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Israel Ramps Up Strikes on Beirut and Other Parts of Lebanon; Israel Claims Nasrallah Killed. Aired 4-5a ET
Aired September 28, 2024 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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KIM BRUNHUBER, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hello and welcome to our viewers all around the world. I'm Kim Brunhuber. This is CNN NEWSROOM.
Israel and Hezbollah exchange more strikes after Israel says it targeted Hezbollah's leader in the Lebanese capital of Beirut. The latest on rising tensions in the region.
Kamala Harris visits the border and outlines her immigration policy. How the Democratic presidential nominee is trying to make gains on Donald Trump.
And what's left of Hurricane Helene is still causing problems for parts of the southeastern U.S. We'll have a look at the wide-ranging impacts of the monster storm.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from Atlanta this is CNN NEWSROOM with Kim Brunhuber.
BRUNHUBER: It's 11 am in Lebanon and its capital is reeling from the worst round of Israeli strikes in nearly 20 years. And some of its residents no longer have a place to call home.
CNN crews at the scene, say the city was pounded continuously overnight and strikes are still underway northeast of there. Now, because of that, some hospitals in parts of southern Beirut will now be evacuated.
That's where the IDF said it struck residential buildings, that house Hezbollah weapons caches on Friday. But their residents no longer have a place to live and they camped up on sidewalks overnight. You can see them there, often with little more than the shirts on their backs.
Some of them saying they were lucky to be alive.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOLDI, BEIRUT RESIDENT: We have no -- we are here for now. So we don't know. Maybe here is safe. We don't know. So we are just here by the grace of God.
AHMAD ISSA, DISPLACED CITIZEN (through translator): We fled under fire because we didn't receive the news. We were at home and had no other place to take shelter. We escaped the shelling but, thank God, we were able to get out with our children.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: Now, all of this happening a day after the IDF targeted Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, according to an Israeli official. Now the source said it's too early to say if he was killed.
In a speech at the U.N. on Friday, Israel's prime minister said his country is only doing what it has to do.
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BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, PRIME MINISTER OF ISRAEL: Would war with Hezbollah, which has hijacked your country and threatens to destroy ours, as long as Hezbollah chooses the path of war, Israel has no choice and Israel has every right to remove this threat and return our citizens to their homes safely.
And that's exactly what we're doing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BRUNHUBER: Nada Bashir is monitoring those developments and she joins us from London.
So more Israeli strikes. And just in, Israel claiming that they actually have killed Hezbollah's leader.
What's the latest?
NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. There had been some questions around the status of the Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. We are just getting this information in right now, according to the Israeli military they have claimed that Hassan Nasrallah was killed in a strike on Friday in Beirut in Lebanon.
Again, this is coming from the Israeli military. We have not yet heard from Hezbollah as an organization. We haven't heard from any senior Hezbollah leaders on the status of Hassan Nasrallah just yet. This is a developing story.
I would emphasize that we are keeping an eye on any further developments. But if indeed this is confirmed by Hezbollah, as it has been now by the Israeli military, this would be a huge, huge development, a significant shift. The potential ramifications could be cataclysmic.
We've seen, of course, senior members of Hezbollah over the past few months killed in Israeli strikes, particularly of course, in southern Lebanon as we've seen that crossfire between the Israeli military along the border with Hezbollah. We have seen senior Hamas officials also killed. Back in February we
saw Saleh al-Arouri, the political chief of Hamas, killed in the Dahiyeh suburb of Beirut. And this is an area where we have been seeing repeated strikes now, overnight.
But again, this would be a huge, significant development. All eyes would certainly be on the potential response, not only from Hezbollah in Lebanon but also, of course, from Iran-backed proxies.
And of course, from Iran itself, what that response would be. We've heard from Iranian leaders, we've heard from Iran's foreign minister as well, saying that Israel has already crossed a red line in targeting Beirut.
And of course, there have been warnings that, if Israel did seek an escalation in the conflict, did target deeper into Lebanon, that there would be a fierce response from Iran and its regional proxies.
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So it remains to be seen what response we see. And again, remains to be seen whether we hear this confirmation in the coming hours from Hezbollah itself.
BRUNHUBER: Yes, staying on that. I'm just wondering, clearly, it would be a significant blow for Hezbollah.
Can you take us through exactly how significant that might be?
BASHIR: I mean, this would be hugely, hugely significant. As I mentioned, we have already seen a number of senior Hezbollah commanders and officials killed over the course of the crossfire that we have seen between Israel and Hezbollah since October 8, on that border with southern Lebanon and Israel.
We have seen senior Hamas officials as well killed on Lebanese territory, assassinated by targeted strikes carried out by the Israeli military, though in cases Israel has not confirmed or denied involvement in these targeted assassinations.
But again, this would be a huge development, the ramifications, the consequences could be very significant in terms of the reaction and the response we see more broadly in the region, particularly from Iran.
Hassan Nasrallah of course, is the leader of Hezbollah, the secretary general. But he is also a hugely significant and symbolic figure for many in Lebanon, for many, of course, in the Shia community more broadly in the region; of course, in Iran as well.
He has been a figurehead over the course of the last year in terms of Hezbollah's response to the war in Gaza. We've been hearing repeatedly from Hezbollah officials and namely, of course, Hassan Nasrallah, that their military actions, their targeting of Israeli territory, has come in direct response to Israel's attacks on Gaza. That this will not come to an end until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
But again, there have been those warning signs and alarm bells being sounded around the potential for the war in Gaza to escalate, to spill over more broadly in the region.
