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CNN International: Norway, Ireland, Spain To Recognize Palestinian State; Today: Judge Hears Arguments On Dismissing Charges In Docs Case; Today: Trump Attends Series Of Fundraisers In Texas; Kenyan President Ruto To Visit White House; One Dead, 104 Injured After Turbulence Hits Flight; Hunter Biden's Trial On Tax Charges Delayed Until September. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired May 22, 2024 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:34]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: It is 8:00 p.m. in London, 10:00 p.m. in Jerusalem, 2:00 p.m. in Memphis, Tennessee, 3:00 p.m. here in Washington.

I'm Jim Sciutto. Thanks so much for joining me today on CNN NEWSROOM.

And let's get right to the news.

We're following several developments this hour on the Israel-Hamas war in a politically important but largely symbolic move. Spain, Norway, and Ireland have today announced they will formally recognize the state of Palestine beginning next week. They join more than 140 other nations to recognize the Palestinian state, which encompasses Gaza and the West Bank. Israel is now recalling its ambassadors in those three European countries in a sign of protest.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the move will not bring peace. He called it a reward for terror.

The White House says a Palestinian state should be recognized, though through negotiations, not through unilateral recognition. Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says, the move is aimed at accelerating efforts to secure a ceasefire.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PEDRO SANCHEZ, SPANISH PRIME MINISTER: If one thing is clear to me, it is that Prime Minister Netanyahu has no peace project for Palestine.

JONAS GAHR STOERE, NORWEGIAN PRIME MINISTER: We believe that permanent peace can only be secured upon the basis of the freewill of a free people.

SIMON HARRIS, IRISH PRIME MINISTER: This is an investment in the only solution that can bring lasting peace in the Middle East. It is a strong call to other countries to do the same as we are doing today.

(END VIDEO CLIP) SCIUTTO: It was quite a remarkable announcement while the war wages on more than 130 Israeli hostages remain held in Gaza. Today, the families of seven female IDF soldiers kidnapped by Hamas on October 7th, have released just graphic footage of the moment of their abduction. And it's shocking to see, you can see the woman bloodied, bruised. Their hands tied behind their backs.

The families are sharing this, they say, to put further pressure on the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to bring all the hostages home.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond is in Jerusalem.

Jeremy, I wonder what more we know about this particular video. And also, why the families are releasing it now?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, it was filmed on October 7 by the Hamas gunman who you can see in that video and it was taken in the early hours of that morning after Hamas launched this surprise attack on Israel, massacring hundreds of Israeli civilians, as well as Israeli soldiers. They also took civilians as well as soldiers captive and took them back into Gaza. And among them are these seven Israeli female soldiers who were posted at the Nahal Oz military base on the border with the Gaza Strip. And I want to show you a clip of that video. And then we can talk about it some more.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

DIAMOND: And you can see obviously these women, the fear in their eyes. The first woman you see there, Naama Levy, 19 years old, her mother spoke with our colleague Bianna Golodryga and just explain the fact that she wanted this video out there in order to pressure the Israeli government who she feels is not doing enough to secure her daughter's release.

You can see several other women in this video -- Liri Albag, Agam Berger, Karina Ariev, Daniela Gilboa, all 19 years old, all taken captive on that day on October 7th. Two other women, Noa Marciano, was also taken from that location. She was killed in captivity according to the Israeli military. Her body was later retrieved by Israeli soldiers, brought back to Israel. Ori Megadish was the seventh of these women. She was actually rescued in a special Israeli military operations several months ago.

But for the five women who remained there, their families are certainly hoping that this brings attention once again on their seven months of captivity now inside of Gaza and they hope that it can lead to pressure on these really government to reach a ceasefire deal.

[15:05:04]

SCIUTTO: And we should note, the video was shot by Hamas, I mean, in fact showing that they viewed these women and that video, those images as a trophy of war, in effect.

Jeremy, I want to ask now about the recognition of the Palestinian state by these three European countries. It's a notable move. We should note also that today, Israel's defense minister authorized Israelis to enter the northeastern part of the West Bank to re- establish settlements that were evacuated by, forcibly evacuated by Israeli forces back in 2005. We should note, all Israeli settlements in the West Bank are considered illegal under international law.

I wonder, are those two events related, the expansion in effect of settlements in the West Bank and this announcement of recognition of Palestinian statehood by these European countries?

