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Trump Holds National Security Meeting Amid Mideast Conflict; New Strikes In Israel And Iran As Conflict Enters Second Week; Israeli Missile Hit Residential Building In Iran; Activist Mahmoud Khalil Arrives In New Jersey After Release From ICE Detention; Iranians Injured By Strikes Speak To CNN From Hospital Beds In Tehran, At Least Eight Dead After Hot Air Balloon Accident In Southern Brazil, Trump: "We Have Completed Our Very Successful Attack On The Three Nuclear Sites In Iran. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired June 21, 2025 - 19:00   ET

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

[19:00:38]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN ANCHOR: You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jessica Dean in New York.

We do begin with breaking news out of Washington. Right now President Trump is meeting with his National Security Team in the Oval Office as he considers taking U.S. military action in the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran. This as multiple U.S. B-2 Stealth bombers head west after taking off from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. We also have learned tonight U.S. citizens have been evacuated from Israel on flights to Greece.

CNN's Alayna Treene is live outside the White House with more details.

Alayna, look, those Stealth bombers have been moved. We've been told not to see that as an indication that any decision has been made yet. That these are just preparations. What are we expecting from this meeting tonight in the Oval Office?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Look, Jessica, I think obviously it's notable that the president has continued to hold a National Security meeting with his team essentially every single day this week as he continues to monitor the situation between Israel and Iran, but also as he continues to weigh this decision of whether or not to involve the United States militarily in a more offensive posture, and helping the Israelis strike some of these nuclear facilities.

Now, in my conversations with White House officials, I have been told that the president's mindset remains that he is still trying to decide what to do here. He does -- would prefer, I should say, is what I'm being told from these White House officials, a diplomatic solution to this. However, of course, they also add that the Iranians need to be far more forthcoming in some of the concessions, really willing to meet the standards that this administration is looking for in a potential deal.

That includes what we heard them outline this week of agreeing to zero enrichment of uranium, something we've so far not heard the Iranians agree to. And essentially what we've been told is that as the president weighed this, if Tehran does not budge, they could, ultimately we could see the president, you know, move forward with some of those attack plans that we know he reviewed earlier this night but decided to hold off on.

Now, I will also add that we did see the president touch down just moments ago on the South Lawn. He did not stop to take questions from us reporters, although we were out there hoping that he would. That is unusual for this president. He often likes to stop and talk with the press as we know, and so unusual that he has not done so at all today, despite given multiple opportunities.

But as for this meeting specifically, look, he's going to be briefed by his National Security officials. We did spot CIA Director John Ratcliffe entering the West Wing moments after he landed back here at the White House. They'll probably be giving him an update of where everything stands. And really, you know, we're now waiting to see what the president will do within that two-week time frame that he said he is going to need in order to make this decision.

DEAN: And Alayna, what more do we know about this decision to send these B-2 Stealth bombers west and get them on the move?

TREENE: Well, it's significant that they appear to have left that air force base in Missouri and are headed west, because we know that these B-2 bombers, Jessica, are the type of weapons that experts say are the only type of bombs that could really penetrate Fordow, that nuclear site in Iran that is really built deep down underground.

And we've now learned, of course, that the Israelis are not able to reach that with their own weapons. At least that has been what experts on this have suggested. However, and you mentioned this, we are told from U.S. officials that that does not necessarily mean, despite them leaving that base and headed west does not mean that the president is any closer to wanting to bring the U.S. into a more military role in this and that he's made up his mind whatsoever.

They also say that does not mean a decision is imminent, but rather that they are trying to preserve his options. And so all of this, of course, really, as the world is watching and waiting to see what he'll do, it also comes, of course, as we know that many people in the American public, including the president's own supporters, are a bit split on what they want him to do. You know, you have that one camp, including several people of the president's allies, people like Senator Lindsey Graham and Senator Ted Cruz, who believe the United States needs to stand firmly behind Israel on this and act to make sure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon.

And then you have the other side that really does not want the United States getting dragged into another foreign war. So this is all, of course, weighing on the president as he continues to monitor the situation and ultimately make a decision within this two-week time frame that he's laid out.

DEAN: All right, that meeting is ongoing there at the White House. [19:05:02]

Alayna Treene, thank you very much for the latest update.