That is what we are seeing now, the targeting of Lebanon, the targeting of senior officials. Now the Israeli military claiming to have killed Hassan Nasrallah. Again, we're still waiting to hear from Hezbollah on that.
Just to really touch on what we're seeing on Lebanon on the ground as well, what we are seeing is the targeting, according to the Israeli military, of Hezbollah assets. But these are areas that are densely populated, filled with civilians.
Particularly overnight and yesterday we saw the targeting and bombing of the Dahiyeh suburb in southern Beirut, an area which is crammed, filled with apartment blocks where families live.
I mean, this is a very busy, very small city and what we've seen overnight is many trying to take shelter on the streets, essentially sleeping on the streets with their children because they fear that they will be targeted next.
The Israeli military has been sending out evacuation orders very similar to what we've seen in Gaza, in fact, telling civilians that they are near what they claim to be Hezbollah weapons storage facilities, Hezbollah targets, that they need to move and get out to safety for their protection.
But these warnings are coming with very little notice. And so it's very difficult for civilians to actually get to safety in time in southern Lebanon. Of course, what we've seen over the course of the last year is a huge movement of civilians.
Many have been forced to flee their homes and evacuate, hundreds of thousands. And in fact, we've heard from the Lebanese health minister speaking to CNN earlier in the week, saying that he estimates between 400,000 to 500,000 Lebanese people have been now internally displaced as a result of Israel's targeting of Lebanese territory.
And, of course, it's important to remember that this escalation has really come about as a result of Israeli action. Of course, we've seen that crossfire between both sides on Lebanon's southern border but this is taking things to a whole new level.
And what we've been hearing from members of the international community, particularly from the United States, Israel's closest ally, is that they do not want to see an escalation. They've even called for a ceasefire.
And so far that has been rejected by the Israeli government. This latest development, the apparent reported killing of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, according to the Israeli military, will have significant consequences.
And we will, of course, be keeping an eye on the developments that follow and of course, waiting to hear from Hezbollah as well.
BRUNHUBER: Yes. And in the meantime, we don't want to forget the situation in Gaza.
What more can you tell us about what's happening there?
BASHIR: Yes, absolutely.
As we continue to focus on what's happening in Lebanon, a huge shift in development there. We cannot forget that the strikes that have been taking place in Gaza over the course of now almost a year are continuing.
We are still seeing civilians being killed. And of course, just as we've been hearing Lebanon, we're still hearing those evacuation orders in Gaza as well. But the situation has not changed.
We've been hearing from the U.N., we've been hearing from other humanitarian organizations that there simply is nowhere safe left for civilians in Gaza. And that humanitarian situation is also rapidly deteriorating still.
And I have to say, reporting on this for now, almost a year, it does feel as though the situation is only getting worse and worse. We are almost repeating ourselves on a daily basis really with regards to the humanitarian situation.
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But that is the reality on the ground. And of course, the fear is, despite calls for a ceasefire, we haven't seen any developments, positive developments on securing that ceasefire in Gaza.
Now we're hearing similar calls in Lebanon, a call for a cessation of violence there. But as calls for a ceasefire haven't been heeded in Gaza, there are real concerns that they will not be heeded in Lebanon either.
In fact, we heard from the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaking at the U.N. General Assembly. He gave a similar message, echoing remarks that we've heard in the past with regards to the situation in Gaza, saying that Israel is determined to complete and meet its military objectives.
Now, that is a huge concern, given what we've seen in Gaza. And we've been hearing from officials at the U.N. General Assembly saying they do not want to see a repeat of the situation in Gaza in Lebanon.
This is, of course, a huge point of concern and there is ramping pressure now on Israel not to escalate this any further.
BRUNHUBER: Yes, that's right. In the U.S., the Biden administration has been trying to work toward a ceasefire. But again, you point out how there has been no movement in the ceasefire and hostage deal for Gaza. Similarly with Lebanon. And it shows how impotent, I guess, the Biden
administration has been in terms of trying to get a halt to this widening war.
BASHIR: Yes, absolutely.
We heard yesterday from U.S. secretary of the State Department, Antony Blinken, giving a statement to members of the press. And he essentially was peppered with questions with regards to why there hasn't been any progress on securing a ceasefire, particularly in Lebanon.
We know, of course, that emphasis has really been brought forward by the U.S. calling on Israel to secure or agree to a ceasefire in Lebanon. Again, we haven't seen any positive movement on calls for a ceasefire in Gaza.
And there are fears that that could be the case in Lebanon as well. Of course what we have seen as well is the U.S. continuing to put forward funding for Israel. So there is a disconnect there.
And the messaging that we are hearing and, of course, what we are seeing in terms of substantial action being taken by the Biden administration, just on Thursday, Israeli officials said that they secured another $8.7 billion in military aid from the United States. (INAUDIBLE) Pentagon on that.
Of course that is a point of concern for many who have called not only for a ceasefire but, of course, for a shift in U.S. foreign policy when it comes to support for Israel.
We've seen huge protests, of course, in Israel itself, many saying that they believe the government in Israel has not done enough to secure the release of hostages, to bring an end to the war in Gaza. So there is pressure coming on Israel from all sides.
But as you said, Kim, we really haven't seen at substantial action being taken in terms of international community response to put pressure on Israel to agree to the ceasefire agreement.
We know that Hezbollah has repeatedly said in Lebanon, their military actions targeting Israeli territory will come to an end when there is a ceasefire in Gaza. But at this stage, it feels as though that is a hopeless point at this point.