DIAMOND: Well, they're not related in the immediate sense, meaning that, that law, that Gallant is acting on was actually repealed by the Israeli Knesset over a year ago, but they are related in the sense that this is yet another step that shows that this Israeli government led by Prime Minister Netanyahu is just not interested in the establishment of a Palestinian state, is interested instead in further expanding Israeli sovereignty over Israel, but also over the West Bank, parts of the West Bank as well, with the expansion of settlement activity. And that was evidenced in the response that we saw today, both in terms of rhetoric, but also in terms of policy proposals from the Israeli government to this decision by these three countries to recognize a Palestinian state.

And that's because the Israeli prime minister himself not only said that he believed that recognizing a Palestinian state is tantamount to a reward for terror. He also said that he believes that the establishment of a Palestinian state will lead to a terror state, which he said will, quote, attempt to perpetrate the onslaught of October 7th time and again.

In addition to all of that, we've heard from the Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a far-right member of the current Israeli government, who said that he wants to seek the approval of tens of thousands of housing units and Israeli settlements in the West Bank, new Israeli settlements and also withholding money from the Palestinian Authority, all steps that he says are intended as retribution for the recognition of a Palestinian state by these three countries.

SCIUTTO: And, listen, we should know that you expand settlements in the West Bank and that reduces the territory of any Palestinian state. And there are many in Israel itself who argued this is a deliberate effort by Netanyahu and others to make that impossible really, or at least less possible.

Jeremy Diamond, thanks so much.

Back here in the U.S., as one Trump trial nears its end, another is barely beginning, maybe may not begin. Right now, a Florida courtroom inside Judge Aileen Cannon is hearing the second of two separate bids to throw out charges against former President Trump and his aid and co-defendant, Walt Nauta, over their handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. This is the first public hearing in more than a month and what's been a notably slow-moving case. Judge Cannon indefinitely delayed the start of the trial, which was actually originally scheduled to begin this week. Questions about her pace have only magnified with newly unsealed

filings, such as these images showing Walt Nauta moving boxes before Trump's attorney had reviewed them.

Let's go now to CNN's Jessica Schneider for more.

What's interesting about what's going on in the courtroom today -- of course, there's long than criticism of the speed or lack of speed with which is judges is dealing with this but as that happens, were seeing really new evidence here in these court filings about efforts allegedly made by Trump himself to avoid the security cameras as these boxes were being moved. That's notable.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: I think that's the more striking thing. Of course, we have this ongoing hearing that's been going on throughout the day today. There was a morning session and an afternoon session is happening now. But what's really notable is what was unsealed in court documents yesterday. These were all proceedings that played out actually right here in D.C. It's sort of regarded whether Trumps attorney at the time could be forced to testify handover evidence.

Turns out he could because of possible violations of the crime-fraud exception, some concerns that maybe he was involved in the crime. And like you said, coming out from that, two notable people pieces of evidence. First of all, you have that June 2022 surveillance video that came out showing Walt Nauta moving the boxes and insignificant because this was in the weeks after Trump was subpoenaed for classified documents.

So it shows that his guys were moving stuff around Mar-a-Lago. Then there was the other piece --

SCIUTTO: Which gets to the obstruction piece of it.

SCHNEIDER: Exactly, exactly what Nauta and others are charged with.

And then there's the other piece of evidence that emerged from yesterday's unsealing that there were classified documents in Donald Trump's bedroom at Mar-a-Lago in December 2022. That was about three months after the FBI searched Mar-a-Lago.

[15:10:07]

And the D.C. federal judge, who is dealing with these evidentiary issues, she basically said, I find it very hard to believe that Mr. Trump didn't know that there were classified documents at Mar-a-Lago based on this discovery. So, that is -- that's what striking about this case, is this these new details coming out just as the other judge seems to be slow walking the actual case.

SCIUTTO: So there's a lot of evidence here how a jury would decide guilt or innocence as a separate question. But are we anywhere close to that happening?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I was going to say jury deciding, we actually get -- SCIUTTO: Yeah.

SCHNEIDER: -- got to get to a trial. I mean, we were supposed to have an August start date for this trial. The judge, Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, who's faced scrutiny for some of her decisions, she is paused the start of the trial indefinitely. We're waiting to see as this hearing goes on today down in Florida if maybe she's going give us some idea if this trial, even as a hope of going to trial --

SCIUTTO: Right.

