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IDF: Iran Fires First Wave Of Missiles Since U.S. Strikes; Trump: U.S. Strikes On Iran A "Spectacular Military Success". Aired 1- 2a ET

Aired June 22, 2025 - 01:00   ET

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

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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. You are in the CNN Newsroom. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.

The latest now on the breaking news from the Middle East and from Washington. Israel on alert now after Iran fired the first missiles since the U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear sites. U.S. B-2 bombers dropped a dozen bunker buster bombs as they're known on the Fordow site and two of those bombs on the Natanz nuclear enrichment site.

U.S. Navy submarines fired some 30 cruise missiles at Natanz and Isfahan as well. An Israeli intelligence official tells CNN it is too early for an accurate battle damage assessment or BDA as they're known of the strikes. It will take time, daybreak just taking place over Iran which will allow a clearer view for intelligence assets, satellites, surveillance aircraft as well.

In the wake of the strikes Iran's Atomic Energy Agency says there are no signs of radioactive contamination emanating from those sites. The White House released these photos from the Situation Room. They show President Trump along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Vice President there on the left J.D. Vance.

When President Trump addressed the nation late on Saturday, he said his objective with these strikes was, quote, to stop Iran's nuclear threat.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: 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.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: CNN anchor, Anderson Cooper, CNN International diplomatic editor, Nic Robertson. They join me now from a bomb shelter as a result of these new Iranian missile strikes. Anderson, tell us what the latest is. Are -- are the missiles still coming in?

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: I'm not sure if they're still coming in. We -- we've been getting some reports and Nic has the latest. We -- we believe there's two waves.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: We do. The -- the sirens have just gone off again in Haifa in the north of the country and where -- there -- there is video image of a blast in Haifa, of an impact in Haifa, pretty close actually to the location of the blast site we were at two days ago there in Haifa.

COOPER: So that's from a second wave. The --

ROBERTSON: I think that one, I think that impact that we've seen is from the first wave and then just in the last minute the second wave has been sirens gone off.

COOPER: There's a variety of ways of the reports come across on -- on -- on phones. Do we know how many missiles came across?

ROBERTSON: The early reporting appears to indicate in the first wave that it was 30 missiles and we have confirmed reports that medical teams are headed to 10 locations which indicates potentially 10 sites where there's damage. So 30 incoming missiles potentially 10 getting through.

We can't say that with clear knowledge because some of these could be parts of the same missile landing in different places. We really need to get better information but that's -- that's the early assessment that we have.

COOPER: It's interesting though because the -- the attack on the Iran nuclear sites by the U.S. that occurred at around 3:00 a.m. just before 3:00 a.m. local time maybe 2:30 a.m. or so. It's now -- I don't know what time it is right now but that's some seven hours or so ago.

ROBERTSON: Eight o'clock.

COOPER: It's 8 o'clock here now.

ROBERTSON: Five -- five hours.

COOPER: Yes. So I mean we were all wondering how soon would there be some sort of response in Israel even if it's symbolic. This is -- if -- if it is 30 and 10 got through that that would be significant.

ROBERTSON: That would be significant and the other thing and again it's always good to be careful when trying to make these early analysis partial data. But if this is a second wave on Haifa coming so soon after the first wave we haven't seen many instances of that. So perhaps is that Iran's tactic the emergency services and I've been trying to talk with the leader there of the war room that sends out emergency teams in Haifa clearly he's busy with that first strike.

They would then send out teams again, they would be sending out teams immediately. Now we have a second wave is that the tactic here to try to hit the emergency response teams. We don't know that, again, early assessment have to be cautious but these back-to-back waves that -- that's not typical so close together of these waves of attacks that we've seen recently.

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COOPER: We have yet to get an all-clear here which is a little unusual. It would usually be a little faster to get an all-clear here.

ROBERTSON: Yes and that could be because there's been that wave of missiles going into the north and -- and really the -- the IDF's sort of missile detection arrays kind of need to know that they can't figure that out until the last moment.

COOPER: You responded -- you were at the scene in Haifa during the last -- in the wake of the -- the last missile that -- that hit there. Talk about the damage that occurred from that.

ROBERTSON: It was extensive damage. It appears from -- from what we could see on the ground that whatever it was that Iran was trying to target they hit a derelict building which means there were no casualties inside that building. The casualties were people outside on the ground who hadn't gotten to shelter fast enough.