And as President Trump does weigh those military options, Israel's military claims to have struck drone facilities, fighter jets and even radar sites all across Iran.

CNN international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson has the latest on that conflict from Haifa, Israel -- Nic.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: So far there have been no sirens across the country. It's been a relatively quiet day. The last barrage of incoming ballistic missiles from Iran was almost 24 hours ago, and that was a very small barrage, according to the IDF. Just a few missiles. There were UAVs, a number 40 or so sent towards Israel from Iran. Two managed to get through, one landed in open area, one hit a house in the east of Israel, northeast of Israel. That one there, the people inside the house were in a shelter. There were no casualties there.

What we're learning from the IDF is very interesting. This going sort of late into Saturday now, early into Sunday, some of the, some of the strikes that they've had in Iran from their missions today, there in central Iran, they say that they have destroyed four F-14s on the ground. But I think that what the IDF is describing as their strikes in Bandar Abbas, which is right in the south of Iran, quite a long way southeast in Iran, a key port city for Iran.

The IDF say that they have struck drone facilities there, as well as radar sites. And Bandar Abbas is significant and interesting for a number of reasons. It sits right at the chokepoint on the Straits of Hormuz. The choke point for all so much of the world's oil that comes out on tankers out of the Persian Gulf, from the UAE, from Saudi Arabia, from all those Gulf states, comes out of the Persian Gulf through this 20 or so mile wide Straits of Hormuz.

And in the past, Iran has used that as a choke point, even throttling off and preventing shipping, getting through at moments of international tension. So the fact that Israel is striking there, I think, is significant. And it's also significant that Israel is saying that it's striking at radar facilities in Bandar Abbas because it is south and because it is southeast in Iran, the radar facilities there potentially part of the Iran's overall radar perspective of threats that may come from the east and, of course, that would be potentially B-2 bombers coming from Guam.

So Israel taking out those sites. I think at this stage, we just have to look at that and say, OK, this opens the perspective of what we're seeing Israel doing, not just hitting the nuclear facilities, not just hitting the missile launch sites in the west of Iran that are targeting Israel, but also branching out now deeper further east, further south in Iran -- Jessica.

DEAN: All right. Nic Robertson in Haifa for us. Thank you so much for that. And joining us now, former NATO Supreme Allied commander, General

Wesley Clark.

General Clark, thank you so much for being here with us on this Saturday evening. As we just we're talking with Alayna about, these multiple U.S. B-2 Stealth bombers are now on the move. In your experience, does the president order this without seriously considering using them in a strike, or is this also a show of force to try to force Iran to the table in this kind of diplomatic window that the president has set?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK (RET.), FORMER NATO SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER: Well, it does both, Jessica. It is a show of force. It does add to the diplomatic pressure perhaps on Iran. And it gets them closer to the action. But, you know, we have to understand that even if the president makes the decision to use force, that doesn't end the diplomacy. The diplomacy can continue all through the conflict.

In 1999, when I was the NATO commander and we were doing the operation against the Serbs in Kosovo, it took us three weeks to get negotiations started. And then it was four weeks to resolve it. All the time we never had a bombing pause. And, you know, people that are at the top of governments, including the people in Iran, they're all successful people. They're all hard heads. They've all achieved a lot.

They all think that, you know, I've never been blocked. I've never failed, blah, blah, blah. So when you go against these people, it's not like some people expect a couple of bombs, and say, oh, my goodness, we're going to stop. No, they think they can break the will of the United States. They think they can somehow defeat the United States and Israel if they persist. And so if the bombing starts, you have to anticipate this is going to go for a while.

DEAN: And Israel has said that it does have contingencies to do damage to Fordow if the U.S. does not end up getting involved.

[19:10:00]

What might that look like? Does that mean Israeli troops on the ground? What could we expect if that is the path we go down?

CLARK: I think you would expect aircraft to take out a lot of the aspects that are supporting Fordow, and I think you'd see some Israeli special forces in there on the ground with some other forces there securing the area. I think it will be a major operation.

DEAN: And you wrote earlier this week that the president, President Trump, has the leverage, that he doesn't need to rush this decision. Walk us through your thinking on that.