BRUNHUBER: All right, I really appreciate all of those insights. Nada Bashir, thank you so much.
I want to bring in Nic Robertson in Tel Aviv.
Nic, again, the news just in, Israel claiming they've killed Hezbollah's leader.
What more can you tell us?
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, this is something that had certainly been circulating and heavily speculated.
And the length of time that it had taken Hezbollah not to be able to give clarity about Hassan Nasrallah's circumstance following that massive targeted strike on the underground complex that the IDF said that it was hitting in central Beirut late yesterday.
The speculation had been growing here that the IDF had accomplished what it said it set out to do. And now, of course, the IDF has said that and it's interesting. We've just heard from the army chief of staff here, General Herzi Halevi. And he has said, this is not the end of our toolbox.
This is a message, he says, for anyone who would want to continue to strike at Israel. The clear implication is that, if other members of Hezbollah continue to strike at Israel, then Israel is going to continue to fire back and target at them.
That will perhaps come as no surprise but those are the first official words we have had from a senior military commander in the IDF, the top commander in the army, the IDF's chief of staff, making it very clear that this is not over, that the targeting and, now they claim, the killing of Hassan Nasrallah is not the end of their operations in Lebanon.
And that this will continue. And I think the other thing to say from here is that, with that speculation overnight and now the confirmation of this news.
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I think there will be a growing level of concern here in Israel about what happens next.
What does Iran do?
What does Hezbollah do?
Obviously, the IDF is trying to prevent more Hezbollah strikes into Israel. But the expectation will be here that, as Israel struggled on October 7th to Hamas' massive and brutal attack then, that it took them some time to find their feet and organize a coordinated response.
It is going to be similar for Hezbollah now.
That's what the people of Israel are expecting. That's what they are wondering, what -- precisely what will happen, when will it happen?
So I think we're going to see a level of concern over this weekend begin to grow and perhaps later today, at the end of the end of Shabbat today, there will be government officials who will come forward and give their assessment and perhaps bring you, know a sense of what they say is going to happen.
And if you will, a level of -- I wouldn't say there's a level of calm (ph) might be the right words but the situation is not uncalm at the moment. But it is certainly expectant and concerned about what comes next.
BRUNHUBER: On what comes next with Hezbollah's infrastructure both militarily and the leadership going now, all the way potentially right to the top, destroyed, what are Hezbollah's options here in terms of response?
ROBERTSON: Hezbollah has a massive force. And what has been targeted has been its weapons storage, its command and control and its leadership and the ability of its leadership to take big, coordinated decisions.
So, there absolutely will still be weapons still in the field, with smaller units who are able to act unilaterally and without necessarily needing to hear from commanders.
But there will be, of course, weapons that are in deeper storage that Israel, that the IDF has not targeted yet. And it will be these weapons that Hezbollah will begin to turn to and to figure out how they can best use it.
And I think a lot of people here in Israel will be reminded that, just a couple of weeks ago, Hezbollah released video of what purported to be deep tunnels carved into mountains, carved into rock, in which trucks were moving around, in which there were heavy ballistic missiles that could be fired from openings in the mountain sides.
So people will be aware that structures like this may exist. And I talked to officials about these videos. And they say there's no reason not to take those videos at face value because Hezbollah has had many, many, many years to shape and prepare its response to Israel, should this day arrive.
So there will, there is within the IDF an expectation that, once Hezbollah figures out its command and control, it will be able to turn to weapons systems that have so far been protected, weapons systems that are designed to be used in this type of scenario from places that it's very hard for the IDF to hit and target.
But without that command and control, that is the key thing for a coordinated response and, on that issue, this is perhaps the area where the IDF feels that it's done the best job so far, depleting the command and control.
We've had the defense minister say that has happened. We've had the army chief of staff in the last few days say that the command and control, the morale of Hezbollah, has been hit.
But I don't think anyone should be mistaken that Hezbollah is broken. It is not. It is tens of thousands of fighters, with weapons, stockpiles of ammunition and long-range, short-range, medium range missiles.
The question for them will be to figure out how to organize and get a chain of command that can give direction over what comes next. And the anticipation would be that, in that process, there would be consultation with Iranian officials. Hassan Nasrallah has been very, very cautious with Hezbollah about not
being drawn, not being goaded into a massive, all-out escalation with Israel, as Israel has escalated strikes over the border into Lebanon.
And the question will now be, what sort of leader emerges?
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And are they less risk averse?
And the principal sponsors who have an absolute vested interest in this, of course, are Iran. So that will be likely that they would have a voice in this.
I think the reality is that the understanding from here at least would be that the leadership at the moment is in such a state of shock. There may be a period of slight paralysis. But that's only going to be a slight paralysis for a short period, very likely.
BRUNHUBER: All right, appreciate that. Nic Robertson, thanks so much.
I want to bring back Nada Bashir in London.
So Nada, I want to build on what Nic was just saying there about Iran and the wider reaction in the region for Iran.
I mean, would this represent some sort of red line for them?
BASHIR: Well, we've already heard from Iranian officials describing the targeting of Lebanese territory or deeper into Lebanese territory, including in Beirut, the capital, as crossing a red line.
We've been hearing those warnings from Iranian officials for some time now. Of course, this will be a significant development. And in fact, we've heard similar messaging in the past from Iranian officials following the killing of other most senior Hezbollah commanders as well as senior Hamas officials who have been killed.
Of course, Ismail Haniyeh, Saleh al-Arouri, who was killed in February in Beirut actually. So this will be a significant development. Hassan Nasrallah not only the secretary general of Hezbollah but also a significant symbolic figure for many in Lebanon, for many in the Shia community across the region.
