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Trump: U.S. Strikes On Iran A "Spectacular Military Success". Aired 12a-1a ET
Aired June 22, 2025 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: This is breaking news. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.
We are learning new details about the U.S. strike on three Iranian nuclear sites, what President Donald Trump is now calling, quote, a spectacular military success. U.S. B-2 bombers hit two of these sites.
A U.S. official tells CNN. Six B-2s dropped a dozen bunker buster bombs, as they're known. These are 30,000-pound munitions on the Fordow facility buried inside a mountain. Another B-2 dropped two bunker busters on the Natanz enrichment site.
Navy submarines fired some 30 cruise missiles at the Natanz and Isfahan sites as well.
This is a consequential moment. U.S. presidents of both parties over the last close to two decades have decided not to carry out military strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities precisely because of concerns about the possibility of a broader war. We should also know that, I'm told, by an Israeli intelligence source that it is too early for a reliable assessment as to the damage to these sites, which what is known as a BDA or bomb damage assessment.
Daybreak just happening now over Iran and a full assessment will only come when satellites and other intelligence assets in the region can see those sites. The question now is will Iran respond, and how will it do so?
There are U.S. military forces based around the region that have been the subject of Iranian attacks before. The White House released these photos from the Situation Room. They show President Trump with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Vice President J.D. Vance.
The president addressed the nation late Saturday night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: A short time ago, the U.S. military carried out massive precision strikes on the three key nuclear facilities in the Iranian regime, Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. Everybody heard those names for years as they built this horribly destructive enterprise.
Our objective was the destruction of Iran's nuclear enrichment capacity and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world's number one state sponsor of terror. Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success. Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.
Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not, future attacks will be far greater and a lot easier.
For 40 years, Iran has been saying death to America, death to Israel. They have been killing our people, blowing off their arms, blowing off their legs with roadside bombs. That was their specialty.
We lost over a thousand people and hundreds of thousands throughout the Middle East and around the world have died as a direct result of their hate. In particular, so many were killed by their general, Qasem Soleimani. I decided a long time ago that I would not let this happen. It will not continue.
I want to thank and congratulate Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. We worked as a team. Like perhaps no team has ever worked before, and we've gone a long way to erasing this horrible threat to Israel.
I want to thank the Israeli military for the wonderful job they've done. And most importantly, I want to congratulate the great American patriots who flew those magnificent machines tonight, and all of the United States military on an operation the likes of which the world has not seen in many, many decades.
Hopefully, we will no longer need their services in this capacity. I hope that's so.
I also want to congratulate the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Razin Caine, spectacular general, and all of the brilliant military minds involved in this attack.
With all of that being said, this cannot continue. There will be either peace or there will be tragedy for Iran, far greater than we have witnessed over the last eight days. Remember, there are many targets left. Tonight's was the most difficult of them all by far, and perhaps the most lethal.
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But if peace does not come quickly, we will go after those other targets with precision, speed and skill. Most of them can be taken out in a matter of minutes. There is no military in the world that could have done what we did tonight. Not even close. There has never been a military that could do what took place just a little while ago.
Tomorrow, General Caine, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth will have a press conference at 8:00 a.m. at the Pentagon.
And I want to just thank everybody -- and in particular, God. I want to just say, we love you, God, and we love our great military. Protect them.
God bless the Middle East. God bless Israel, and God bless America. Thank you very much.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: We should note this is quite a turn for President Trump himself, who just in the last 24 to 48 hours was saying it was his priority to pursue a diplomatic path to ending or limiting Iran's nuclear program.
We are learning that some Republican lawmakers were told in advance of the strikes on Iran. Sources told CNN those Republicans include the House Speaker Mike Johnson, and the Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
The top Democrats, however, on the House and Senate Intelligence Committees were kept in the dark. Their Republican counterparts on those committees were briefed, even though all of them are members of what is known as the Gang of Eight, who are usually notified regardless of party, before the president orders major military action.
CNN's Tom Foreman joins me now with more.
And, Tom, as you know, the gang of eight was created deliberately to take the politics out of decisions like this and to keep the members. For instance, the chairman, the ranking members of the relevant committees, including the intelligence committees, informed that did not take place in this. In this instance. What's the significance of that?
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think we're going to hear a lot more about it. Thats one of the significances, Jim. And the other one is that in many ways, by doing this, Donald Trump made it such that the Republican Party politically owns what happened here.
The Democrats can say, look, you needed to at least tell us before this happened. The Democrats, as we understand it, were informed after the attack had happened about the same time that it was being put out on Truth Social.