SCHNEIDER: -- before the election, because the initial date was August. We're sliding closer and closer to the election. We'll see.

But I mean, right now, it looks like both of these cases from the special counsel might not see the light of day before the election.

SCIUTTO: Of course, Supreme Court has a key decision on immunity questions related to January 6 case.

Jessica Schneider, thanks so much.

All right. Let's take a little deeper. I'm joined now by national security attorney Bradley Moss.

Good to have you on. Thanks for joining.

BRADLEY MOSS, NATIONAL SECURITY ATTORNEY: Thanks (ph).

SCIUTTO: So let's go through some of the new evidence we discovered in this case. We are these filings. The first is Jessica and I were discussing there we're learning that Trump ensured his employees would avoid security cameras when moving those boxes after they already knew that the government wanted those boxes back in effect.

How important is that information, that evidence in a court of law as relates to these charges?

MOSS: Yeah. You know, you guys were just talking about how sad that this is a fortunately likely never going to see the light of day before the election. The public's going to be deprived before they go to the voting booth of knowing just how detailed these obstructive efforts were by Donald Trump and Walt Nauta in their efforts to conceal this these documents from the government who refused and failed to comply with the subpoena.

The obstruction in this case was always the most clean and clear cut of all four criminal cases against Donald Trump. The fact that it's taken this long and we're nowhere close to trial is really a stain on the process.

SCIUTTO: Do you see with Judge Cannon's handling this case, do you see partisanship or inexperience? I mean, to be fair, it's been said to me by lawyers for a long time that any case involving classified documents, there's a lot of hoops to jump through in terms of how you consider this evidence. But in the way she's handled these questions, including what some

lawyers have said were frivolous challenges to the prosecution in general, is that partisanship in your view? Is it inexperience? Or all are those potentially reasonable legal judgments by the judge?

MOSS: Yes. So it's a mixture of factors. You know, as you noted, because it was a national security case, because there was classified information, there was going to be a lot of detailed under seal in classified proceeding in hearings that were going to take time and to her credit, Judge Cannon probably was a little bit more comprehensive in her review the materials than most judges would have been because maybe they just seen it enough times. They sort of rubber stamp out a little bit. There's nothing wrong with that part.

The issue that we've had with how this case is procedurally concerns that have been identified is how slowly she's moved on resolving other pretrial motions that are rather straightforward. Just as an example, one of them today is this idea of just an -- it's an insufficient pleading for the indictment. Another one is that there was a vindictive prosecution. That could have been resolved weeks goes on the papers, not require a hearing today.

SCIUTTO: I feel remiss if I don't ask this question of you, given a lot of folks watching wouldn't have followed this case day to day-to- day. But, of course, Joseph Biden, Vice President Mike Pence, former Vice President Mike Pence, they also had classified documents in their possession. They returned those documents.

Can you explain legally the difference between the behavior of Biden and Pence as relates to the classified documents and Trump in this case? So what is the substantive difference in your view?

MOSS: Sure. So in the end, whatever the government finds that someone has been withholding the classified documents without authorization in a private residence, in a private office, whatever, they generally do not bring a prosecution unless there some separate evidence of intent to conceal it or a separate obstructive act that wasn't present with Hillary Clinton. It wasn't present with Joe Biden. It wasn't present with Mike Pence.

That's why there were no charges in those cases.

[15:15:01]

The obstruction is what has brought this indictment to Donald Trump's doorstep.

SCIUTTO: And we also learned in this filing, the chief justice of D.C.'s federal courts said that investigators had, quote, strong evidence in his view that the president intended to hide those classified documents. We'll see if that gets it day in court.

Bradley Moss, thanks so much.

MOSS: Absolutely. SCIUTTO: All right. To the race now, for the White House, there is

also a race, of course for campaign cash, lots of it. Today, former President Trump is making a play for donations, big ones in Texas, appealing to big energy and oil executives with deep pockets.

CNN's Steve Contorno joins me now.

And, Steve, tell us about Trump's strategy here, because there was interesting revelation from one of his campaign pitches last week, that, in effect, he said, hey, donate to my campaign because if I'm president, I'm basically going to kill oil and gas regulations and electric vehicles, by the way. I mean, is that -- is that essentially the quid pro quo, these presenting these donors in Texas?