COOPER: There were -- there were injuries nobody -- no fatalities.

ROBERTSON: No fatalities, yes. A couple of very serious injuries as well, a 16-year-old boy. But, you know, as we went into that site like all these sites here, you know, you're a hundred yards away and the storefronts are all blown in, the cars are torn apart and wrecked and the closer and you get the -- the -- there's an immense amount of blast damage the -- the windows in nearby buildings are shattered, cars are thrown against the -- against the walls at the side of the road and that building itself windows completely falling out top floors, middle floors that have been hit just -- just crumbling rubble.

COOPER: Yes. So Jim we are still waiting for the all-clear here and obviously news of that which seems to be a second wave that's -- that's the latest from here.

SCIUTTO: Well please stay safe guys. It looks like the danger has anticipated and we'll come back to you. Nic Robertson, Anderson Cooper in a shelter there in Tel Aviv.

Well the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now reacted to the U.S. strikes thoroughly endorsing President Trump's military action.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: Congratulations President Trump your bold decision to target Iran's nuclear facilities with the awesome and righteous might of the United States will change history.

In Operation Rising Line, Israel has done truly amazing things. 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. President Trump and I often say peace through strength. First comes strength then comes peace. And tonight President Trump and the United States acted with a lot of strength.

President Trump, I thank you, the people of Israel thank you, the forces of civilization thank you. God bless America, God bless Israel and may God bless our unshakable alliance, our unbreakable faith.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: We're joined now by Alan Pincus he's a former Israeli Consul General in New York and he's joining us from Tel Aviv. Good to have you on. I -- I wonder if you could give us first your sense of the ongoing Iranian missile strikes. Are they still ongoing and do you have any sense of -- of the level of damage at this point?

ALON PINKAS, FORMER ISRAELI CONSUL GENERAL, NEW YORK: Well they're not ongoing this very moment. And I -- and I assumed and expected them to end right before I'm on air with you just so you know I -- I did not want to ruin your show. But I'm in northern Tel Aviv, the northern part of Tel Aviv. There was a not just a series of sirens but a very protracted intermittent series of explosions.

Some of them have to do with the interception of the missiles. And you know when you intercept a missile, large fragments fall down on earth and that creates a noise. And there's another tier of defense that tries to shoot down the fragments.

So you had, you know, you had -- you had a lot of blasts and a lot of explosions. As for the extent of the damage, I honestly don't know. I think it is still being examined. You know Israeli media is reporting two or three places in the country that have been hit. Whether or not it's just structural damage or hopefully not injured and -- and fatalities. I honestly don't know at this point.

SCIUTTO: Of course we also don't know how and how extensively Iran will retaliate, to what degree it will retaliate for the U.S. strikes. But one, can we reasonably assume that these strikes so it's not the first time Iran has struck Israel that these strikes are part of that Iranian retaliation?

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PINKAS: Yes, well I would imagine because if it was a direct response to yesterday's Israeli actions you would think that they would try something earlier than this. But -- but, and this is a big, this is an important aspect here Jim. We're entering into notwithstanding the U.S. attack on -- on the three sites on Fordow and Natanz and Isfahan with those huge, you know, GBU-57 30,000 pound bombs, notwithstanding that.

In terms of the Israeli Iranian dynamic, we're entering into something called missile economy or missile economics, meaning that there is an equation, there is a ratio of how many Iranian missiles slash launchers there are and how many interceptor, Israeli missiles there are, particularly the -- the so-called Arrow 3 interceptor.

Now Iran's -- the -- the arsenal of the stockpiles of the inventory of missiles that Iran has is less important than the number of launchers they have. And so in the last three or four days, Jim, Israel has been investing heavily in -- in a concentrated effort to go after the launchers because once -- once -- once you don't have a launcher the missile is of no use to you.

Now yesterday Israel was saying well we hit 55 percent of the launchers. I don't know how they -- they reached such an exact figure but let's assume it's accurate. That still leaves 45. So what we saw today going back to your original question this barrage today was, A, definitely a response to the U.S. attack. And it was symbolic in the sense that look we're still alive. Look we could still -- we still have a fight with us -- within us enough. I'm sorry.

And -- and look we're still capable of doing this. So it remains to be seen how many they still have.