So, the bottom line is Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has already said that he thinks that we must, as he put it, we must enforce the war powers act immediately. That's the 1973 law that basically says the president needs to be consulting with Congress, not just his party, when something like this has happened and that Congress is supposed to be able to somewhat restrict the president's ability to just launch into what is a warlike action or could be flat out war, depending on what the response is and what comes next.
A lot of responses out there, Jim, I must say. Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee. Senator Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, both of them raising alarms about this, noting it's easier to start wars than to end them. And as you would expect on the GOP side, there's a lot of praise. Mike
Johnson, you mentioned a minute ago the speaker of the house said, this is the America First policy in action, but some other questions have been raised by some of the others. As you mentioned, the gang of eight. Typically, they would all be involved to some degree, knowing what was going forward, how it was going forward and to be in some advisory capacity to if the president chose to listen to them. Representative Thomas Massie, a Republican, said, this is not constitutional. The action itself.
So, I think, Jim, that the political fallout from this obviously will take a little bit of time to coalesce. But no question, a lot of people on the Democratic side disturbed that the president made this a partisan action based on who he informed. And there are some on the Republican side who don't seem totally thrilled about that either.
SCIUTTO: Well, not surprising, given this is a president who promised to end wars, U.S. military engagements abroad. It was just a short time ago when he was in the region, when he said that the era of nation building was over, in effect, that the U.S. was not going to get involved militarily. So that's a political 180. I think one could say.
Tom Foreman --
FOREMAN: Yeah. He and he will get and he will get pounded by that from I think certainly people on the Democratic side, but people on his own side as well as, you know, Jim, there is a very strong portion of the Republican Party that also has huge objections to something like this happening. Will they be quiet right now since it's happened?
This country and political parties tend to get behind a president when there is military action involved, simply as a matter of just kind of a good strategy to not seem immediately divided.
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But make no mistake about it, there are some deep divisions in this country in politically that I think probably became deeper tonight because of the way this was handled politically.
SCIUTTO: Tom Foreman, thanks so much.
FOREMAN: You're welcome, Jim.
SCIUTTO: I do want to go now to Tel Aviv, where our Nic Robertson is.
And, Nic, good to have you on. I mean, you and I, in our years covering this region, this this option, this possibility of the U.S. striking Iran's military program, nuclear program, militarily, was this, you know, you know, a step too far for many.
I mean, presidents of both parties in this country have decided not to concern about creating a broader war in the region. There's been a lot of push, as you know, from Israelis to get Americans on board with doing so. And here we are. Here we are even, you know, from a president who just
in the last couple of days had been talking about a diplomatic solution to this.
Tell us, just put this into context. What a remarkable turn this is.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: It is because the concern had been raised that if the United States joins Israel in these strikes, that this would inflame the situation, that Iran would lash out, hit U.S. interests, perhaps hit global interests, perhaps interrupt global supplies of oil and gas by interdicting ships in the Persian Gulf and the Straits of Hormuz. That this could bring an escalation. Iran, it was less than a year ago, was threatening when Israel was responding to one of Iran's strikes here last year. How long ago that seems.
Iran was threatening to strike gulf countries like the UAE, like Saudi Arabia, to hit their oil infrastructure and essentially crush and hit their economies. These were very -- these were threats that were taken very seriously. Fast forward to where we are today. It appears as if the estimation has become that by shortening the period of Israel's one on one conflict with Iran, which could have gone on for a protracted period, because the punch that the United States brings militarily at the Fordow sites, Natanz and others, therefore shortens the time frame of damaging setting back, potentially destroying Iran's nuclear capabilities, which was the outcome.
So, the -- in essence, the decision seems to be to shorten that time frame and all the potential repercussions as that potentially dragged on against the calculation that Iran is weakened internally. Hamas has come out and condemned this.
One of Iran's proxies, but they're not militarily strong. Hezbollah has really, really diminished by Israel over the past year. Thats another proxy that's out of the game. Syria is no longer a playground, if you will, for Iran's proxies, because the leadership there has been brought into the fold of Arab nations, Sunni Arab nations in the gulf and relationships with the United States have been getting on a good footing.
There are, of course, the Iranian militias in Iraq who could target U.S. troops based in Iraq and that still remains a danger. And public protests on the streets in the around the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, those sorts of things. But the president moved a week and a half ago to mitigate against those drawing unnecessary personnel back out of the region.