STEVE CONTORNO, CNN REPORTER: Why don't know if I go school would go so far as to call it a quid pro quo, Jim, but certainly that is the pitch he has been making any he has not just been making that pitch behind closed doors. It's one he has been making very publicly as well. He has said essentially that every sort of Biden policy on energy that has moved since he took office is on the table to be eliminated and he would roll back to some of the regulations that were in place when he was president, he would make sure that the companies can drill, that some of these pipeline products that have been put on hold can advance.

And so that is what that stake for these oil companies and these elections and Trump as he undergoes this fundraising blitz, has not one, not two, but three fundraisers in this state today with energy executives and oil executives trying to catch up to Joe Biden in the fundraising race. And for these oil executives, when you look -- when you look at the or -- excuse me, when you look at the invites for these fundraisers, it's a who's who of the oil and energy industry. Some of the wealthiest people in Texas are there for Trump trying to raise money for his campaign.

And you're also seeing this become a talking point for the Biden campaign and for Democrats who are campaigning for reelection by standing by the former president, or excuse me, the President Biden's actions on climate change. In a statement ahead of these fundraisers today, the DNC said, quote, Trump wants to sell our planet to the highest bidder -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Steve Contorno, thanks so much.

Still to come, in the next hour, Kenya's president will visit the White House, the first U.S. state visit by an African leader since back in 2008. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:20:55]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

In the next hour, President Biden will welcome Kenyan President William Ruto to the White House. Ruto's visit comes as the two countries seek to improve economic and security cooperation, and as a Kenyan-led multinational force has arrived in Haiti to help restore security in that nation. This is the first state visit to the U.S. by an African leader since back in 2008.

CNN's Kayla Tausche joins me now.

Kayla, Ruto, close ally of the U.S., certainly as they look for solutions to the problems in Haiti, but also as Russia has expanded its role in Africa, Kenya expanding its security cooperation with the U.S. Tell us what we're expecting out of this visit.

KAYLA TAUSCHE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, as you know, they're going to be some specific deliverables from this visit on emerging technology, with the U.S. expected to highlight Kenya's role as a hub for emerging technology and digital technology.

There's going to be a roundtable here today, with several CEOs from that space. Meg Whitman, the former CEO of many technology companies, now the ambassador to Kenya, sort of helped spearhead that. The two countries will also focus on issues of national security, shared goals of defeating terrorist organizations in the region, as well as financial stability with President Ruto expected to speak out against predatory lending to Africa by other countries.

And that brings us, Jim, to the big picture. There's also going to be a very clear message that is going to be sent by this visit to not only Russia, as you mentioned, but perhaps more specific typically to China -- the message that China cannot co-opt an entire continent and leave its countries indebted. That is one reason why the White House has been so strategic in making some infrastructure investments to some countries on the continent, specifically to counter China's belt and road program.

There have been many officials from the administration who have visited Africa specifically to send that specific message that I just mentioned. And President Biden himself in 2023, pledged but he would be visiting the continent as well. And today, national security adviser Jake Sullivan was asked, since the president has not delivered on that commitment to make that trip to Africa is that a failed promise to countries like Kenya.

Jake Sullivan said the state dinner, the state visit here in Washington, is one example that that is not a failed commitment.

Here's what Sullivan said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAKE SULLIVAN, U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR: I think it shows along with the specific tangible policy actions that he has taken including most recently, by the way, an overlooked part of the national security supplemental was funding actually to help emerging economies, including an Africa. You know, his record will stand for himself and we believe that what today will showcase is not questions about the U.S. commitment, but answers that the U.S. is actually delivering for Africa, for the African people, in this case, for the country of Kenya, but also with Kenya.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAUSCHE: The two leaders are expected to spend some informal time getting to know each other this afternoon after President Ruto's arrival and before the official program gets underway -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Quite a moment.

Kayla Tausche at the White House, thanks so much.

Now, to a surprise move in the U.K. today, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced that there will be a general election held quite soon, July 4th, just six week from now, earlier than they had to be -- they had to call these elections.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RISHI SUNAK, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Earlier today, I spoke with his majesty the king to request the dissolution of parliament. The king has granted this request and we will have a general election on the 4th of July. This election will take place at a time when the world is more dangerous than it has been since the end of the Cold War.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: The British prime minister was required to hold a vote by January of next year. So significantly earlier, his party faces an uphill climb to extend its 14 years in power. Polls show the embattled Conservative Party far behind Labour consistently.