SCIUTTO: Let me ask you about the -- the U.S. decision to strike. This is something the Israeli prime minister had wanted for some time. Do you believe that Israel to some degree paved the way for President Trump's decision including its success in recent days striking at Iran's not just nuclear program but at its missile sites?

PINKAS: Yes. There's no question that -- that in terms of paving the way or making it more hospitable it's a bad word to use here but making it more has been making the terrain more hospitable for an American -- I'm sorry for an American attack. Absolutely. I think that Israel also exerted massive amounts of pressure, public and private on the administration on -- on the -- on President Trump in particular of course.

You're right in -- in determining that Israel had wanted this for a long time and a long time is not the last 10 days since the war began. But the better part of the last 20 years of Mr. Netanyahu has been imploring the U.S. to attack Iran. In fact this goes back to the U.S. invasion of Iraq when he thought that that the U.S. should expand it into Iran or at least believe that it would have a major effect on Iran.

So he's been -- he's been at it for a long time. And the question now is and I'm sure you're going to ask this throughout the day or days is whether or not this was a one off. This was America saying OK. There was a nuclear infrastructure. Iran was lying. Iran was that -- was very close to a bomb true, not true, accurate or inaccurate. It doesn't matter now. So we went after those three nuclear sites. But we're out. We sent B- 52s. We're not sending Marines. There are no boots on the ground. There are no, you know, permanent sorties of F-15s or F-35s in the air, just those two -- those several B -- B-2 bombers. OK. The question is what happens then. Look -- look at Mr. Trump's statement. He now thinks there's going to be diplomacy.

I -- I believe he believes that there should be. But I don't know that that's going to happen. So if this is a one off then the war in the next 24 hours is going to revert back to the pre-American attack. Meaning that equation that we just spoke about Israel shoots during the day, the Iranians respond with a missile barrage during the night or early in the next morning and so on.

I -- that's -- that's the big question. And that leads to a different question which deserves an entire segment of its own or entire show Jim. And that is, is Israel and the U.S. actually thinking, contemplating, planning a regime change in Iran. And that's important not just because of the -- the concept of regime change but because of the Iranian regime perceives to be under an existential threat to its very power. Then all breaks loose as if hell didn't break until now.

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SCIUTTO: No. It's -- it's a very good point. And it -- it -- it also raises questions about the diplomatic path. If -- if one party to this perhaps Israel or some in Israel are looking for regime change and the U.S. is not or --or wants to negotiate, again, quite an open question. Alon Pinkas in the near term please stay safe in the midst of these ongoing strikes. We do appreciate you joining us.

PINKAS: I will. Thank you Jim.

But when we return we will have the latest on not just the U.S. airstrikes on Iran but the ongoing Iranian strikes now in Israel. And also why Donald Trump is threatening that there might be more to come. More breaking news coverage ahead on CNN.

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SCIUTTO: We just have this breaking news in the CNN that is that the IDF home front command in Israel has now lifted restrictions that had required people to go into shelters there, bomb shelters as a result of dozens of Iranian missiles fired towards Israel.

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Our own team members there in Tel Aviv Nic Robertson, Anderson Cooper they went to the shelters as well. But the news is that it appears that the barrage for now is over and people are being advised they can leave the shelters. The breaking news overnight that we continue to follow President Trump says the U.S. carried out what he called massive precision -- precision strikes on three of Iran's most important nuclear sites.

Sources familiar with the military operations say the U.S. used what are known as bunker buster bombs. These are enormous munitions some 30,000 pounds in weight and it used them on multiple facilities including those at Fordow and the tens also fired at Isfahan another nuclear facility.

Iran confirmed the attacks called them a blatant violation of international law. Sources tell CNN that the U.S. informed Iran the strikes would be contained and that for now no more are planned. However, in his remarks late on Saturday, President Trump warned Tehran that the U.S. could strike more targets if Iran does not, quote, make peace.

CNN's Tom Foreman joins me now. And Tom one notable feature of this is that the Trump administration let Republican lawmakers know some of them on relevant committees, intelligence committee, et cetera, leadership positions but did not as per normal let Democratic leaders on those relevant committees know. What's the significance of that?

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well the significance Jim is that presidents usually do not do that. They would like to present the notion that this is an action by the entire U.S. government not by one party of the government. And yet what the President did here is he informed the leaders on the Republican side in both the House and the Senate and on the intelligence committees informed them before the blast occurred, where the attacks occurred and then on the Democratic side informed them before they made it all public but after the blast had occurred, thereby giving the Democrats no chance to even try to say wait a minute are you doing the right thing should we talk about this. Can we at least raise our objections or say anything we might want to say about it.