The Houthis, who said the United States will have to bear the consequences, are a proxy that still has teeth and are still able to interdict shipping in the Red Sea. So that means a path of oil and global commerce is potentially under threat. It's really the ball, though, principally lies in Iran's court and Israel at the very outset took out some of the principal military leaders, the people that the regimes leadership have relied upon for advice.
Their replacements, these military leaders' replacements in many cases, have also been killed in targeted strikes by Israel. It diminishes the ability of the leadership to think properly, think squarely and actually respond. The military capability of Iran has been diminished, the estimation appears to have been taken that Iran is not able to respond, potentially in a coordinated way.
The reality of that assessment is that most intelligence officials believe that the Iranian leadership will feel pushed into a corner, well, speaking to a former Mossad intelligence official here just a couple of days ago, who said the scenario you want to avoid is where Iran is forced into a corner and behaves like, you know, a wounded tiger, a wounded lion that just sort of lashes out.
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The calculation seems to be that that lashing out cannot be as deadly and strong and sustained as would have been feared several weeks ago.
I think these are the things that have changed. However, Iran will over time, it is expected, reconstitute a minimal amount of its threat and figure out how to use it. And that's what the region is bracing for.
SCIUTTO: No question. Listen, when you look at what we used to call the ring of fire around Israel, the damage to that ring of fire, Iran's points of leverage, Hezbollah depleted, Hamas depleted, certainly at enormous human cost in Gaza. And now Iranian resources at least depleted, and the damage assessments that will be coming in the next hours and days will show to what degree.
Nic Robertson, thanks so much. I know we're going to come back to you soon there in Tel Aviv.
The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is praising the Trump administration's actions. He spoke a short time ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: But in tonight's action against Iran's nuclear facilities, America has been truly unsurpassed. It has done what no other country on earth could do.
History will record that President Trump acted to deny the world's most dangerous regime the world's most dangerous weapons. His leadership today has created a pivot of history that can help lead the Middle East and beyond to a future of prosperity and peace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: Joining me now is Amos Yadlin. He's the former chief of Israeli military intelligence.
Thanks so much for taking the time tonight.
AMOS YADLIN, FORMER CHIEF OF ISRAELI MILITARY INTELLIGENCE: Good night, Jim. SCIUTTO: So first I wonder with the U.S. strikes tonight, I know it's
early for full assessments of the damage, but with the U.S. strikes tonight and Israeli strikes over the course of the last several days, are we seeing the end of Iran's nuclear program?
YADLIN: We have to wait for the BDA, battle damage assessment from satellites and from other sources. But I think that we destroy Israel about 70 percent. And what they do the U.S. have done is another 20 percent, 20 very important percent that Israel can't do, the Fordow site, but remember, there are in the hands of the Iranians about hundreds of enriched uranium in a high -- a high level. And this is very difficult to find, and to destroy.
But after saying that, their weaponization process is now going to be very long because most of the scientists were targeted and most of the of the sites and the capabilities to weaponize this enriched uranium are now almost close to zero.
SCIUTTO: As you know, successive U.S. presidents have refused to go this far to take this step. And until a few days ago, it seemed that this president was at least reluctant to bring the U.S. to strike Iranian nuclear sites.
What do you believe got President Trump over that hump? What do you believe led him to make this decision and was part of it driven by Israeli success over the course of the last several days?
YADLIN: I think it has to do with the understanding that Iran is not ten feet high for years. For years, for years, the American expert analyst military generals thought that attacking Iran will bring a World War III, or at least a regional war. I think what they saw the capabilities of Iran after Israel, after the Israeli air force destroys their air defense almost totally have air superiority over Iran, the ballistic missile force, thousands of ballistic missiles, and they hardly can hit Israel.
They understood what I'm trying. -- I'm trying for about 20 years that there is another mode of operation, which is surgical, surgical pinpoint attack on nuclear.
And then with the B-2, you send a diplomatic message saying, okay, we dealt with your nuclear program. We don't want a war with Iran as a state. We have not -- we don't have any intention to go against the Iranian nation.
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But pay attention, don't retaliate. Don't retaliate because the U.S. is very seriously stationed to retaliate back. And this can bring us to the main goal of the -- of this operation, which is a diplomatic solution, which is a better deal, much better deal than the 2015 deal. And include in this deal not only the zero enrichment, but also the ballistic missile force. That should be dismantled.
If this is the -- if this will be the result of the attack tonight, it's exactly what the president said. Peace through strength. SCIUTTO: Let me ask your assessment. And you're not in Tehran, right?