CLARK: Well, the longer Israel goes with the momentum, the greater the damages the Iranians will sustain. And the more damages, the less powerful they'll feel. And at some point, they will recognize that they've got two choices. They're going to either go down in martyrdom, or they're going to make some kind of a diplomatic deal that gets the bombing stopped, or even the Israeli bombing stopped, or if the U.S. joins the Israeli, and American bombing stop.

These people are -- they're stubborn, they're hard. They're patriotic for their own cause. They're not going to give in easily. And so we shouldn't expect that they'll suddenly just throw up their hands and say, OK, OK, enough. We're going to give up on this. But you do have leverage and the longer it goes on, the greater the leverage. Provided that you don't lose aircraft, you don't run out of targets, and you continue to pummel the Iranians. There's lots of targets left.

DEAN: And there is this question about whether regime change could be the ultimate goal here, especially for Israel. What do you think about the chances of that and considering what history teaches us about that strategy as well?

CLARK: There are undoubtedly people in the Iranian forces in positions of some level of authority who don't see it quite the way the ayatollah might see it. And at some point, with increasing pressure on Iran, these people might say, look, we've got to do something to salvage some of this. We don't want to lose everything. And at that point, he could be deposed, but we don't have a government in exile standing by.

We don't know what that next government might be. So even if there's regime change, we're going to need to go in and get the nuclear materials out. We can't just go through this and drop some bombs and say, OK, we blew up Fordow. That'll take maybe six or eight months for them to reconstitute. And now they really will want a nuclear weapon, even if they didn't quite before.

This stuff is not just in Fordow. There's stuff scattered all over Iran in hidden places. And unless we go in on the ground, get the papers, exploit it, talk to people, we're not going to really dig this out.

DEAN: All right. General Wesley Clark, always great to have you on. Thank you so much.

CLARK: Thank you. And greetings from Little Rock, Jessica.

DEAN: Always good to get greetings from my hometown. Thank you, General. We appreciate it.

Israel's strikes on Iran aren't just targeting key weapons and nuclear facilities. They've also taken out some top military officials. And Iran says those attacks have also killed civilians. Its Ministry of Health saying more than 400 people have died. More than 3,000 people have been injured since those strikes began.

CNN's Katie Polglase takes a closer look at the human civilian toll of those strikes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATIE POLGLASE, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hitting the heart of Tehran, Israel's campaign expands every day. CNN has been analyzing these Israeli strikes using satellite imagery,

video and publicly available data. We found somewhat extraordinarily precise, taking out key regime members in their own apartments, while others destroyed whole buildings, killing and injuring civilians.

This video shows an apartment building hit by missiles in Tehran on June 13th. We geolocated it to this residential street in the center of the city. We then cross-referenced the location with a list of addresses of key political and military figures from a public database leaked by activists. The address matched that of a nuclear scientist, Ahmad Reza Zolfaghari.

Iran confirms the scientist's death. But aftermath footage shows the human toll could be far greater than one person. A whole building turned to rubble.

That same night, this residential building collapsed after a strike, though it's unclear if it was Israel's intended target or collateral damage. The building is here in Chamran, an upmarket Tehran neighborhood, and just 1,000 feet away is a military complex, multiple buildings, all belonging to Iran's Ministry of Defense, and still standing.

[19:15:10]

Once again, aftermath footage indicates the likelihood of a heavy civilian toll. Medical staff reported at least 40 people died in this attack, including as many as 15 children. By the second day of its assault, Israel claimed it killed over 20 members of Iran's security apparatus, including senior commanders.

Over the following days, they hit more key institutions like this oil depot on the outskirts of town. An Iranian state broadcaster under fire while live on air. But throughout the civilian toll grows, these strikes, which we geolocated here to Orcade, a wealthy neighborhood in central Tehran, killed a young Iranian poet along with her entire family.

The strike was likely targeting Abdul Hamid Manouchehr, the head of nuclear engineering at a university, who, according to Iranian media, lived in the building. As rescue workers dug through the rubble of his home, his university confirmed he had been killed.

Israel's recent strikes on Iran follow their operations in Lebanon and Gaza that also took out key military and political leaders. Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, pictured here in Gaza in this now infamous drone video seconds before his assassination. But the civilian toll once again prompts questions around Israel's proportionality and decision making on striking targets in such densely populated areas.