More broadly, certainly in Iran. And this will draw action from many in Iran, who will, of course, have been supportive of Hassan Nasrallah and Hezbollah as an organization. But of course, that remains to be seen.
Of course, the situation in Lebanon is growing more dire. This will, of course, perhaps put more pressure on Iran to take further action. We have seen action taken in the past by Iran's proxies in the region. We have seen direct targeting of Israeli territory by Iran itself.
But as the situation grows more desperate in Lebanon, that has certainly put pressure on Iran to take further action. We have seen the bombing of areas hat are densely populated with civilians overnight.
This is a country that has already been through so, so much in recent years from a collapsing economy that has really pushed many in Lebanon into the brink of desperation, to, of course, the port blast in 2020. And now this.
And, of course, we have seen that huge number of civilians killed already and warnings from officials across the globe, particularly international leaders at the U.N. General Assembly in New York, that we cannot allow what we have seen in Gaza to be replicated in Lebanon.
But of course, that is something we've heard from Israeli military officials in the past, saying that what is happening in Gaza can be, in their words, copy and pasted in Beirut. Those warnings have been coming in from months prior.
And now what we are seeing in Beirut is what the Israeli military terms and claims to be a targeted bombing campaign, targeting Hezbollah assets, targeting Hezbollah officials, weapons, store facilities, et cetera.
But again, these are areas that are densely populated, filled with civilians and families. Just as we have seen in Gaza, we're hearing those evacuation orders once again from the Israeli military with little time for civilians to actually get out to safety.
And there are fears that this could only be the beginning, that we could continue to see this situation spiraling. That was certainly the warning from Lebanon's foreign minister, who has called on the international community to take action, to intervene, to prevent the situation in Lebanon from spiraling out of control.
Not only the situation in Lebanon but more broadly in the region as well. Of course, important to underscore that the situation in Lebanon is deeply connected to Iran's proxies more broadly in the region. And there may well be a response from those proxies targeting Israel, as you heard from Nic Robertson just there.
There may be some heightened concern in Israel around that as well. But again, this will be a significant shift with significant consequences, certainly.
BRUNHUBER: All right.
Appreciate that, Nada Bashir in London.
I want to go now to Fawaz Gerges, professor of international relations at the London School of Economics.
Thank you so much for being here with us. So again, the news just in. Israel claiming that they've killed Hezbollah's leader. We have no word, no confirmation of that yet, as I understand.
But if indeed he is dead, I mean, what kind of blow would that be for Hezbollah? FAWAZ GERGES, DIR. MIDDLE EAST CENTER, LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS:
Well, significant blow. Hezbollah -- I mean, Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, is the beating heart of the organization.
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He's an iconic figure. His followers, his supporters, millions of his followers think of him in terms of a -- they worship his charisma, his personality.
But what we need to understand is that Nasrallah is not only an iconic figure in Lebanon, he is an iconic figure, the glue that connects the axis of resistance throughout the region. So really Nasrallah is much bigger than Hezbollah.
In fact, he is as big as the supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, for the axis of resistance, whether you're talking about Yemen or Iraq or Syria. And even many Iranians look at him as basically the glue that basically connects the various groups that support Israel.
So if Nasrallah has been killed, as the Israeli army claims, we still have not heard a word from Hezbollah. We have to wait and see. I think this will be a major blow. But having said so, I think it would be extremely misleading to write the obituary of Hezbollah.
Hezbollah is deeply embedded in the social, political and institutional structure of Lebanon. Hezbollah is much bigger than one leader, even including Nasrallah, fitly institutionalized, deeply institutionalized.
You have scores of leaders who could basically replace Nasrallah, even though they won't have the charisma and the iconic figure. So this is not the end of Hezbollah, even though it's a shattering blow, because Nasrallah has been at the helm of Hezbollah for the past three decades or so.
BRUNHUBER: In terms of who might replace him, I mean, is there a second in command who would easily ascend to take over?
Or is that still to be determined?
GERGES: No, there is a second in command. And that's why I'm saying that Hezbollah, what we need to think of it really, is a very institutionalized, both political and military organization. It's not a one man's show, even though Nasrallah is the beating heart of Hezbollah.
He is just iconic for the party followers and supporters and the axis of resistance and the region. You have multiple leaders, even though I think most probably that Hashem Safieddine, his second in command, who is -- who comes from a similar social and political and ideological background, has similar also religious education and training.
And he has, Nasrallah has been really preparing Hashem Safieddine for this particular role for the past few years. But again, we have to wait and see to hear from Hezbollah. The fact that we have not heard officially from Hezbollah for the past 12 hours tells me that Habi Adiwon (ph) survived in the four buildings that they were bombed by Israel.
But regardless, I think what we really, what we have seen, what we are witnessing now, it's all-out war. As you know, for your viewers, we have been warning about this particular tipping point for the past 12 months.
Finally, Israeli prime minister has his wish because, really, in a way, Netanyahu has declared war not only against Hamas but even against Hezbollah. And yesterday, from the podium at the United Nations, Nasrallah (sic) threatened Iran directly.
He's saying there is no place in Iran that we cannot really reach. So in a way, despite the pleas by the Americans and the French and the British and the Europeans, Netanyahu has decided to really -- he wants to have total victory not only against Hamas but against Hezbollah.
And probably he is gunning for Iran, he is hoping that Iran would retaliate. It gives them the justification to go after Iran's nuclear program as well.