You can't see into the minds of Israelis -- of Iranian leaders, rather. But would they trust negotiations at this point, either with the U.S. or with Israel, given the scale of military attacks, might they conclude that they could make a deal and get attacked again? What would be the incentive other than no choice right to go to the negotiating table?
YADLION : It's huge incentive to end the war and to and to save the regime. This is huge incentive.
But, Jim, look, they have three options now to come -- to declare that they are coming to negotiate and asking to end the war, negotiating on the base of zero enrichment. On the other hand, they can do a symbolic move which is leaving the NPT and maybe trying to go to the bomb, even though I think their capabilities to do it not exist in the coming year or two.
And the third option is to retaliate and the retaliation also can be in couple of stages. They can retaliate with terror. Their capability is quite low. They can retaliate against American forces in the Gulf, only Americans, and they can retaliate against the Gulf states trying to block the Strait of Hormuz and attacking the oil rich countries.
This is where I will look in the next 24, 84 hours, because the ball is in the Iranian yard and they have to decide whether to come to negotiate or to retaliate and go to a war not only against Israel, but also against the United States.
SCIUTTO: Where do you think Russia plays in this? Because, of course, Russia was a party to the 2015 nuclear agreement. Now Russia is an ally, one might say, of Iran. Iran is supplying Russia with drones for its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Does Russia help Iran in the -- in the current circumstances.
YADLIN: You see Russia and China are Iran allies. However, both of them will not risk their global position by going to war for Iran. Russia is already involved in another war involving in another war in Ukraine. They will not open a second front and China is interested in the Pacific, in Taiwan, and they don't have capability to project power -- military power to the Middle East.
So, everybody think about a global conflict, I think should think again. On the contrary, I think what the president of the United States have done today will help to calm down the Chinese in Taiwan and the Russians in Ukraine.
And if you listen very carefully to Putin yesterday, he said about Israel, I have 2 million Israelis who are speaking Russians. I will not attack Israel. It's not on my agenda.
SCIUTTO: Are you surprised that President Trump is the American president who ultimately made the decision to attack Iran, given Trump is someone who ran against more wars abroad? He ran to end wars and to end U.S. military involvement abroad.
Are you surprised he is the man who chose to take this step?
YADLIN: I'm not surprised because I think there are people that finally understood that if you want to avoid war, if you want to avoid a catastrophe and President Trump said, Make America Great Again doesn't mean that Iran will have a nuclear program.
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So, he joined those who think that sometimes a preemptive attack can stop and prevent a disaster and holocaust. Israel have done it twice. In 1981, in Baghdad, and in 2007, in Syria. And these two attacks brought peace, not war. So, I hope that what the president have done will bring peace.
And I want him to do it on the three fronts in Gaza. First, bring back our hostages by ending the war in Gaza. And make the rules that we have done, the model that we have done in the north, the model that if the bad guys are going back to build their military force against Israel, America and Israel agree that Israel has the right to stop it.
This is a new defense doctrine that Israel adopted. And I think what the president have done tonight will bring more peace to the Middle East when Iran is weak, the Middle East is safer. When Iran is weak, the Middle East is more stable. When Iran is weak, peace can be achieved even between Israel and the Palestinians.
SCIUTTO: Quite a hopeful take. Amos Yadlin, former head of Israeli military intelligence. We do appreciate you taking the time tonight.
YADLIN: Good night. When we do return, we'll have the latest on the U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear sites and how Israel is responding to the Trump administrations military action, just ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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SCIUTTO: Back now to the breaking news in the Middle East. President Donald Trump has announced the U.S. dropped multiple munitions on three key Iranian nuclear sites at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. He called it a, quote, spectacular military success.
A U.S. official tells CNN that law enforcement agencies are now watching for any response from Iran or others against U.S. interests, both in the region and around the world. President Trump had been weighing the strikes for days as the conflict ranked up between ramped up between Iran and Israel. Iranian state media reports the country's atomic agency has condemned the attacks and vowed to never stop its nuclear program.
Joining us now, CNN's senior political and global affairs commentator, former U.S. ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel.
Ambassador, thanks so much for taking the time tonight.
RAHM EMANUEL, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL AND GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Thanks, Jim. Thank you.
SCIUTTO: So, from where you're sitting, was this the right call by President Trump?
EMANUEL: Well, we won't know for a while. I mean, I kind of look at this. And you have in the history for the United States, the situation in North Korea in 1994, where a decision was made complicated, but made not to bomb North Korea, became a nuclear power.