Turning now to the war in Gaza, as we look at the psychological tool it is taking in particularly on children. A 2022 study by Save the Children found that some 80 percent of children in Gaza reported feelings of sadness, depression, grief, or fear.

[15:25:06]

That was before this war.

Now, UNICEF estimates that almost all of Gaza's 1.2 million children need mental health and psychological support. No child in Gaza has known life outside of Israel's blockade.

Former CNN correspondent Arwa Damon is the founder and director of International Network for Aid Relief and Assistance, INARA. The organization focuses on providing medical and mental health care to children impacted by conflicts and natural disasters.

Arwa, thanks so much for coming and it's great to get a chance to talk about your work.

ARWA DAMON, FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL NETWORK FOR AID RELIEF AND ASSISTANCE: Thank you for having me. SCIUTTO: You consistently described this as generational trauma in

Gaza, and I want to read a quote from your recent CNN op-ed that really struck us here. As you write, a mother came up to you when you were there and said, my son, he's seven. Every night, he screams and convulses. He's been doing this for two months. And then this next line, ever since you saw his younger sister's head fly off when the bomb hit.

That line really caught me and I imagine hearing that from the mother must have caught you. I can only imagine. How do you even begin to help children who seen such trauma there?

DAMON: The hardest part of it, Jim, is that actually right now, while the trauma is still ongoing, while the triggering factors are such a constant, there really isn't much that you can do when it comes to trying to even begin to allow a child to move past these very severe psychological injuries.

You know, we talked a lot about physical injury, but psychological injury can actually be just as if not more detrimental to a child if it's not addressed. But the reality is that all that we can do, all the bombs are still falling, all the drones are still fly while people are still hungry is really try to create a distraction for children. So when we talk about emergency mental health interventions in this context, it's really about creating play. It's about creating an ability for a child to be able to try to draw their emotions because they can't communicate verbally or at the very least tried to get out excess energy.

But when we think about just how many children right now are so deeply traumatized. I mean, it's overwhelming.

SCIUTTO: No question. I want to talk about the bombing for a moment because of course has been a lot of public debate about the conduct of Israel's war there.

In the first two months of this war, CNN found that the IDF dropped more than 500 2,000-pound bombs. For context, the U.S. dropped one 2,000 bomb in its years-long campaign against ISIS. Although they dropped a lot of bombs, but there's something particular about the size of that in any confined and highly populated area.

Quoting again, from the op-ed you wrote for CNN, the constant bombardment is a dagger plunged repeatedly into the gaping wound of a crushed psyche. The soundtrack of every night and day is the relentless buzz of drones that taunts, oh, you think you've survived, just wait, death can still come.

How do people there how to children describe that experience and how does it impact a child's development, that fear?

DAMON: It's very detrimental to a child's ability to, you know, psychologically develop and if left untreated, you know, actually be a functioning as recall, it member of society as they move into adulthood, look, adults cant process what's happening to them. I mean, you drive through Gaza and it's like you're driving through a

sea of ghost. People's movements are completely mechanical. Their eyes are absolutely deadened. You don't really feel as if they are alive in the way that you and I are alive, for example.

And children are talking about things that no child should ever need to talk about. You know, they're talking about their siblings dismembered. They're talking about loss and missing there, their parents and not being able to understand why it is that, you know, mommy is not there to kiss them. And also we have cases of children that I've met that have been so traumatized and they're generally around between the ages of three to five, that they have lost their ability to speak.

So this is obviously when a child first begins to attain an ability for speech, but they've gone completely mute. And they are very difficult to compete with. And you try to make eye contact, you try to coax a little bit of a reaction out of them, but they are completely stunned by the sheer depth and breadth and scope of what it is that they've witnessed and been through.

SCIUTTO: Listen, as a parent, I try -- I try to insulate my children from just images of conflict like that. So the actual direct experience of it, I can only imagine.

I want to ask you a difficult question here, you spend time on both sides of the border in the Mideast. You've covered terror attacks in Israel and you've covered the war in Gaza.

[15:30:01]

I've done the same. I wonder what your sense is of Israelis awareness of the suffering in the Gaza, inside Gaza, but also sympathy or empathy to it. I'm going to quote just from an IDF veteran who wrote in "The New York Times' this week on this very topic.