Katie Polglase, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DEAN: Still ahead tonight, the Palestinian activist at the center of a long running deportation fight arrives home after three months in custody. Why he says his fight isn't done yet.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:21:35]

DEAN: New tonight pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil arriving in New Jersey after spending the last three months in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Louisiana. He was detained back in March in connection with his role in protest against Israel's war in Gaza at Columbia University.

And CNN's Gloria Pazmino has more on the moment his family and supporters have been waiting to see.

GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jessica, there were dozens of supporters who gathered here at Newark Airport since early on Saturday morning when they learned that Khalil would be arriving right here. They waited for several hours in fact. His flight was quite delayed. But during that time they made welcome home signs. They sang songs. They waited for this moment that they've been looking forward to for 104 days.

The moment when Khalil would arrive back here to the New York City area to reunite with his wife, Dr. Noor Abdalla, and their newborn son. Remember, the son was born only a few months ago, while Khalil was in custody back in Louisiana.

Now, Khalil was detained back in March by federal officials outside of his apartment, and he was one, in fact, the first in a long string of student detentions by the Trump administration, which was targeting international student protesters. Khalil played a major role on the campus of Columbia University, helping to organize protests against the Israel-Hamas war.

Now, upon his release, and as soon as he was able to speak with reporters and the public here today, he continued to center that very same message. He spoke out once again about the plight of Palestinian people. He said he would continue to advocate for Palestinian human rights. And that he had a message for the Trump administration.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAHMOUD KHALIL, FREED PRO-PALESTINIAN ACTIVIST: I continue to advocate for Palestinians, for the immigrants who are left behind in that facility. The 1200 men who all of them are incredible men who the Trump administration are trying to portray as whether criminals. As I said yesterday, whether you are a citizen, an immigrant, anyone on this land, you are not illegal.

That doesn't make you less of a human. And this is what the administration is trying to do, to dehumanize me, to dehumanize the immigrants.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAZMINO: Now, Khalil also spoke about the men he said he left behind in that immigration facility. He talked about how immigration and migrants have also become so central and talked about the Trump administrations targeting of migrants. He said he wanted to make sure to continue to talk about the men that he left behind, in his words.

Now, Khalil's legal case is far from over. There's still an outstanding immigration charge, including a potential deportation order, that his attorneys are continuing to fight against. They've told me they plan to take that to the immigration appeal process, but right now, they said the most important thing is that Khalil gets to go home with his wife, his newborn son, and that he is no longer being kept away from his family, his loved ones and his attorneys -- Jessica.

DEAN: All right. Gloria Pazmino, thank you very much.

And let's bring in CNN's senior political analyst and Bloomberg Opinion columnist, Ron Brownstein.

[19:25:00]

Ron, thanks for being here. I do want to broaden our conversation out on the topic of immigration. You're there in L.A., the National Guard still on the ground in Los Angeles after these protests over ICE operations there and appeals court ruled this week in favor of the Trump administration. And this has really been a defining moment for California and its governor, Gavin Newsom.

Who do you think in terms of the politics of all of this how is this shaping up who's been able to really make the most of this moment?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, it's really a critical moment I think, not only for Newsom and Trump, but really for the country. I mean, you know, the -- I think what the ruling of the Ninth Circuit told us is that if there are going to be constraints on the increased domestic use of the military for law enforcement, it is probably going to come more through the political system than the legal system.

I mean, the Ninth Circuit ruled on one issue. They said that Trump was likely to prevail on the question of whether he had the authority to federalize the National Guard over Newsom's objection. The first time that's happened in 60 years over a governor's objection. It did not rule on the second issue, which is whether Trump is correct when he asserts that he can routinely use the Guard, integrate it into enforcement of immigration enforcement actions, as well as the Marines in enforcement actions without invoking the Insurrection Act.

That's still out there. And the, you know, the district court is going to be hearing arguments or at least papers on that next week. But I think, you know, the basic tenor here is it kind of reinforces what we thought to begin with, which is that the courts are based on the case law through American history, are going to be deferential to the president when he claims executive authority to take these extraordinary steps.