You saw what happened in Libya on the other side of the spectrum. And then you have kind of a breakdown of a country.
And so, the question here is between those two polar kind of opposites, can you get a position where you've effectively deterred Iran from getting a weapon, not a wider war and an ability to negotiate, because as you said earlier, in the end of the day, this is going to be resolved at the table.
And so, the right decision from a nuclear? Yes. From what happens in the Middle East, what happens further? The jury is out.
I do think the I say two other things that haven't been discussed, which is the blast radius of this is going to be felt both in the Middle East and we already know because of the Shiite arc, what's happened here. Iran and their proxies have been severely degraded from where they were just 600-plus days ago.
The second blast radius will be felt in Moscow, Beijing and in North Korea. And they've watched the United States taken action here, a capability here. Others have now watched China and Russia one getting military, the other one getting oil doing nothing to help, quote, unquote, a key pillar of the axis of resistance.
And so that reverberation or that blast radius will change their calculation of this president and it change their calculation of the United States.
And then third, which I haven't seen, and maybe its out there and I've missed it. Which country the United States chose to deliver from the Gulf to Iran, the message, we intend to negotiate with you, we're only going to do this once, et cetera. Was that Qatar? Was that Oman? Was that Saudi Arabia?
I haven't seen that report. Maybe I'm missing it, but to me, the selection of the country and the messenger is a very important piece to what comes next.
SCIUTTO: Smart points, and I do want to get to the more global ramifications, including involving those involving Russia and China. But before I do just in terms of the diplomatic path now, is that a realistic path if you're Iran, if you have been really, truly decimated by Israeli airstrikes, strikes over the course of the past week and now this, this, this enormous U.S. strike, do you as an Iranian leader?
And again, they don't have good options right now. Do you trust negotiations given you have that hammer in effect, hanging over your head? The hammer of potential military action, further military action.
EMANUEL: Yeah. Well, first of all, a lot of the other speakers said, you know, there's door number one, door number two, door number three. I -- maybe door number four where they do all the above.
Meaning they -- I don't see how Iran based everything I know about both Irish student of Iran, but student of the Middle East. They're not going to get bombed to the table. They're going to try to do something. And if they do something, it will also, if they decide to go to the table, they're going to take some kinetic action for reputational deterrence and for their own face.
The idea that they're going to just go to the table and say, okay, where do you like me to sign?
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That's not possible. No country would do that, let alone a country with the Parisian -- not Parisian -- with Persian background and cultural outlook. So that's not possible. My guess is they will take some steps. I don't know, I could be wrong. We all could be wrong. We're guessing.
I don't see them risking other countries energy because their energy facilities, their energy infrastructure is incredibly vulnerable right now. And that is the only livelihood that our only ticket to some form of the economy.
I think you should also, I forgot to say this earlier. They spent hundreds of billion dollars building a nuclear capability. We know close to about $40 billion in Syria, probably an equal amount in Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Literally, 30 years to 40 years' worth of not only work resources, time and energy is now down to zero. That when they put the calculated, you're going to take another country's energy capability out because yours is going to be totally open to being destroyed. I don't think they'll do that. They -- their backs are against the wall, but they're not crazy.
So, my guess is they're going to take some action and try to communicate to the Americans.
SCIUTTO: Yeah.
EMANUEL: That's a guess. And anybody tells you they know they're going to do --
(CROSSTALK)
SCIUTTO: To your point that -- that money -- that money spent in Syria spent with Hezbollah and spent on its nuclear facilities, of course, money not spent helping the Iranian people, right? And of course, the Iranian people might -- must be making that calculation themselves right now.
Just to --
(CROSSTALK)
SCIUTTO: Go ahead. Sorry.
EMANUEL: I was going to say, if you remember, over the last three years, the protest in Iran was the -- there were many people holding up protest. Why are we supporting Hezbollah? Why are we supporting the Palestinians when we don't have an economy here?
So, they're going to be -- their one asset they still have, I'm not sure they're going to risk it. That's -- I just don't see it.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. So, if you're Kim Jong Un right now, are you thinking that your nuclear facilities are potentially vulnerable? And if you're Xi Jinping, are you thinking, well, if I took military action against Taiwan, perhaps I'm vulnerable?
EMANUEL: Well, I think -- I think -- I think the other piece of this, and I wrote about this once, we're about to see the -- if you thought nonproliferation was expensive, you're about to see the cost that you can get sticker shock over proliferation.