He said: The innocent we say must be protected, but we have lived for too long as an occupying power, too many among us see no one as innocent anymore. We see threats everywhere and in any one threats that we feel justify almost anything.

Do you believe the Israeli people are aware of the extent of the suffering in Gaza and have you seen their reactions to it?

DAMON: I don't think they are. If you look at sort of what's broadcast in the Israeli media, you don't see the images of the children being pulled out from underneath the rubble and the chaos that happens in the aftermath of a bombing, and you get the sense that, of course, no, you can't really speak in general terminology population, but even among some Israelis who are trying to talk about peace, who are trying to advocate for more aid to go and trying to advocate for a ceasefire, they have a greater understanding of exactly what is happening inside Gaza.

But I do get the sense that for many Israelis, this is a horrible thing that has happening, but it is a necessary evil for them to be able to protect themselves and there isn't enough of a debate or analysis happening along the lines of, well, what alternative military strategies but Israel have employed or is this actually the strategy if we want to eradicate a terrorist, right? Because if we look at the history and the evolution of al-Qaeda to ISIS, one could very strongly argue that this is just going to create more violence as opposed to somehow reduce it.

But it's obviously narrowly emotional on both sides to a certain degree because you do have fear and it's quite interesting because, you know, if you listen to a Palestinian or Gazan and Israeli and you take out the words Gaza, Israel, Jewish, Arab, anything that what I (AUDIO GAP) if they just spoke about their fear, they would be saying exactly the same thing, along the rhetoric that you hear mirrors each other.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. It's such a good point human experience of trauma is quite similar no matter what side of the border you're talking about.

Arwa Damon, really appreciate the work you're doing and thanks for sharing some of it with us.

DAMON: Thank you. I appreciate it.

SCIUTTO: When we come back a new documentary captures the first face- to-face meeting between the son of Auschwitz's top commandant and a Jewish woman who survived the camp against all odds. We're going to speak to the director about that emotional meeting, how trauma is inherited across generations. And how "Never Forget" means honestly reckoning with the horrors of the past, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:36:31]

SCIUTTO: How does one reckon with indescribable terror committed by one's own family? And is it possible to find forgiveness for the worst crimes of humanity?

Those are some of the questions explored a new film that captures a powerful and haunting meeting between the descendants of Auschwitz's top commandant and a survivor of what is the most infamous and deadly concentration camp of the Holocaust.

The story of Rudolf Hoss, the German officer who oversaw the murders of more than 1 million Jews at Auschwitz, was fictionalized in the Academy Award-winning film, "Zone of Interest". Now, the documentary, "The Commandant's Shadow" tells the real story.

Here's some of the trailer. We should note, the film is being released by our parent company, Warner Bros.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My father never told us about his work.

(MUSIC) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think my dad probably subconsciously suppresses some of the experiences he's had. I mean, his father was the greatest mass murderer in human history.

It freaks me a little and think about my dad's joyful family life in Auschwitz was just behind the barbed wire walls of people being murdered. People are still suffering now, almost 80 years later.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In Auschwitz, my mother survived every imaginable horror.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would you consider meeting the son of the commandant of Auschwitz?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have never met a concentration camp survivor.

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A historic moment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Well, with me now to discuss that film is its creator and director, Daniela Volker.

Thanks so much for joining, Daniela.

DANIELA VOLKER, DIRECTOR, "THE COMMANDANT'S SHADOW": Thank you for having me.

SCIUTTO: That moment had to be powerful to witness. Tell us what the interaction was like between those two, Hans Jurgen Hoss, the son of the Auschwitz commandant, and Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, if I have the name correctly there. How did they interact?

VOLKER: Well, it was a very human meeting because he was actually very nervous, having never met a concentration camp survivor and having really only just found out the extent, the magnitude of what his father did. So she put him at ease. You know, she found common humanity.

She said, you were German, so was I, what a crazy world. And she told him about her life and asked him about his and his experiences.

So it was very moving really to see how gracious and generous she was. And I think it also meant a lot to him because, you know, he did kind of in a way realize his hereditary burden was enormous, you know, once he had been to the death camp that Anita had survived. We're, of course, nearly during 80 years since D-Day, marked the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany.

Yet, your film looks at how that trauma lives down through the generations. What did you learn about -- about that and how it remains through all those years?

VOLKER: Well, I think they interesting thing is that the Holocaust, in a way lived on in those who are touched by it on both survivor and perpetrator sides.