The real question, I think, is whether public officials and the public itself is going to accept kind of the normalization of the idea that you will see the military involved in enforcing domestic laws, in this case immigration law. But Trump has talked about other uses for the military in blue cities. Whether we are going to accept that as a kind of a new and routine part of our lives here in the U.S.

DEAN: Yes. And I think that is a big question. So we have that going on, obviously in California. And then potentially having impacts across the country at the same time in Washington, Republicans and Senate Republicans trying very hard to make sure that this legislation gets over the finish line. The Senate parliamentarian, not to get too into the weeds, but they are using this procedure that has to go through all of these steps. And the Senate parliamentarian ruled some aspects of this legislation today does not comply with the rules. So they're going to have to kind of reconfigure on some of this.

BROWNSTEIN: Right.

DEAN: What happens when they tinker with it and send it back to the House? Where do you see all of this going?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, first of all, I think this is the most consequential thing Congress will do over this two-year session in terms of its impact on the midterm election. I mean, this really is the big kind of moment that they will be putting their imprint on the Trump agenda. It's been overshadowed by Iran and by the battle over immigration and the use of the National Guard in L.A.

But, you know, Republicans, Jessica, with this bill, as we've talked about before, are doing something they have not done in 30 years, since 1995 with Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich. And that is marry tax cuts and spending cuts in a single bill. Every other time they've cut taxes in this century, '01, '03 and '17, it was all sugar, no spinach, only tax cuts. This time by putting them together, they've allowed, you know, analysis to be done that really explicitly makes clear who the winners and losers of this bill are because, you know, it provides very large tax cuts to people at the top, and it has significant cuts in programs that people -- that benefit people in the middle and below.

The Congressional Budget Office has calculated that everybody below $76,000 a year, all families below $76,000 a year in income, will come out net losers from the bill. It's also calculated that 16 million people are going to lose health insurance from the bill. That would be the most ever from a single piece of legislation in U.S. history. So Republicans are taking an enormous gamble here because, as I say, this bill makes the winners and losers in their budget plan much more explicit than in the last three times they cut taxes.

And in 1995, they were simply unable to defend that balance that they struck. Clinton won that argument. It turned around his presidency, allowed him to cruise to reelection. The polling right now shows this bill is pretty unpopular. People don't want big cuts in health care. They don't want big tax cuts for people at the top. And they especially don't want, you know, them linked together. So it is an enormous gamble. I suspect in the end they will get it over the finish line. First year

of a Republican presidency. They do cut taxes. '81 Reagan, '01 Bush, '17 Trump. But in doing so, they are taking a big gamble that this will be one of the, if not the defining issue of the 2026 campaign.

DEAN: All right, more to come. Ron Brownstein, thanks so much. Good to see you.

BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.

DEAN: As President Trump meets with his National Security Council on Iran tonight, the country says more than 400 people have been killed in Israeli strikes.

CNN's Fred Pleitgen is going to take us inside a hospital in Tehran where people are coping with the civilian cost of these attacks.

[19:30:15]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:34:40]

DEAN: Iranian state media says the conflict with Israel has killed over 400 people and left more than 3,000 injured, and Iran's Health Ministry says most of the casualties are civilians. That includes at least 54 women and children, according to the state linked news agency, "Tasnim."

CNN's Fred Pleitgen is the first Western journalist allowed into Iran since the fighting with Israel began last week, and he visited a hospital in Tehran, where the casualties of this conflict are mounting and we do want to give you a warning that some of what you're about to see is disturbing.

[19:35:10]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): So, while the Israelis say that they are only targeting military installations, the Iranians say the vast majority of people who have been killed and wounded are civilians. And we've been touring hospitals here in the Tehran area, and we've been hearing the stories of some of the people who were wounded in Israel's strike. And were going to visit some of them now.

(SHAKEEM speaking in foreign language.)

PLEITGEN (voice over): "Something exploded in front of me," Shakeem (ph) says. "It hit my head, my stomach and my leg. Somebody took me to a clinic."

(NASREEN speaking in foreign language.)

PLEITGEN (voice over): "My kitten went to the window and I went to grab it, and there was a blast." Nasreen (ph) says, "I was thrown and hit the wall. The whole building was empty. I just barely made it to the door. One of the neighbors called emergency services and they brought me to the hospital. I've had five operations in my abdomen area, my kidney, my liver."