BRUNHUBER: Last we spoke, we were talking about Israel's strategy as opportunistic, attacking Hezbollah with a level of impunity, knowing that Hezbollah's response would be constrained by not wanting to provoke all-out war.
With this, with presumably with its leader killed, does that change the calculus here?
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Is, as you say, all-out war basically now at their doorstep anyway?
GERGES: Absolutely. I mean, I think that there are no really real guards anymore, no limits. I think what we need to tell our viewers is to really be -- have clarity. The Israeli prime minister and his government have decided to have all-out war. Hezbollah has no other choice. It's a matter of capabilities. It's a matter of capacity.
Remember, Israel has been able to erode a great deal of Hezbollah's capabilities in the past couple of weeks. It has killed scores of its leaders. It has neutralized and injured thousands of its rank and file.
I mean, in the past while, as Israel has been bombing nonstop, you have a major displacement crisis in Lebanon. Hospitals are overwhelmed. Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese on the run. So what you really have is now all-out war. And Hezbollah, I think is basically positioning itself for the long war.
Look, and I'm not -- I'm trying to really be critical and informative. Israel will not be able to achieve its overarching aims in Lebanon by just bombing Lebanon. It cannot do it by air force. Even the Americans could not do it in Afghanistan and Iraq. They had to sound, they had to send boots on the ground. At the end of the day, regardless of how much damage Israel can and
could do -- and it has done a lot of damage -- it has to launch a ground, basically invasion in order to really prevent Hezbollah from bombing its towns and cities.
But we know very well that a ground war, Israel will -- basically if and when Israel's ground war happens, it basically will fall into Hezbollah's trap because Hezbollah wants Israel to attack militarily because that's the only way that Hezbollah could basically inflict damage.
I mean, see its damage on Israel. But I expect the next few days and next few weeks, the next few months, you're going to have strategic escalation. Once Hezbollah really has basically -- is in charge of its capabilities, you're going to see hundreds, if not thousands, of long- term, precise missiles fired at Israeli towns and cities.
So the war has not started from Hezbollah's point of view. Israel now is celebrating the damage that it has inflicted on Hezbollah. But remember, Israel has started this war. Israel can never, will never be able to finish this war on its own terms.
And sadly and tragically, we have seen this before. Once you start a war, you don't really determine its conclusion. As we have -- I mean, whether you're talking about the American invasion of Afghanistan or Iraq or, in fact, now Israel's war in Gaza.
BRUNHUBER: Really appreciate getting your analysis on this, Fawaz Gerges.
Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.
GERGES: Thanks. Thanks.
BRUNHUBER: All right. I want to go back to Nada Bashir in London and Nic Robertson in Tel Aviv.
Just to update everybody on what just happened, Israel claiming that it has killed Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah.
So Nic, we just heard there from our expert, talking about how he represented sort of the beating heart of Hezbollah. He was -- he was as big as Iran's supreme leader. So take us through exactly what his death might mean for the group.
ROBERTSON: Yes. Iconic, charismatic, part of the fabric of Hezbollah and beyond and its affiliates throughout the region. Absolutely. A huge figure and his face looked down on the people of Beirut and elsewhere in Lebanon, where his support was strong.
There were huge banners and posters of him. When he spoke, everyone would tune in, they would hang on every single word that he had to say. I was struck by what Fawaz Gerges said there at the end, that I think that's significant, particularly when you compare to what we're hearing from Israeli officials right now. What Fawaz said there was that, while Israel has sort of started this
war, they won't be able well to dictate the way that it ends. They won't be able to dictate the coming steps. But this is precisely the signal. The reverse of that, that the army chief of staff, the IDF chief of staff, General Herzi Halevi is giving.
I mentioned before that he said, this is not the only tool in our toolbox. We are preparing for the next things, he says.
[04:35:00]
Be sure, anyone that strikes Israel, the people of Israel, we will, we will get them back. We can reach them in the north. We can reach them in the south. We can reach them even further away.
So he's making it very, very clear there that Israel is already preparing its next steps. I mean, let's take one of our own steps back here, to look at the broader picture. Israel has been preparing for this moment for almost 20 years. Hezbollah, too, has been preparing for a long time.
So what Israel is doing right now, the battle plan that it's executing, the leaders that it's executing, all of this has been planned. It has been formulated. And the messaging right now is it doesn't stop with Hassan Nasrallah, that it will continue.
And I think we got a sense of that as well from another thing that General Herzi Halevi had to say this morning after the announcement of, the IDF announcing that they have killed Hassan Nasrallah.
He said, we'd been preparing for this for a long time. We did it at the right time. These are his words. We are now preparing for the next thing.
So when we talk about Israel preparing for this, what does that actually look like?
What did, what does it mean?
It means they figured out, they believe, who the top commanders are, who that they should be targeting, remembering that the first people, the big commanders they targeted were the ones from the Radwan force, this sort of elite force that was in charge of the southern border.
The most direct and imminent threat to Israel coming from the southern border of Lebanon into the north of Israel and they targeted them. They had already sort of hit at the command and control structure by going after the pagers and the intercom, the walkie-talkies, which restricted or disrupted Hezbollah's ability to communicate.
And then after that, they'd gone after the commanders who've been in control of the drones, the commanders who were in control of the missiles, who have been in control and in charge of the south.
So this plan that they've executed has been to degrade Hezbollah's ability in the short term, to target Israel. What again -- and I go back to that question -- does 20 years of
preparation look like it look like?