Democrats clearly not very happy about it. Several of them have spoken up and said they really want a vote on whether or not the President has violated something here. They want to pull it forward and say we need to take the War Powers Act and push it into place. 1973 is when that was put into place. Initially it has been criticized as being relatively toothless in that theoretically it says Congress has to be consulted. And yet this has come up before it's come up before with Donald Trump.

And he's essentially shrugged it off and said I had to take action because it was an emergency which is what he is saying here. But as you expect --

SCIUTTO: And which we should note that --

FOREMAN: Yes.

SCIUTTO: -- multiple presidents of both parties have done this.

FOREMAN: Yes. Democrats, Republicans have carried out military action without -- without congressional approval over the -- the past several decades.

SCIUTTO: Yes, absolutely. And -- and the last time and the last time we declared war in this country was 1942 and World War II. Many of these actions are handled in some version of this. Nonetheless the fact that he cut out one party entirely is going to be. I mean that's a storm that's just on the horizon now. I suspect by Monday morning Tuesday morning it's going to be a lot louder whether Democrats can do anything about it.

I -- I -- legislatively, I don't know what they would do other than make a lot of noise maybe force a couple of votes. One goal that they have out there is to -- to basically say look we want the American public to understand if you read some of the quotes, Tim Kaine from Virginia said I will push all senators to vote on whether they are for this third idiotic Middle East war.

A few Republicans have spoken against this. Most are in favor. Thomas Massie from Kentucky has said this is not constitutional. The only Democrat siding with the President over this is Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman who said I've maintained this was a correct move. Iran is the world's leading sponsor of terrorism and cannot have nuclear capabilities. I'm grateful for this -- for this move here.

So -- so the bottom line is, Jim, that this is something where Democrats have a lot of feeling right now that this was a very risky, very capricious move and they don't appreciate the fact that they were cut out of it. Truly, you know, Jim, as you've been talking to so many guests there it comes out in many ways to be a gamble. If it turns out that this was a good play then this allows Donald Trump and the Republicans to say it was ours. We did it without them.

SCIUTTO: Right.

FOREMAN: If it was a bad play, Democrats are going to make them own it.

[01:24:55]

SCIUTTO: Votes in support of military action have at times come back to bite American lawmakers. If you think those who supported for instance U.S. military action in Iraq in 2003, Hillary Clinton among them paid political prices for them later based on the outcome. We'll see.

FOREMAN: And -- and the Middle East is one of those places where we -- as we have seen already and as many lawmakers have started it's easy to start a fight. It's hard to end it. The unintended -- the question is did Donald Trump with his action tonight politically even did he tonight end something or did he start something.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

FOREMAN: And that is all the difference in the world.

SCIUTTO: It's important framing there and it's an open question. We don't know.

FOREMAN: It is.

SCIUTTO: Tom Foreman, thank you. Joining us now is H.A. Hellyer. He's a senior associate fellow with the Royal United Services Institute and he joins us now from the region live from Cairo, Egypt. H.A. good to speak to you again. I wonder if I could begin with the question that I ended there with Tom Foreman and that is, is this the beginning of something or the end of something?

It appears to be the president Trump's intention here is to finish the military action, the war we've seen underway between Israel and Iran over the course of the last week with the U.S. now involved by either ending or severely damaging Iran's nuclear program. The question is, does it end or does it spark something bigger?

H.A. HELLYER, SENIOR ASSOCIATE FELLOW, ROYAL UNITED SERVICES INSTITUTE: Thank you for having me on the program. Actually your question to your colleague was exactly what I was thinking. Does this end something or does it begin something? And I think that would be the question that will be on everybody's mind not only in the region but internationally. But it will be ending something else as well.

Or at least this will be the question that people have. Of course we'll be thinking about the war whether or not this sets up a spiral of even greater violence and destruction. But it will also set up questions about is this the end of using international law as the basis of international relations at least within the region.

The United States entered this war. There are many questions within the United States of course about how that was done in a partisan fashion and so on as you've just covered but also within the region. Then, you know, on -- on what basis. There was no United Nations Security Council resolution that authorized it. It was a unilateral American decision, a decision that was taken by administration that was negotiating with this regime with the Iranian regime only 10 days ago.