[15:40:02]

So I'm -- it's some -- I think it's very hard to quantify. What I did learn is that the experiences of the descendants of the survivor and the perpetrator are quite similar of toxic silence over many decades of a slow kind of in a way coming to terms and overcoming the past and the need on both sides to sort of get together and find some sort of resolution, which in our film, they find in the meeting between two people who were there at the same time, but in very different circumstances.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. The -- of course, the trauma last but sometimes memories do not. And here we are 80 years later, you have candidate for president the United States, Donald Trump, his former chief of staff, John Kelly, told me that Trump expressed admiration for Hitler, had the nerve to say he did some good things while he was president.

Do you find that people do forget some somehow over time, forget not just the facts of history, but the lessons of history?

VOLKER: Yes. And I think they also tend to trivialize. So a lot of Holocaust denial, for example, these days is not, it didn't happen just because it's so well-documented.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

VOLKER: It's -- it wasn't that bad.

SCIUTTO: Right.

VOLKER: It's not that many people died. You know, look at all these people as someone says in our film, the daughter of the commandant, you know , look at all these people who survived. You know, it can't have been that bad.

So I think perhaps this just an inability to really in a way come to terms with the actual extent. I mean, it was slaughter on an unprecedented scale. And I think that's why our film is so important because it reminds people of the past, but it also offers hope for the future.

SCIUTTO: Right. And you need both, right? You need to acknowledge the past, to perhaps to make that hope a reality.

Daniela Volker, thanks so much for joining us and thanks so much for your work on this film.

VOLKER: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: You can see "The Commandant's Shadow" in select U.S. theaters a week from today on May 29th and 30th.

We're going to take a short break. For our international viewers, "LIVING GOLF" is next. And if you are streaming on Max, we will be back with more news after a short break. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:45:31]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

An investigation is now underway after extreme turbulence hit a Singapore Airlines flight yesterday, leaving one person dead, more than 100 now injured. Data from flight tracking site Flight Radar 24 shows the Boeing 777 rapidly dropping and climbing multiple times within 90 seconds before declaring an emergency and then diverting to Bangkok.

CNN's Pete Muntean covers aviation for CNN and has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: The investigation into this incident is just beginning with investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board here in the U.S. assisting transportation investigators in Singapore on this.

Of course, they will want to look at the weather at the time of this incident, about ten hours into this 13-hour flight to Singapore is when this incident occurred over Myanmar. That is where the monsoon season is beginning and an analysis by our CNN meteorologist team says that there were rapidly developing thunderstorms in the area, developing so fast that they may have not even been visible on radar just yet.

They bloomed up in the span of an our from the tops of the anvil head of each cloud sort of signifies the amount of energy in each thunderstorm from 20,000 feet to 50,000 feet, a 30,000-foot growth in the span of just one hours time.

Now, pilots know that turbulence is often associated with thunderstorms, but it could be caused as by other things like terrain in the area, like mountains also from wind shear, different currents of air flowing over one another. It's an insidious and invisible problem. And even passengers who were injured on board this flight say they understand that pilots may have not been able to see this coming.

JOSH SILVERSTONE, INJURED PASSENGER: I'm very fortunate to come out early 24 hours later. There's no much I can do. I think the pilots, they felt the (INAUDIBLE) and they managed to kind of continue and land safely and they did an amazing job. So, yeah, I think -- no, I'm no expert on this, so I don't know, but I think they look (ph) very good.

MUNTEAN: The passengers who were injured mostly cuts and bruises. The airplane in question, a Boeing 777-300 ER built in 2008, often airplanes like this are not heard. They are stressed to incredible tolerances, especially the severity of turbulence that they experience over and over again, really rare that the turbulence is so severe though to cause a fatality.

The last piece of international data of a fatality onboard a commercial airliner was back in 2021. Before that, it was 2016.

Pete Muntean, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: Thanks to Pete Muntean for that report.

News just into CNN, that Hunter Biden's trial on tax charges has now been delayed until September. The judge presiding over that case made Hunter Biden's attorney promised he would not seek further delays beyond September. This is a separate case to the trial starting in two weeks, where the president's son is facing felony gun charges.

CNN's Marshall Cohen joins me now.

So, Marshall Cohen, to be clear, its a number of cases facing Hunter Biden. Why were they seeking a delay for this particular case?