PLEITGEN (on camera): Iranian authorities tell us well over 400 people have been confirmed to have been killed in Israel's strikes, and thousands of people were wounded. They also say because the conflict is still ongoing and there could still be mass casualties, that they're actually freeing up additional capacities in their hospitals of hospital beds.

At the same time, I was able to speak to the Deputy Health Minister of Iran, and he says one of the things that's helping them now is the experience many of their surgeons have with wounds from the Iran-Iraq War.

ALI JAFARIAN, IRANIAN DEPUTY HEALTH MINISTER: As you know, we have, you know, eight years' war with Saddam Hussein's regime. And in that period, our surgeons, our physicians are very well trained for the trauma patient management and, you know, I'm a surgeon too. And at that time I was a medical student and I was in the battlefield as a healthcare worker.

So most of our surgeons are very familiar with the war trauma.

PLEITGEN (on camera): So, as you can see, there's a lot of people here in Tehran and other places who are still in hospital and the Iranians say they understand that this conflict is far from over.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN Tehran.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DEAN: Fred Pleitgen, thank you so much.

Harrowing moments caught on camera in Brazil, where a hot air balloon caught fire in midair. Eight people were killed. What we know about that terrifying incident, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:42:01]

DEAN: At least eight people have died after a hot air balloon accident in Brazil today. Video of the accident shows that balloon catching fire in the sky before deflating and then falling to the ground. The local governor confirming 21 people were on board, only 13 surviving that crash.

Today's accident is the second fatal balloon accident in that area in less than a week. Last Sunday, a balloon carrying 35 people without authorization to fly fell in Sao Paulo. One person died as a result, the pilot was arrested.

CNN's Rafael Romo is joining us now. Rafael, what more do we know about that accident so far?

RAFAEL ROMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jessica, second accident in the last week. Three in the last two weeks and in the last hour, Jessica, we have learned that the pilot of that balloon apparently was asking people to jump off before the crash.

That's what CNN Brasil is reporting at this hour, citing local police, adding that some people were unable to jump as the flames started to spread very rapidly all over the balloon. This is what we know so far.

The accident happened in Southern Brazil in a coastal city called Praia Grande, or big beach, a popular destination for hot air ballooning, located in Santa Catarina State. According to Santa Catarina Governor Georgina Melo, eight people died and 13 others survived the fire and crash. Melo also said that the people of his state are in mourning and called what happened a tragedy.

CNN Brasil is also reporting that the fire started with the flame inside the basket, ignited by torch equipment that is normally used to start the flame that makes the balloon fly.

And as we can see in the video, the fire started while the balloon was still in the air. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva expressed solidarity with the families of the fatal victims and the survivors on his X account, the President said that he's making available whatever resources and support are necessary to help victims and local officials who are working on the rescue operation and care for the survivors.

And finally, Jessica, Santa Catarina Governor Melo said he will pay close attention to the investigation as authorities try to find what happened and why it happened. Now back to you.

DEAN: Rafael Romo, thanks so much. And ballooning expert Troy Bradley is joining us now. Troy, you watched this video. It's a really -- it is really disturbing to see. It's scary to see. How does something like this happen?

TROY BRADLEY, BALLOONING EXPERT: Well, first and foremost, from the ballooning community, our heartfelt condolences to all the families that lost loved ones. It doesn't happen. This is a very rare occurrence. This is something that doesn't happen often.

There was obviously a malfunction with the fuel system, something that occurred and the investigators will come to a conclusion once they've been able to investigate all the equipment and talk to all the survivors.

The one thing I do know is that the video is a little bit deceptive in the fact that the survivors that did survive are not on that balloon during the video. They had existed prior to that. The balloon is back in an ascent going up with the final eight people who passed, the ones that perished actually went back up into the air. The 14 that survived actually were out of the balloon prior to that.

They came down to try to make an emergency landing and then were exiting and too many people exited at once to where the balloon had the lift to be able to take those last people up in the air.

So, the people that did survive were close to the ground when they actually did. So that the ones that were injured are from that video point forward.

[19:45:30]

DEAN: That is really, really important context there. What would you tell people in terms of, you know, you say this is very uncommon, is it safe to go on a hot air balloon?

