ago with Bush v. Gore. On that, here's CNN's Supreme Court Reporter, Joan Biskupic on how times have changed. Here she is.
BROWNSTEIN: Yes.
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JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SENIOR SUPREME COURT ANALYST: So this case comes to us now in a way that's so much more polarized. And that just again points up how the Supreme Court should really come in and show some stature and try to rule on these issues quickly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: What happens if this is delayed? What happens if this is drawn out? How much does that play into Trump's benefit here, the longer it takes?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, even more to his benefit on the other issue of immunity, where his clear strategy is to raise these claims of presidential immunity in the hope of delaying any trial and much less any conviction on any of the serious charges he's facing, especially the indictments over attempting to directly to overturn the election that Jack Smith is pursuing in federal court.
Try to pursue that, push that back as long as possible. You know, we do have evidence in polling and I think even this case has the potential to have the impact where the indictments obviously have not been a huge problem for Trump, even in the general electorate, certainly not in the Republican primary electorate.
But there is reason in polling for him to worry that actual convictions by a jury of his peers or courts of law on the serious charges he's facing would have more of an impact on the willingness of voters to put someone who has been convicted of a serious felony back in the White House.
His goal is to, you know, preempt that possibility by delaying the trial. The real question, the biggest question, I think, before the Supreme Court is whether they play into that strategy by delaying the repetition on immunity. On this, I suspect they will act fairly expeditiously.
VAUSE: And if they do act, and if they do not strike down the Colorado ballot ban, then apparently the Colorado Republican Party is vowing to abandon the primary for a caucus system should the decision be upheld. Very much in keeping with the Republican tradition of ignoring results and decisions which you do not like. What does it say about the party and its devotion to Trump?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, the devotion to Trump is bottomless, you know. I mean, whatever else you think about Donald Trump, he kind of has a feral understanding of human weakness. You know, he can find the weak spot in any opponent. You see it in the way he gives nicknames.
But also, I think he took the measure of the Republican leadership a long time ago and realized there was no line he could not cross. That would cause a critical mass of them to oppose him, either because they fear him or because they desire what they can get from his ability to mobilize his supporters in terms of the power to do other things they want to do.
And we see it again here, as we did during the indictments, that, you know, you would think in a normal political world, this would be a moment for his rivals for the nomination to say, is this really who we want to represent our party? But instead they are rallying around him again, they have painted themselves into a corner where their inability to criticize his underlying behavior leaves them in a position where all they can do is join him in attacking the -- any effort to hold him accountable as politically motivated.
Trump understands he has the party in his pocket, and he is behaving accordingly. We'll see whether the voters in the Republican primaries give him any rude surprises.
VAUSE: Ron, thank you. Ron Brownstein live for us there in Los Angeles. Thank you, sir.
BROWNSTEIN: Thank you.
VAUSE: Argentina's new Libertarian president is pressing ahead with his promise for economic shock therapy. Javier Mele signed a decree Wednesday promising to scrap 300 regulations which he claims are holding the economy back. He says proposals will go before Congress in the coming days. Last week, his government has plans to devalue the currency by more than half as Argentina struggles with inflation as well as poverty. Thousands turned out upon us areas on Wednesday protesting these reforms.
News agencies reporting there will be a second day of voting in some places in the Democratic Republic of Congo after chaos marred Wednesday's general election. There are reports that some polling stations opened late or did not open at all. Allegations of fraud and violence from opposition candidates who want the whole election redone. The president right now is seeking a second term and faces 18 opponents.
Still ahead, a tearful reunion as a woman who survived the deadly Hamas attack on the Nova Music Festival returns to the scene of a massacre and meets the man who saved her life.
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VAUSE: Welcome back, everyone. I'm John Vause. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
[00:31:53]
It's been 76 days since Hamas militants massacred hundreds at a music festival in Southern Israel. And now one woman who survived has returned to the scene to be reunited with the man who saved her life.
Here's CNN's Will Ripley.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Looking at that cloud of smoke, what does that trigger for you?
NATALIE SANANDAJI, NOVA MUSIC FESTIVAL SURVIVOR: So seeing that smoke definitely reminds me of those noises, bringing me back to that day.
RIPLEY (voice-over): In Southern Israel, you don't need a map to know you're near Gaza.
RIPLEY: Why are you here? What do you want to go back?
SANANDAJI: Sorry.
RIPLEY (voice-over): That loud boom, outgoing artillery near our car, rattling native New Yorker Natalie Sanandaji.
RIPLEY: Tell me what that made you feel like just now.
SANANDAJI: Like I'm scared that, like, we're being shot at. I panicked.
RIPLEY (voice-over): The last time she was on this road, Natalie was running for her life. Just after sunrise on Saturday, October 7th, rocket interceptions seen
from the dance floor at the Nova music festival. Hamas militants killed more than 350 people, mostly young, mostly Jewish, mostly unarmed.
SANANDAJI: I feel so lucky that -- that I made it out, that I got out alive. I feel like it's my duty to be that voice for all those who weren't as lucky as me.
RIPLEY (voice-over): That sense of duty is why she's returning to Israel for the first time since the attacks.
SANANDAJI: Just seeing all these faces and -- and knowing people that loved these faces.
RIPLEY (voice-over): Faces of friends who never made it home.
SANANDAJI: Oh, my God. She's someone I recognize. It's so crazy. And I was dancing right next to them, you know? So hard to see how many of them there are.
RIPLEY: And it could have been you?
RIPLEY (voice-over): The music festival campsite, now a place where families come to grave.