It looks like and was and is a team, a large team, that was dedicated, absolutely dedicated to finding Hezbollah targets inside of Lebanon and beyond, where weapons were being smuggled in, where the weapons were being stored.
What intelligence assets could they could they get on the ground?
Who could inform the IDF about what Hezbollah was doing?
This is -- it's not like operating in Gaza, which is very much a sealed place where the IDF really lacked accurate and useful intelligence, which is why they didn't know the October 7th huge attacks were coming.
In Lebanon, it's a different scenario and entity. Hezbollah has extremely good security, extremely good vetting, is extremely wary of people and elements that they don't know and don't understand.
Yet over the course of 20 years, Israel would have been able to generate lines of intelligence coming from disaffected individuals, coming from people who are perhaps receiving substantial amounts of money to inform on Hezbollah's movements.
Even maybe informants within the organization of Hezbollah itself.
Why do I say that?
Because that is the way that armies have worked their way around the world. That's the way that the British government worked against the IRA in Northern Ireland, deep, deep intelligence penetration.
And really that's part of what we're witnessing here right now. So those 20 years of preparation, not just knowing where the -- where the missiles are stored, is, knowing the movements of the commanders and how to get them.
So the question that will be on the minds of the Hezbollah commanders who are sort of trying to restructure and regroup right now is, you know, who else is informing on them?
How vulnerable are they?
How are they going to make sure there -- that they and their weapons are safe?
So a very, very complex scenario has been triggered here. But again, just to underscore that deep, deep level of planning -- and the IDF saying that they have more essentially targets planned.
BRUNHUBER: All right, really appreciate that.
Nic Robertson. Thank you so much.
I want to go now to Hong Kong. We're joined by Ivan Watson.
So Ivan, you have a close connection with Lebanon. You have family there.
[04:40:00]
So take us through the impact on civilians as, now with the death of Hassan Nasrallah, this war threatens to tear the country apart.
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, look, it's important to note the tragic history that Lebanon as a country has suffered.
I mean, just in the last couple of years, if you consider that there was a massive economic crisis in 2021, which is weighted as one of the worst kind of economic downturns that has been seen in a century.
You had this enormous port blast in 2020 that shattered much of downtown Beirut. In 2019, you had a failed protest movement to try to reform the system of government. To this day, there is no president right now. There hasn't been for more than a year.
In Lebanon, the competing factions haven't been able to agree on one. Lebanon is a country that endured years of Israeli military occupation, of Syrian military occupation, one that ended in 2001, that it ended in 2005.
And, of course, its own disastrous civil war that went on for some 15 years. And you can see the scars of all of these conflicts and crises just on the sides of buildings as you travel around the country. And every family has felt, every family in Lebanon has felt these crises and these traumas.
And you see it in the diaspora of Lebanese people scattered around the world. And when they come home for their holidays to visit those relatives, who stay in their country -- and the violence of the last week-and-a-half I think has rekindled enormous trauma in enormous number of people.
This is not the first time that the southern suburbs, that Israeli warplanes have bombed the southern suburbs of Beirut. They were devastated in the 2006 month-long war that Hezbollah fought against Israel.
And now, once again, there are fears that Lebanon is in for yet another war with Israel, a country that has battled it many times in years past. So the discussions that people are having is, how to get out, how to take their children, their elderly relatives to safety.
News of the claims, the purported claims, that Nasrallah may have been killed, are raising new rounds of discussions. While Hezbollah was hands down, is hands down the most powerful political and military faction in Lebanon, this is still a very polarized country that's divided by religious groups and by ideologies.
Even its detractors would argue that Hezbollah had a certain level of discipline and reputation for less corruption than the many other political factions in that country. That said, it had many enemies.
We've seen reports of people in opposition controlled parts of Syria celebrating the bombardment of Hezbollah targets overnight because Hezbollah participated in the atrocious civil war in neighboring Syria on the side of the governing Assad regime there, against a largely Sunni Arab uprising.
All going to show that this is, this is a country in a movement with a very checkered history. And there are more questions than answers right now about what this will mean.
In just a week, we have seen more Lebanese casualties in Israel's bombing campaign, in just a day, almost half the casualties that were witnessed in a month-long war in 2006. And I think many people are afraid that Israel is not done with bombing Lebanese cities, villages and towns.
BRUNHUBER: All right.
I appreciate that. Ivan Watson. Thank you so much.
So we just want to give you an update on our breaking news. Israel military claims that the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an airstrike in Beirut yesterday. Now Hezbollah hasn't commented so far.
The IDF said in a statement, quote, "Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Hezbollah terrorist organization and one of its founders, was eliminated by the IDF, together with Ali Kharkiv, the commander of Hezbollah's southern front, and additional Hezbollah leaders."
All right. I want to bring in H.A. Hellyer, Middle East studies scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
And he joins now, live from Athens.
Thanks so much for being here. I just want to get off the bat your take on the news, not confirmed yet by Hezbollah but certainly Israel claiming that they have killed Hezbollah's head.
[04:45:05]
What do you think?
H.A. HELLYER, SENIOR ASSOCIATE FELLOW, ROYAL UNITED SERVICES INSTITUTE: Thank you so much for the invitation. I think you'll have a lot of people today having takes on what's happened and having predictions about what's going to happen.
I suspect that many of them are going to be very wrong, not because I'm a better analyst than they are but because I think it needs to be recognized there are lots of wild cards in this situation right now.
We do not know, for example, how Iran is going to respond. We don't know who's going to take over from Hassan Nasrallah. What we do know is that, in the past, the previous leader of Hezbollah, Abbas al- Musawi, when he was assassinated by the Israelis in the '90s, the assumption was, oh, Hezbollah has taken a fatal blow or something.