SCIUTTO: Yes, North Korea is going to look at this. My guess is South Korea is going to look at this and make it start to make a decision. I think there's going to be European countries, given what's happened on NATO, are going to start Germany, Poland. They've already talked openly about this.
So, I think Beijing both is -- I will say this: they're going to look at what just happened. And you look about Taiwan straits. But I would also say South China Sea, and remember, the Philippines, sovereign nation, treaty ally, not true about Taiwan. There's a lot going on in the South China Sea vis-a-vis, the Philippines.
They're going to look at it, president said, here's two weeks. It didn't take 24 hours. He's going to say I -- you know, I did want to do this. Does it very quickly. I think they're going to say, this is unpredictable and its going to throw a lot of the things that they assumed and are based and baked in. They're going to start reevaluating assumptions.
That will also be true in Moscow. And so, there's both adversaries and others that are going to just start to recalibrate how they think of the United States, what it will do to predictability around that, that has its own strategic deterrent value. It is also in an uncertain world and an -- in a world topsy turvy, it makes it more less. It doesn't make it less. It makes it more uncertain.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. The ripple effects of this, you picture the pebbles dropping in a pond and how broad they go around the globe.
EMANUEL: But, Jim, I will say this: 600 plus days ago, we were talk -- we were -- we would have sat here and talked about how Israel's deterrence and the (INAUDIBLE) deterrence, military capability had been degraded.
SCIUTTO: Yeah.
EMANUEL: In that period of time everything from Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria has been fundamentally changed. Iran has been fundamentally changed. If there was, Israel would pursue or Bibi Netanyahu would pursue diplomatic efforts, both getting the hostages released, quieting that down, then opening up a channel to expand its capabilities of peace with other neighbors in the Gulf, you actually could.
And I think this -- the military takes you here, the political and diplomatic take you that much farther. And that's the piece that's both the United States and Israel separately have to now seize the opening created by both the American military action and the IDF over this last 600-plus days. Yet to be seen.
SCIUTTO: Ambassador Rahm Emanuel, thanks so much for joining. Fascinating conversation.
EMANUEL: Thank you.
SCIUTTO: More to come. Our breaking news coverage continues next as we monitor the ongoing aftermath of the U.S. strikes on Iran and the many unanswered questions, including how Iran might respond.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.
The breaking news, just into CNN. The Israeli military says Iran has fired a fresh wave of missiles towards Israel. It is now urging people to enter shelters. We have been looking to see how Iran might respond to this U.S. military strike on its nuclear facilities. And this may indeed be part of that response.
Our Anderson Cooper is in Tel Aviv, where he has been instructed to enter a shelter.
Anderson, I know the connections a little spotty, given where you are underground, but have there been any impacts yet? Do we know the status of the strikes?
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "AC360": Yeah. Yeah, Jim, we think we've heard some impacts. We don't know if that's -- I assume that's interceptions, but we just heard some dull booming. We're in a basement. So, we wouldn't hear as well as we'd hear from our rooms. I'm here with Nic Robertson.
We got a warning, a ten-minute warning which is standard. And then we've just got a red alert a few moments ago and then heard those explosions.
ROBERTSON: Yeah. And we're sort of trying to track what's happening outside. Sirens also in Jerusalem and in other parts of the country as well.
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But yes, as soon as you get the ten-minute warning come down, other people in the shelter here talking to people on the way down. They woke up this morning to hear the news about the United States joining Israel. That's the first they sort of heard of it.
COOPER: And that's what's -- that's what's significant about what's happening right now. This is the first -- this is the first air raid after the attack, which occurred. I'm not sure even what time it is. Probably like three hours ago or so.
ROBERTSON: Yeah, three or four, three or four hours ago. It is. And I think that's what people are reacting to this morning. They're trying to assess, okay, how bad is it going to be. So, this is going to be the real test.
When people come up what do they see. How many missiles do we hear that's fired? I think the early readout we've just been getting from the IDF so far is in the region of 20 missiles, but of course, that can be updated.
COOPER: And this was an alert around most of the nation. Some spots didn't have it. But I looked at a map, it seemed like alerts all over Israel.
ROBERTSON: Across the whole country. So, you've got close to 10 million people on their way to the shelters, and they will be listening very closely. I was speaking with the war room in Haifa, in the north of the country. The leader of that room, an operation, he said, absolutely. They're ready. They're on a close-hauled high alert because this is the morning after a few hours, after waiting to see how Iran strikes.
COOPER: There were no -- yesterday, it's now Sunday morning here. Saturday, there were no -- there were no incoming missiles. There were no, no warnings, at least in Tel Aviv, you were up in Haifa as well.