Rockets in the sky, gunshots on the ground. All she could do was run. Many took cover in bathrooms, bomb shelters, ditches. Most of them ended up dead.
Four hours of running, exhausted, dehydrated.
SANANDAJI: I never thought that --
RIPLEY (voice-over): Natalie collapsed.
SANANDAJI: -- I would really just sit down and accept my fate.
RIPLEY (voice-over): Too tired to run as a truck came closer.
SANANDAJI: We had nowhere to run to. Like, where were we going to get up and run to? Like, if this is a terrorist coming to kill us, like, that's it. Kind of like that one, you know?
RIPLEY (voice-over): The man behind the wheel, not a terrorist, from at nearby village. Natalie never got his name. She only tracked him down a few days ago. It's why she's come back, to thank him.
They're about to meet for the first time since that day.
The man fighting back tears, Moshe Sati, an Israeli father of four who left home and drove directly into danger, not once or twice; more than ten trips to and from the music festival site.
MOSHE SATI, RESCUED PEOPLE FROM MUSIC FESTIVAL: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE) GRAPHIC: This is too hard for me.
SANANDAJI: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
GRAPHIC: It's very nice to meet you.
SATI: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
GRAPHIC: Likewise. I said we are in it together. Come inside.
RIPLEY: You live so close to this, but were you prepared fully for what you saw on October 7th?
SATI (through translator): Things like this you can't forget. I'll never forget what I saw. It's very, very tough.
RIPLEY (voice-over): Haunted by the horrors he saw, heartened by the lives he saved.
SANANDAJI: So many people were saved in this truck.
RIPLEY (voice-over): Natalie, one of well over 100 people he packed into his pickup and drove to safety.
SANANDAJI: Like, this truck saved so many lives. And like, it just looks like an average truck. Like, I stood right there in that corner. If it wasn't for him, I truly don't think I would have been here today.
RIPLEY (voice-over): One bright chapter on a very dark day.
RIPLEY: Natalie told us one reason she's sharing her story is she doesn't want people to forget that there is a human face to all of this. These young people who were killed on October 7th have been politicized, and Natalie herself has been the target of pretty intense online hate as a result of shearing her story.
She wants people to remember that civilians on both sides are dying. And they have families. They have people who love them. And she says they need to be remembered.
Will Ripley, CNN, Tel Aviv.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Still ahead here on CNN, an active volcano in Southern Iceland means thousands will be unable to return home for Christmas. Find out what the government is trying to do to help them.
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VAUSE: Three of the world's biggest porn websites will face tougher regulation in the E.U. Pornhub, StripChat and X Videos have been classified as very large online platforms, with at least 45 million average monthly users in the E.U. That means tougher standards, including preventing minors from
accessing the sites, combatting illegal contact such as child sexual abuse or deep-fake pornography.
The sites have four months to comply.
Well, scientists might just be a little closer to providing the world with a near endless source of clean power. Researchers in California report a world first: producing a nuclear fusion reaction that released more energy than it used. And the important point here is they did it three times.
Fusion essentially recreates the power of the Sun on Earth, but unlike nuclear power, leaves no radioactive waste.
The amount released was small, and scientists say there's a long way to go before fusion becomes commercially viable, if it ever will. It probably won't. But we hope.
Thousands of people evacuated from a town in Southern Iceland won't be allowed home in time for Christmas. Lava flows from the volcano, which erupted Monday, continue to slow, but authorities say they are unpredictable and could start heading towards the town of Grindavik.
The government, though, is now buying apartments for many people who are in dire need. And CNN's Fred Pleitgen is there.
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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Up close as the Earth spews fountains of lava. South Iceland remains in a state of emergency as the volcanic eruption continues.
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PLEITGEN: This is as close as the Icelandic authorities are going to allow us to the actual fissure, to where the eruption is happening. I'd say we're a mile, maybe a little less than a mile away from it.
Now, things have calmed down a little bit, but at the same time, of course, the danger is still there. The authorities fear that there could be new events that might open up, pop up, and that more lava could be gushing to the surface and then could be coming to the surface in fountains, like we've seen over the past day and a half.
So while things have gotten a little bit more muted, certainly, the danger is not over.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): In the early stages of the eruption, a wall of lava spewing hundreds of feet into the air. While it has subsided somewhat, the underground magma tunnel remains active and dangerous.
BJARKI KALDALONS FRIIS, GEOLOGIST: It's still dangerous, of course. And the -- and the magma that is coming up is around 1,200 degrees hot when it comes to the surface. And it takes a long time for the surface to cool down. PLEITGEN (voice-over): The area around the eruption zone remains
cordoned off, critical infrastructure in danger. The world-famous Blue Lagoon hot springs, closed.
PLEITGEN: Here's another reason why the situation is so dangerous. You see over there is the volcanic activity. And if we pan over in this direction, over there is a geothermal power plant that's extremely important for the electricity here in this area.
The authorities are trying to protect that power plant by building a berm against any lava flows.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): For the local residents, no respite.
KATRIN JAKOBSDOTTIR, ICELANDIC PRIME MINISTER: We now have this volcanic eruption very close to Grindavik. I think it is -- it has proven right, that the town was evacuated in November. We have been buying flats for the residents, so now, we actually have 70 flats that people can move into before Christmas. It is the most -- people who are in most dire need of housing.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): Leaving many residents wondering if they will ever see their homes again.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, near Grindavik, Iceland.
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VAUSE: I'm John Vause, back at the top of the hour with more CNN NEWSROOM. But first, WORLD SPORT starts after a short break. See you back here in 18 minutes.
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