So the -- the -- the precedents here I think are very serious. I think this will have wide ranging consequences for a very long time to come. And it happens not in a vacuum but at the, quote unquote, end of 20 months of another war that is taking place.

SCIUTTO: Right.

HELLYER: Israel's war on Gaza. And you can't separate these two environments. That sense of impunity of -- of taking this sort of unilateral action I think is -- is really going to be worrying a lot of regional leaders because they're looking for predictability. They're looking for negotiations. They're looking for the -- the hope that this region will turn into a more peaceful one. And instead of the past 20 months they've just seen several wars break out without any prospect of international law coming to bear.

SCIUTTO: Let me ask you because of course Iran has taken a series of -- of military actions, right, you know, outside of international law. Despite concerns about a war, will there be those in the region who perhaps quietly, hope for the end of Iran's nuclear program? HELLYER: So here's the thing, right? I don't think you're going to find many, quite rightly, who are fans of the Iranian regime. I mean, if we think about what the Iranian regime did in places like Syria, in places like Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, I mean, there -- there -- at the very least, you can say there are impacts and influences that are entirely negative.

In spite of all of that, in spite of all of that, I don't think you'll find any political leader within the region, with the exception of the Israelis and Netanyahu in particular, who frankly has domestic concerns that he wants to address through these sorts of actions. The -- the overwhelming feeling in the region from, you know, all quarters, including those who are incredibly cynical about Iran, again, rightly so. And we're even urging the Trump administration to be more aggressive with Iran in Trump won and the first Trump administration, none of them wanted this.

[01:30:07]

None of them wanted this war. None of them wanted escalation. They all wanted this to be de-escalated. They -- precisely because they're concerned about the spiral to take place. And they're also concerned that attention is now shifting away from what they see as the much more destabilizing force in the region which is the state of Israel.

So I'm -- I'm glad that you pointed out that Iran has carried out a number of operations that are incredibly damaging to regional security over the years, but they were recognized as a pariah state for doing so. It's very different when you have the United States doing actions that are outside of international law and its allies.

SCIUTTO: And some history of that as well, going back to the Iraq invasion. H.A. Hellyer, thanks so much for joining.

HELLYER: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Our breaking news coverage continues next as we continue to monitor the aftermath of U.S. strikes on Iran. And just in the last hour, Iranian missile strikes once again on Israel.

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SCIUTTO: Welcome back to CNN Newsroom. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington, D.C., and back to our breaking news. Continuing in the Middle East, Israel's military says Iran has fired a fresh wave of missiles toward Israel. It had urged people to enter shelters during that attack.

Video geolocated by CNN shows smoke rising, and you see it there, from the northern Israeli city of Haifa following one of those strikes. Buildings severely damaged in Tel Aviv in an area struck by an Iranian missile as well. Emergency officials are calling it a large-scale destruction site, with several two-story residential buildings severely damaged, some collapsed. These are the first attacks launched by Iran since the U.S. struck three of the country's major nuclear installations.

[01:35:24]

President Donald Trump praised the U.S. operation. He said that Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated. However, an Israeli intelligence source tells me it is too early to make such an assessment with confidence, given they will need to gather intelligence as day breaks there and as they examine other intelligence sources, including communications intercepts.

U.S. officials tell CNN that American B-2 bombers and Navy submarines hit sites, three sites at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. Iran's foreign minister has condemned the attacks, warned they would have, quote, everlasting consequences. All this comes after Israel began targeting Iranian nuclear sites and military missile launch sites, top military officials, more than a week ago.

President Trump had been weighing U.S. strikes for days. The White House released these photos of the President with other top officials in the situation room as those strikes were underway. A U.S. official tells CNN law enforcement agencies are now watching for any possible response from Iran or others against U.S. interests in the region and around the world.

CNN's Larry Madowo has been tracking all the international reaction. He joins me now from London. And -- and I wonder what other leaders around the world are saying following President Trump's orders here.

LARRY MADOWO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jim, it's only daybreak here in Europe, so it should be a few more hours until we start to hear from the British prime minister and other European leaders. But we've heard from the U.N. secretary general who said he was gravely alarmed by this decision in a region already on the edge. He said there is no military solution here, that there has to be a way to talk out of this situation.