ROBERTSON: The same. A couple of drones that came in 40 drones. Most intercepted. One landed in an open space, one hit a house in the Northwest of the Northeast of the country. People were in the -- in the shelter there.
But the drones the impact is, is so much smaller than these missiles. And the concern has always been, what is it that Iran has got up their sleeve that they've been saving for a moment like this? The missiles where they say the warheads can split off the missiles that can deviate their direction at the last minute to evade the interceptions.
And that's what we're going to see play out. That's what we're going to find out in the next few hours, the IDF said I think it was 48 hours or so ago, maybe 24, that they had eliminated what they believe are half of the launchers for missiles that Iran has, which is a -- it's a lot of launchers to have eliminated already. But still, you still have half left. And the precautions that the home front have put on the country today,
it's gone up a step from where it was previously. There should be nobody on the beaches outside. I was looking earlier. There were some surfers, but they shouldn't be there.
According to the new instructions, nobody should be going to work unless it's an essential work. No schools are operating. So, the government has put the country on this higher footing of awareness and an alert level.
COOPER: And that's a change because they were sort of ratcheting down the alert level as of yesterday. But obviously, now that's changed.
ROBERTSON: It's changed and it's in recognition of the moment that we're at.
Look, the government here, the intelligence agencies, Mossad will be studying the way Iran has responded to try to understand how cohesive the leadership is. Are there challenges to the leadership as it comes under pressure?
The leadership doesn't have its trusted cohort that it would have had a week or so ago of military commanders that they will have worked with over the years because they've been taken out by precise assassination strikes by Israel.
So that's going to confuse the leadership in any conflict. This is what former Mossad intelligence people were telling me a few days ago. In any conflict, you have to understand that tensions will exist within the leadership of that country, potentially those that want to shift aside the current leadership, take control, don't think they're doing the right job, not up to the job.
So, this is all putting a stress on leadership. So, it makes their reactions less predictive. And the possibility of sort of being the wounded lion is how one former Mossad intelligence official put it, that they will lash out in an unpredicted manner.
COOPER: It was just, I think within the last 24 hours that Israel announced that they had actually killed two other high ranking Iranian officials. I think they were members of the Quds Force or leaders of the Quds Force.
ROBERTSON: One of them was associated with Hamas. He was somebody the IDF said had been involved in helping Hamas plan. The October 7th attacks have been involved in building up, helping build them up militarily.
COOPER: They said that they had internal communications from Hamas, which indicated in a meeting that Hamas had contacted this guy from the Quds force about a month prior to the October 7th attack.
ROBERTSON: And so, it's very clear that he has been somebody essentially on the hit list in in Iran for the IDF, not right at the top of the military, but a key player. One of the other key players they hit was somebody who had a similar association in helping provide weapons from Iran to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
So again, people that were on the list, this is the thing that we continue to hear from the IDF, from the political leadership that they have been working methodically through a list of targets. And that clearly is people that they've held responsible for the deaths of Israeli citizens over, over the past number of years.
COOPER: We are waiting for the all-clear. Usually, that should happen pretty soon.
Jim, let's go back to you.
SCIUTTO : Question just for you and Anderson, you and Nick, if I can, Anderson, given that Iran has been firing missiles at Israel every day over the course of the last week, what is the level of confidence in Israel right now that they have the interceptors and the capability to shoot the bulk or all of the missiles down?
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COOPER: Jim has asked a question about the interceptors. What is the -- given all that we've seen so far that they have the interceptors to shoot all the missiles down, what is the confidence that there are enough? I mean, that has been a question. How much? Obviously, the interceptors are very expensive. Theres a limited number of them. How many does Israel have?
SCIUTTO: It's not clear. I did ask that question to the prime minister three days ago when he went to the hospital in Beer Sheva to look at the damage there. He didn't give me an answer. Maybe that's the answer, that he didn't want to give one, that what was being rumored that they were having to ration the missiles to because there -- because there is a shortage, he didn't want to get into that.
But look, I think what we see is a complex array of defense mechanisms, and they're imprecise. And again, that's the repetitive thing that we hear from officials here. It's not a hermetic seal. They continue to repeat that the shelters are the safest place to go to.
Operational details like that are obviously exactly what we want to understand, but it's what Tehran wants to understand as well.