And Nasrallah turned out to be a much more dangerous leader of Hezbollah than Musawi. So we don't know what's going to happen next. We do know that, in the strike that took out Nasrallah, until this is verified, yesterday, six buildings were leveled. Hundreds of Lebanese were killed, the vast majority of whom would have been civilians.
And I think that we're entering into a phase of quite reckless escalation, where we don't know where the spiral is going to wind up but that the possibility for a much wider regional confrontation still remains.
And I think it's really important that we push as much as possible for de-escalation in order to avert a catastrophe that would engulf the entirety of the region.
BRUNHUBER: The Biden administration has been pushing for de- escalation, of course but that the momentum of this war seems to be going in the entire opposite direction with this latest assassination, possibly, of Hassan Nasrallah.
Again, we stand much closer to the brink of war than before. Impossible to know exactly how Hezbollah will respond. And certainly you mentioned Iran there as well.
But do you have a sense of what the response would be, now that perhaps they might not be constrained by the idea of trying to avoid escalation?
Because clearly open war seems to be upon them.
HELLYER: So I would just like to clarify it, when it comes to the Biden administration, they have pushed forward with the rhetoric in terms of de-escalation. But they haven't pushed forward with policy.
The Biden administration, along with France and a multitude of other countries, earlier in the week, engaged with the Israelis in order to get a ceasefire proposal on the table. They then announced a ceasefire proposal after having consulted the Israelis ahead of time.
And then the Netanyahu government turned around after the ceasefire proposal was announced and said no. And promptly hours later then bombs. So then Beirut, destroying and leveling those six buildings, which also included the apparent assassination of Nasrallah.
The Biden administration has not taken the steps in order to force a change in Israeli behavior, which means that the Israelis really have no reason to think that there would be consequence for escalation and for more reckless action.
And I think that, as long as that is the case, we have to be extremely concerned. There are no checks or balances on this, even though there are tremendous amounts of leverage that the United States in particular could use in order to push forward a ceasefire, not only in Lebanon but also in Gaza. But as we've seen over the past 12 months, they've been unwilling to
use that leverage. This is a deliberate choice. It's not because they've tried using all the tools in their arsenal. In terms of the Iranian response, again for Iran, Hezbollah is a huge card to play.
And I think what you've seen over the past year is that the Iranians have been unwilling to escalate past a certain point. They've also been reckless but not quite to the same degree. And now they've seen Hezbollah take a massive hit in Lebanon just over the past week.
And of course, with the assassination of Nasrallah, it's only increased the image of Hezbollah being a much weaker organization than it was otherwise portrayed to be. And I think that that creates a very difficult situation for the Iranian regime that has been relying on Hezbollah as that sort of ace in the hole.
And I'm not sure what they intend to now use it for.
BRUNHUBER: We'll leave it there.
[04:50:00]
We really appreciate getting your analysis. H.A. Hellyer with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, thank you so much.
All right. I want to bring in CNN's Jeremy Diamond, who's standing right in Haifa, Israel.
So Jeremy, you're in one of the areas that that has been fired upon by Hezbollah. Take me through the reaction there.
JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, there's no question that Israelis are celebrating this moment today.
Hassan Nasrallah, in his more than three decades at the helm of Hezbollah, was certainly responsible for the killing of many Israeli civilians and soldiers. And that is the frame of mind within which his killing is being viewed here in Israel.
But make no mistake. This is an earth-shattering moment, whether you opposed and reviled Hassan Nasrallah or, like some in Lebanon, whether you supported him, because of the enormous geopolitical impact that his death is going to have.
The question is, how will it impact things on the ground?
There's no question that there is a real risk of things spiraling out of control in the wake of Hassan Nasrallah's death. But also clearly this is a moment where Hezbollah, what remains of its leadership, as well as Iran, which has funded and supported and closely coordinated with Hezbollah for years now.
They are going to have to decide what happens next, who takes over the helm of Hezbollah.
And how does his killing and the bombing that left many others dead in this Beirut strike as well, how will this, what will the response be from Hezbollah, from Iran, as well as from the other Iranian proxies in the region?
And that much remains uncertain at this time. We have already seen that Hezbollah fired several rounds of rockets toward northern Israel in the wake of the Israeli military announcing Nasrallah's death.
But certainly that is not the extent of the response that we are likely going to see from Hezbollah and perhaps also from Iran. So this certainly puts us a knife's edge in this region.
And this is one of the most significant moments of this nearly year- long conflict that we have seen roiling the Middle East. The Israeli military has been touting this success, this morning, saying that they acted with precise intelligence, that they had been planning this strike for some time.
And that ultimately they chose to carry it out at what they are describing at the right time. It seems quite clear that the Israeli military has been aware for a long time now of this central Hezbollah headquarters underneath this Dahiyeh suburb in Beirut in the Lebanese capital.
And clearly this was a target of opportunity. They got the intelligence that Nasrallah was in this underground compound and they chose to carry out this strike, no less while the Israeli prime minister himself was actually out of Israel, traveling in New York for the U.N. General Assembly.
There was a photo that the Israelis released of Netanyahu approving that strike while he was in New York. Again, an enormous moment in this conflict. We don't know exactly how it will change the course of things. But there is no question at all that it will have an enormous impact.
BRUNHUBER: Yes, absolutely.
So to follow up on that, I mean, Israel's army chief has warned that this is not the end of our toolbox.