MARSHALL COHEN, CNN REPORTER: Jim, this is a huge relief for the president's son. They wanted that delay because they said it's very difficult, if not impossible to prepare for two trials back-to-back. That's what they were facing, a gun trial on the East Coast in Delaware in two weeks, and then followed by a tax evasion trial in California at the end of June that was the plan going into today.

But just moments ago, according to our colleague, Cheri Mossburg, who was in that courtroom in L.A., the judge decided to delay the tax trial and he said, very clearly that this is the final delay. They're not going to be any more delays after that.

So this tax case is going to happen in September. This does not change the schedule for the gun case, which is just two weeks away.

To break down all these charges, Jim, just so the audience understands. Hunter Biden's accused of illegally possessing and purchasing a gun in Delaware. It's against federal law for a drug user or drug addict to buy a gun. That's what that case is about.

And then in California, he's accused of failing to pay his taxes, failing to file his taxes, and evading taxes from money that he earned in some of those very lucrative deals that he had in Ukraine, in China, and other countries overseas.

[15:50:14]

SCIUTTO: And we should note, these are, this is the same Justice Department that Republicans accused of weaponizing the system against Donald Trump. Of course, it's going to try the current presidents on twice before the election. The gun case, the one that's coming up sooner, will include a lot of personal information and frankly, embarrassing details. What do we know?

COHEN: Yeah, of course, Jim, it defies sense. If you think that the Justice Department is being weaponized to help Democrats, then this is the last thing they would do. This is the very last case that they would think about putting on because according to court filings we are expecting intensely personal details to be presented at this gun trial.

Again, the prosecutors need to prove -- to get a conviction, they need to prove that he was addicted to drugs when he bought this gun. And they're planning to bring on some of his former romantic partners who will testify in devastating detail, Jim, about his crack cocaine addiction and how it ripped their family apart and how it was a lifelong struggle for him.

And to be clear, he has been sober since 2019. He bought the gun in 2018 when he was still in the throes of this addiction. And just for the record, of course, he has pleaded not guilty and denies all wrongdoing.

SCIUTTO: Marshall Cohen, thanks so much.

Still to come, the new developments involving Elvis Presley's famed Graceland Mansion.

(COMMERCIAL; BREAK)

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

The company behind an attempt to foreclose on Graceland, Elvis Presley's famed home in Memphis, Tennessee, says they are not going to proceed with their claims.

Isabel Rosales joins us now with the latest on what have been -- well, clearly lots of twists and turns in this story. It was only earlier today a Tennessee judge put the foreclosure on hold.

So is it passed now or could this crop up again?

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jim, it is a crazy story. We have actually reached out to the attorneys for Riley Keough. She's the granddaughter of Elvis and the legal heir to Graceland to inquire about the status of her lawsuit, given this news that this company has now dropped its attempts to foreclose.

[15:55:07]

We've also reached out to the D.A.'s, attorney's office, the U.S. Attorney's office, too, asking and inquiring whether they will play any role in this legal battle, considering the accusations of fraud.

Now, according to a statement released to CNN by someone who identify themselves as a representative of Naussany Investments, this company behind this attempted foreclosure they said that they are dropping claims so with prejudice. So that sounds like they are abandoning all efforts to refile again, and this is the end of the line in this foreclosure attempt.

Now, this company says that they came to this decision in consultation with lawyers and part of the reason why they are dropping this claim is that a loan was not correctly recorded with the county. Now we know from court documents that Naussany Investments produce documents claiming that Lisa Marie Presley, before her passing, had borrowed money from them, $3.8 million and use Graceland as collateral. The company also claiming that she defaulted on that loan and therefore, Graceland belong to them.

Now, Riley Keough, the granddaughter of Elvis, again, claiming that this is all bogus, that those documents were forged, a signature on there was forged, that her mother never borrowed money, never put Graceland up as collateral, and that Naussany isn't even a real company.

And as you mentioned, Jim, earlier this morning, hours before this all came down, a Tennessee chancellor blocked -- temporarily blocked the sale of Graceland, pointing to an issue of a notary, a Florida notary in this loan paperwork. Well, that notary signed an affidavit saying she never met Lisa Marie Presley, never notarized her signature -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Goodness. Quite a story.

Isabel Rosales, thanks so much for walking us through it.

Thanks so much for all of you for joining me today. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.

"QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" is up next.