BRADLEY: Yes, yes. So the safety is there, as you heard in your other reporters saying that the Brazilian Civil Aviation Authority is going to look into this. They're a qualified organization to be able to handle that. All the balloons are registered. The pilots are certified just as they are in the United States.

Something happened to compromise the fuel system and that needs to be found out what the problem was, whether it happened at the tank level or at the burner level. But something did cause that, you know, maybe a break in some way that we don't know at this point, but hot air balloons, obviously, there's propane on board. So the fuel systems are inspected.

If you do have a leak, you know, prior to ever even inflating the balloon, you can usually tell that because there is a smell that's induced into propane to actually give it a pungent smell. So, you know that there's a leak before ever turning on and doing any, any flame. So, what was missed? I don't know, unfortunately, we won't know until the investigation is concluded.

DEAN: Yes, but we certainly don't see these accidents often, especially here in the U.S.

BRADLEY: Oh no, this is this is so rare. I've been a pilot for 45 years and I have never witnessed one of these personally. We have had other accidents where there's been fuel systems compromised around the world. A couple of accidents, but as far as the United States, everything -- all the pilots are FAA certified pilots just like any other helicopter fixed wing pilot. The balloons are all certified aircraft and they go through annual or hundred-hour inspections. So, anything that would be a possible potential for a problem is identified and those balloons are grounded until we find what the problem is.

So, we have never seen anything like that type of an accident. So, it is truly an accident.

DEAN: Yes, all right, Troy Bradley, thanks so much for that context. We appreciate it.

BRADLEY: Okay, thank you.

DEAN: Right now, President Trump is meeting with his National Security team at the White House. What we are learning, the President is still weighing -- he is still weighing whether or not to use military force against Iran. We'll have more when we come back.

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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

DEAN: Breaking news now, as President Trump announcing on Truth Social that the U.S. has successfully bombed sites in Iran, I'm going to read you that post right now. "We have completed our very successful attack on the three nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz and Esfahan. All planes are now outside of Iran airspace. A full payload of bombs was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American warriors. There is not another military in the world that could have done this. Now is the time for peace," he says, in all caps. "Thank you for attention to this matter."

Again, the breaking news coming from President Donald Trump that the U.S. has indeed bombed sites in Iran. I want to go to Alayna Treene, who was there at the White House.

Alayna, just to back up for a second, this news coming that they have attacked three nuclear sites there in Iran, as we saw President Trump coming back to meet with his National Security team there at the White House. As we saw, these B-2 bombers, stealth bombers that were involved in this being mobilized earlier. What more are you learning as we get this brand new information?

TREENE: Yes, we do know that the President is still currently inside the West Wing with his National Security officials. We saw CIA Director John Ratcliffe enter the West Wing just a little over an hour ago. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, we just spotted moments ago outside the West Wing on the phone, engaged in a in a phone call. And look, I mean, so far, all we know is what we have seen the President post. Of course, this is very different from some of the things that we've been hearing in recent days, that he was still weighing this decision.

Well, despite that two-week deadline that he gave himself on Thursday, just two days ago, he is now, of course, made that decision moving forward with the series of strikes. I think very notable. You know, I was in some conversation with folks who are wondering, does this mean the U.S. when he says, we will, he thanks American warriors in this saying that no other military in the world could have done this.

Some other things, I think very much worth emphasizing here, Jessica, is he says that the bombs were dropped on the primary site, Fordow. Of course, that was really what we had been hearing, and all of our conversations that really only the United States bombs, these B-2 bombs that you mentioned, we had reporting that had left that Missouri Air Force base yesterday. They were the only ones that could really penetrate Fordow that nuclear site, to really help the Israelis and their ultimate goal of wiping out Iran's nuclear capabilities.

He says that they have done that, of course, and struck two other facilities as well. And he says all planes are safely on their way home. So, really big news here that the President has made his decision and not only made it, they have already moved forward with this. They have struck three different Iranian nuclear facilities, really bringing the United States into this in a far more offensive way than we have seen and also, kind of going against some of what we also know as many people really wary of the United States getting involved in this.