So where does Israel's campaign go from here, do you think?
DIAMOND: It is notable, first of all, that they are warning that more will come. And we already saw last night, in the wake of this strike on Hassan Nasrallah, that the Israeli military carried out multiple airstrikes in the Lebanese capital, something that was once viewed as extraordinarily rare, to strike within the Lebanese capital.
Over the course of this last year now becoming a regular occurrence and one that put the lives of many Lebanese civilians living in those southern suburbs of Beirut very much at risk. The Israeli military issuing evacuation orders.
But only minutes or sometimes, hours later carrying out strikes on those very locations where they told people to evacuate. Certainly not much time for people to get to safety. The Israeli military, over the course of the last week, has been saying that they are preparing for the possibility of a ground invasion of Lebanon.
When we were up traveling near the northern border in Israel yesterday, we saw fields with multiple tanks and armored personnel vehicles, the kinds of preparations that might be being made for the potential of a ground incursion.
Although we don't know that enough forces have yet been brought into the northern border to actually carry that out. And certainly one thing is clear, is that the Israeli government has not yet decided whether or not that is the step that they want to take.
[04:55:00]
Whether or not they want to move forward with that. And they are simply laying that out on the table as a distinct possibility.
We do know, though, that the Israeli military, in taking out Hassan Nasrallah, certainly they are going to view that as a tremendous success. And it's not just Nasrallah, it's the fact that they have taken out so much of Hezbollah's leadership structure over the course of the last couple of weeks alone.
And that is dealing a severe blow to Hezbollah, which is going to have to regroup and figure out what it does next.
BRUNHUBER: All right, appreciate that. Jeremy Diamond in Haifa. Thank you so much.
I want to bring back Nada Bashir in London.
We're just getting word from the IDF that they say they don't know how many civilians were killed in that strike on Hassan Nasrallah but we certainly are getting the impression that the amount of civilian casualties, they would have certainly been willing to trans (ph) those, given what was at stake for them.
What more can you tell us?
BASHIR: I mean, the level of civilian casualties that we have seen in the specific timeframe is significant and unprecedented.
And the fact that the Israeli military has targeted an area that is so densely populated, that is known to be so densely populated with civilians, is certainly a huge point of concern and troubling, regardless of the stakes for the Israeli military, at least from the Israeli military perspective.
And, of course, this is going to have significant ramifications for Lebanon's civilian population. We've already seen hundreds of thousands displaced already.
BRUNHUBER: We will have to leave it there for now.
Are we still -- we still have a minute to go?
All right. So before we go, I just want to get any more reaction that we're seeing from the region to this, as this news of Hezbollah's leader potentially being killed sort of filters through.
BASHIR: Well, look, we're still waiting to hear from Hezbollah as an organization with regards to this statement from the Israeli military.
But, of course, all eyes will be waiting to see the broader regional reaction. This will have significant regional ramifications. And all eyes will certainly be on Iran, of course, to hear the reaction from there.
We've already heard from Iranian officials describing the targeting of Beirut in the past few days as a red line, as a significant escalation. Hassan Nasrallah, not only a key figure in Lebanon but of course, more broadly in the region, a crucial ally to Iran.
So there will be an expected response from the Iranian regime. Of course, it remains to be seen this confirmation for Hezbollah and, of course, how this triggers any sort of reaction from Iran and its regional proxies, whether or not we do see a reaction in terms of military action from Iran and its proxies or whether perhaps there is restraint.
But again, this is a huge blow, a significant escalation. This follows the killing of a number of senior Hezbollah officials and commanders as well as Hamas officials, including Hamas' political leader Ismail Haniyeh, including Hamas' deputy political leader Saleh al Arouri, who was assassinated in Beirut.
This is a huge tipping point, a significant, significant escalation.
BRUNHUBER: Yes, absolutely. And for the people of Lebanon, as we've been saying, to, again, be plunged into possibly all-out war here, you can imagine how desperate they are for this not to happen. Take us through just the sense of desperation there in Lebanon as this war continues to heat up.
BASHIR: This is a country that has seen war time and time again. This is a country which, just in the last few years, has gone through a number of crises and economic collapse, which just pushed many in the country to the point of desperation, the brink of desperation.
We've seen the port blast in 2020. Again, significant ramifications for the civilian population across Beirut. And now this. And there have been fears for some time now of an all-out war with Israel.
We've, of course, seen that crossfire between Israel and Hezbollah along Lebanon's southern border, which has already pushed around 100,000 people out of their homes, forced them to evacuate that region.
Now we are seeing even more civilians being forced to evacuate across the country. The health minister Lebanon telling CNN, he estimates around 400,000 to 500,000 have now been internally displaced.
And it is a desperate situation. Our colleagues were on the ground yesterday in Beirut, seeing families on the streets overnight, essentially escaping their apartments and homes for fear that they could then be struck.
Next, we're hearing those evacuation orders from the Israeli military, telling civilians in specific pockets that they need to evacuate because they are close to, according to the Israeli military, Hezbollah targets.
But what we are also hearing from many on the ground is that those warnings are not giving them enough time to gather their belongings together, their family members and, make it out to safety in time. So this is a hugely desperate and terrifying situation for many on the ground.
BRUNHUBER: Yes, absolutely. All right. Really appreciate that.
[05:00:00]
Nada Bashir.
Once again, our news just in, Israel claims that they've killed Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah. We're going to have a lot more on this story, including reaction all over the region coming up here on CNN NEWSROOM.
I'm Kim Brunhuber, please stay with us as our coverage continues.