But we're also hearing some very strong reaction from Iran. The Iranian regime is calling for an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council. They're claiming that these airstrikes were coordinated and supervised by the U.N. nuclear watchdog, providing no evidence of that.

But they've been very critical of the U.N. nuclear watchdog since these Israeli strikes began. We also heard from the Iranian foreign minister who said this will have everlasting consequences, pointing out that the U.S. is a member of the U.N. and this violates international law and that Iran reserves the right to defend itself. You're already seeing some of that reaction, some of that response to that.

We're hearing from some advisors, one senior advisor to the Iranian leader saying they have now to target U.S. Navy ships on the Red Sea and suggesting that they should close the Strait of Hormuz to -- this is a key shipping route to German, to U.S., to French, and to U.S. ships along that. That would have major consequences. So you see this kind of massive reaction.

We've heard from as far as Latin America. We've seen from leaders of Cuba, Chile, Venezuela, Colombia condemning this and asking for a diplomatic solution. So this is some of the very early reactions. But a lot of that is what we're seeing right now.

One of the most interesting, Jim, has been a reaction from an Iranian lawmaker representing the region that includes the foreign nuclear side. He said this was very superficial and actually accused President Trump of lying about this.

I want to read some of what he said that, based on the information I'm able to stage to you, that contrary to claims of the lying President of the United States, the foreign nuclear installation has not been seriously damaged. Iranian officials essentially saying that they were able to evacuate that facility before any of these airstrikes happened. And the damage is so small that they couldn't quickly rebuild, trying to create the impression that this didn't really have any major impact.

Obviously, as you've been reporting, it's still too early to tell the BDA from that, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes. And you might expect Iranian officials to downplay any potential damage. Larry Madowo in London, thanks so much.

[01:39:16]

We will be back after a short break with the latest as we continue to cover these U.S. strikes on Iran and now Iranian strikes on Israel.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: The major breaking news tonight, President Donald Trump says the U.S. carried out airstrikes on three of Iran's key nuclear facilities.

Trump says his objective was to, quote, destroy the nuclear threat posed by the world's number one state sponsor of terror. Those were the President's words tonight. That is the same rationale Israeli leaders have been offering as they enter their country's second week of conflict with Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is praising the Trump administration's actions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NETANYAHU: 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: The question had been, how might Iran respond to the U.S. strikes? And perhaps we got a taste of that in the last hour as more Iranian missiles fell on Israel.

Stephen Erlanger is the chief diplomatic correspondent for the New York Times. He joins me now from Beijing -- from Berlin, rather. And Stephen, you've been covering this region for some time. There is a sense that this administration believes it can end the current phase of conflict, bring Iran to the table now for negotiations. Is that a realistic hope, expectation?

STEPHEN ERLANGER, CHIEF DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: Well, it's a hope. I'm not sure it's an expectation. Iran has to obviously make a choice. It's going to strike back in some fashion. That it's going to have to do. But the question is how long Iran will want to strike back, whether it will try to hit American troops, of which there are 30,000, 40,000 American troops inside the Middle East, particularly vulnerable in Iraq and in Syria.

Iran has lots of missiles. But Iran has to decide if it's worth the pain. I mean, it -- it could be, as the first Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini said, when he finally agreed to a ceasefire with Iraq in the 1980s war, he said he would drink from the poison chalice to save the country.

[01:45:08]

So the question is, what will they do now? I don't know the answer. I don't think they quite know the answer. But I do think there will be a wave of retaliation right now.

SCIUTTO: Yes. I wonder if -- if you could help us connect the dots here, because over the course of the last several months, Iran has -- has lost perhaps all or at least a big portion of -- of what was referred to as its ring of fire, right? It's -- it's leverage around Israel from Hezbollah in Lebanon to the Assad regime in Syria, Hamas in Gaza and -- and its own capabilities, nuclear and otherwise. Is Iran weakened significantly?

ERLANGER: Oh, I think without question it is. And its whole idea of forward defense with this ring of fire, which you just aptly described, I mean, that's gone.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

ERLANGER: The big question now is the survival of the regime itself. And what direction it will take. I mean, if there is regime change, even without regime change, it's very likely that stronger militant, more militant people, particularly around the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, will push for a faster race to a nuclear weapon.