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Some key things, I think, though, are also important to note here, Jessica, is what I had heard in my conversations after we had reported earlier this week that the President had reviewed attack plans on Iran. I was told that behind closed doors, in these conversations, he had asked his team specifically if there was a way to have the United States carry out some of these strikes without launching them into a prolonged war. I've been told repeatedly in my conversations here with White House officials that their goal was to see, even if they get involved in this, perhaps that does not necessarily mean that the United States is getting involved in a war, or that this will make it a full scale war.

Of course, we have to see how the Iranians will respond to this, but that has been what I've been told in my conversations here at the White House.

DEAN: And, Alayna, just to give people, again, some added context around how we got to this moment, kind of zooming out for just a second. Of course, Israel has been attacking Iran for several days now. Iran striking back at Israel, Israel taking more missile attacks than they had seen and injuries than they had seen in a very, very long time. Iran also sustaining tremendous damage. And there was this question about if Israel wants to get rid of any threat of Iran having a nuclear weapon and getting rid of that program, how do you achieve that goal? And the big question around that was whether the U.S. would get involved, because, as you mentioned, the really -- the key way to do that is with these bunker buster bombs, you need these B-2 stealth bombers in order to do that.

Now, the Israelis had said they had contingency plans, but they certainly wanted the U.S. to step in here and help them offensively. The U.S. had been helping them defensively, trying to protect them as Iran was sending those missiles back over.

But again, Alayna, the big move here is that the U.S. is now engaged in this conflict in an offensive way.

TREENE: That's exactly right. I mean, and you're right, I do think stepping back and looking at how we got here is so important. I would note as well, of course, that -- one, the President has been saying for months, even before he took office, that he believed that the Iranians could never have a nuclear weapon, that the ultimate goal was to find a way to prevent that.

And, the first attempt at that was really what we've seen this administration do, which is try to engage. They did engage in negotiations with the Iranians, led by the President's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, to see if they could reach a new potential new nuclear deal. Those talks kind of broke down, and we had heard the President repeatedly expressed his frustration with that.

And then as we were hearing, that is when we heard and learned of the Israeli plans to strike Tehran and then, of course, those strikes began just over a week ago.

And if you look at where the President has been, at first he really was saying that he wanted to find a diplomatic solution to try and de- escalate the conflict between Iran and the Israelis and essentially, he had said that he needed the Iranians to be far more forthcoming in those talks and really make major concessions that they had really been unwilling to do up until that point.

And then he gave himself that two-week deadline on Thursday where he said, I will make a decision, even though we had been reporting up until that time that he was more he was closer to wanting to involve the U.S. militarily than he had been. But now we it is clear, of course, that he has made that decision, gone ahead and ordered the military to strike these three different facilities, specifically Fordow, again, which you pointed out is really the key one that a lot of people believed that the United States needed to be involved in.

And your point as well, about what the Israelis have been asking the President, they've said it publicly. We know they have been saying this privately in their conversations. They wanted the United States to get involved. This is exactly what they were hoping they would do. A key question now is where does this go from here? And were going to have to continue monitoring that to see exactly what this could lead to. Now that the United States is far more involved in this directly than they had been up until this point.

DEAN: Certainly, all right, Alayna Treene with the very latest at the White House, thank you for that.

Again, the breaking news, President Trump saying that we have completed our very successful attack on three nuclear sites in Iran. We have special coverage of this breaking news continuing right now with Anderson Cooper, who is live in Tel Aviv -- Anderson.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN BREAKING NEWS.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: I'm Anderson Cooper in Tel Aviv. You've heard the breaking news. I want to put the statement by President Trump up on the screen. He says in a Truth Social. Post, "We have completed our very successful attack on the three nuclear sites in Iran. Including Fordow, Natanz and Esfahan. All planes are now outside of Iran airspace. A full payload of bombs was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the world that could have done this. Now is the time for peace thank you for attention to this matter."

I'm here with CNN Jeremy Diamond in Tel Aviv. Obviously, Jeremy, this is something that we have been waiting for and

watching for. We got the word earlier today that B-2s were in the air. There had been some reporting. They're heading toward Guam. We don't know exactly what aircraft were used in this.

They said a full payload of bombs, which there had been a lot of discussion about how many of these bunker-buster bombs would be required to really damage Fordow facility. Unclear if just one would be enough. He says bombs, it sounds like there were multiple strikes.

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