COOPER: It is interesting, Jim, though, because the more time you spend here, the greater the -- your tolerance level for the danger of it increases. And there's a tendency, I think, on a lot of peoples part to after a while, not even go down to the shelters anymore. And then certainly on a day like today, you're reminded of the -- the very real danger that exists, the, the reality of this. And so even though it's very early in the morning, people are responding obviously to this -- to this wave, Jim.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. They can't -- they can't get through. We know that. Anderson and Nick, please stay safe. Your teams as well. Thanks so much.
Well, with more now on how the strikes by the U.S. will impact Iran, how Iran might react to all this. We're joined by Mohammad Ali Shabani. He's a Middle East scholar and editor at Amwaj Media.
Thanks so much for joining us this evening.
I wonder if you could help us assess Iran's thinking right now -- the thinking of Iranian leaders as to what their next moves will be. They're striking Israel now with more missiles. Not the first time we've seen that, but the first the first strikes we've seen since this U.S. strike. Do you expect them one to strike at U.S. interests in the region as well?
MOHAMMAD ALI SHABANI, MIDDLE EAST SCHOLAR: Thank you, Jim. I think the number one thing they want to do is to understand what happened last night. And I think the number one thing they need to look at is the damage assessment. Having done the damage assessment, I think they need to really evaluate what has really been taken out, what hasn't been taken out, and what leverage they have in their hands.
I think when you look at the nuclear program, there's a tendency to think of it as a series of facilities. The real nuclear capability of Iran is in its human resources. It's in the thousands of nuclear scientists that they have. That's number one.
The second thing is the stockpile of enriched uranium, based on the sources we've been speaking at and watch media, we know that the facilities that were targeted were evacuated beforehand, that the American side provided advance warning, that they notified Iran also, that they want this to be a one off, that they're not seeking a further escalation.
And more importantly, there are indications that this stockpile, which I just referred to actually is quote unquote, safe. This means that right now buildings have been bombed. But that doesn't mean the nuclear program is eliminated, right? So, I think what we've seen in the past from Iran is that they tend to be cold and calculated in their response. And I think what the U.S. side is signaling, basically saying that they want to draw a line under this at this point, they don't want to escalate any further.
The closest thing we have to look at is 2020. In January 2020, Trump ordered the assassination of Quds Force Commander Qasem Soleimani in Iraq. Iran took five days to respond, and when it did, it bombed U.S. military bases.
That was highly choreographed. It was mainly a symbolic strike. No U.S. soldiers were killed, but it sent an important message from Iran. It was about saving face. It was about sending out this message to his allies as well, that it will respond.
I think this time, what is quite unique about this strike is that unlike the 2020 strike, the attacks by the U.S. number one, the B-2 bombers which bombed for appeared to have been departing from the United States mainland. They did not depart from any regional basis. Thats number one.
Number two, the Isfahan and Natanz nuclear facilities were hit, apparently by tomahawk missiles fired by a submarine. What does this mean? It means that Iran's retaliatory options in terms of a kinetic response are quite limited.
[00:55:01]
We're not sure whether Iran wants to target U.S. military bases in the Gulf, for example, because then that would upset Iran's relations with, let's say, Saudi Arabia or Qatar, right? That's number one.
So, if we look in terms of kinetic responses, I think they're probably looking at Iraq again. But then there's another complexity, which is basically that the United States has evacuated most of its military personnel, both at diplomatic missions and also military sites. That's on the one hand.
And on the legal side, what can Iran do to escalate or provide leverage before I think, obviously, they need to come to the table at some point to make a deal because this battle is going to be solved politically.
I think there's no military solution to any of this. And I think the Trump administration understands that. And they also want leverage. I think that's how Iran is looking at it, looking at the United States is wanting to make the best possible deal. And I think Iran also, obviously is going to try to make the best possible deal.
So, in terms of the legal and kind of regulatory options that they have, they can go and for instance, announce that they're going to withdraw from the NPT, the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. But I think doing so is a is a double-edged sword, because if they were to withdraw from the NPT, which is a 90-day process, essentially they will provide Europe with a pretext to initiate what's referred to as snapback, which is the reimposition of all these U.N. Security Council sanctions --
SCIUTTO: Of those sanctions from -- right.
SHABANI: -- which were lifted under the -- exactly, the 2015 nuclear deal, right? So they want to have that scenario. So, what I think we're looking at --
SCIUTTO: Unfortunately, we're going to have to leave it there, given the time. But Mohammad Ali Shabani, we do appreciate your perspective.
Thanks so much for joining. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington. There is more of CNN's breaking news coverage when I'll be here right after this break.