Iran said after the last IAEA report that it had a third site prepared in a secret place. We don't know if that's true and we don't know where that is. And -- and there is a question of what's happened to the big pile of 60 percent enriched uranium that was at Isfahan. Perhaps it was still there. Perhaps it's been dispersed. Perhaps there are amounts of it elsewhere that we don't know.

So Iran really does have quite an existential choice in front of it. Because, of course, Israel hasn't stopped and the United States can come back and hit again because it has freedom of the skies over Iran. So, you know, I mean, nobody's a prophet, but Iran really has a tough choice to make. And Trump is -- is -- is expecting, I think you're right, that Iran will now want to come back to the table. I think if it does, it's going to have to strike back first.

SCIUTTO: Yes, yes. And listen, in such a short time frame, a lot of the myths about Iran's impregnability, right, faded, at least. Stephen Erlanger, thanks so much for joining.

ERLANGER: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: This is breaking news coverage on CNN. As we noted, the U.S. struck three nuclear facilities inside Iran using some of its most powerful bunker buster munitions, as well as cruise missiles fired from submarines. Please do stay with us. We'll have more after the break.

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[01:52:09]

SCIUTTO: Joining us now to discuss the reaction from Iran to U.S. airstrikes is Iranian journalist and researcher Abas Aslani. Joining us live now from Tehran. Abas, thanks so much for taking the time.

ABAS ASLANI, IRANIAN JOURNALIST AND RESEARCHER: Good to be with you, Jim.

SCIUTTO: It's morning where you are. I'm sure Iranians waking up to the news of these strikes. What reaction are you seeing and hearing there?

ASLANI: Well, you know, this attack -- Iran was not caught by surprise about this attack and it was expecting this from a few days ago. That's why they relocated their nuclear material to a different place in order to avoid contamination as well as prevent those materials being -- from being destroyed by the United States as well as Israel.

And thanks to those, you know, precautionary measures, you know, and the -- the situation is somehow in control. However, there have been damages to those nuclear facilities. But it -- it seems that, you know, the attacks have been much weaker than what was expected. And --

SCIUTTO: Well, how can that be? How could dropping -- how could dropping six 30,000-pound bunker busters on, for instance, the Fordow site, how can it be limited or exaggerated damage? Of course, we don't know the extent of the damage, but how could that just be superficial damage?

ASLANI: Well, you know, the damages are, you know, you cannot be denied. But the point is that due to the initial assessments, you know, specifically in Fordow, which is heavily protected and fortified on the ground nuclear facility, the -- the entrance of that facility has been damaged. And the Iranian officials think that this could be restored and it is repairable. In the meantime, they had also relocated that material to a different place to avoid them from being destroyed. And -- but I think we will need more time for further investigation to have a better and precise assessment of the impact of those attacks. But the second point is that what has been stressed by Iranian officials and Tehran is that you might bomb a facility, but you cannot destroy and bomb the know- how and the knowledge in the country.

And this will, you know, make the country, let's say, more resolved in order to continue and to pursue the nuclear program.

SCIUTTO: How about public reaction there? Many Iranians, when I've traveled there, have complained that so much money goes to the nuclear program and not to, well, building schools, building roads.

[01:55:10]

ASLANI: You know, it's a bit early to gauge the public reaction because it's early in the morning, as you earlier said. But for sure, you know, this was, you know, against nuclear facilities, which is somehow away from the, you know, those residential areas. But people didn't feel a specific, you know, consequences as a result of those impacts.

But we can refer to the initial reaction by Iranian people against Israeli aggression. This could be the case, contrary to maybe the calculations or the expectations from the Israeli or American sides. These, you know, attacks have made people united in the country, rallying around the flag against an external threat.

Maybe some thought that this could provoke people coming to the streets, protesting against the government. But in practice, because of, you know, feeling a, you know, an external threat, they have been united against that threat. And they have been supporting an Iranian response against that in order to establish a deterrence and stop further attacks in future.

SCIUTTO: Abas Aslani, joining us from Tehran. Thanks so much.

ASLANI: My pleasure, Jim.

SCIUTTO: The news we've been following, the U.S. has struck Iranian nuclear facilities. In addition, Iran has fired more missiles at Israel in the last hour. And we're learning from the Israeli military that it is now launching more of its own strikes against Iran. Much to cover. Thanks so much for joining me. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington.

Our Becky Anderson in Abu Dhabi picks up our coverage of the breaking news right after a quick break.

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