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Global Outrage Over IDF Strike Killing Five Journalists; Ukrainians Worry As Donald Trump Entertains Land Swaps With Vladimir Putin; Donald Trump Puts Washington, D.C. Under Federal Control; U.S.- China Agree to Extend Tariff Deadline by 90 Days; Strong Winds Complicate Wildfire Containment Near Madrid; Swarm of Jellyfish Shuts Down French Nuclear Plant; Meteorite That Crashed Into Georgia Home is Older Than Earth. Aired 2-2:45a ET
Aired August 12, 2025 - 02:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[02:00:22]
ROSEMARY CHURCH, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world, and to everyone streaming us on CNN Max. I'm Rosemary Church.
Just ahead, crucial voices in Gaza silenced. International condemnation is growing over the deliberate killing of journalists at a critical juncture in the war. Also:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There will be some swapping. There will be some changes in land.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: Donald Trump lowers the stakes ahead of his meeting with Vladimir Putin, we will take you to the heart of Donetsk, where the fate of Ukrainians living there could be at stake.
Citing a crime emergency, the U.S. president says he's taking over the police in the nation's capital, and it might not end there.
And then later, how swarms of jellyfish are forcing nuclear power plants to shut down.
ANNOUNCER: Live from Atlanta, This is CNN NEWSROOM with Rosemary Church.
CHURCH: Thanks for joining us. Global outrage is growing over the killing of five journalists in Gaza by an Israeli air strike. Large crowds gathered in Gaza City on Monday for the funeral of Al Jazeera Correspondent Anas al-Sharif and four other journalists killed in the strike. And in the West Bank, Palestinians also protested the journalists' deaths. The IDF accused al-Sharif of leading a Hamas cell, an allegation al- Sharif and Al Jazeera had denied. And an Al Jazeera News Chief says Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking to, "Eliminate any eyewitnesses to the plan to take over Gaza City."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SALAH NEGM, DIRECTOR OF NEWS, AL JAZEERA ENGLISH: The timing of this attack was clear from the Israeli Prime Minister press conference yesterday, he announced his plans for Gaza. He wants to go and level the city and transfer something like one million of its inhabitants to concentration camp in the south, and maybe will accept voluntarily what he calls volunteer evacuation. And in fact, it's expelling all of them. That is a plan for Gaza.
Now, does -- do they need eyewitnesses? Do they need cameras to monitor that? So, it's killing the messenger and trying to eliminate any eyewitness to atrocities and genocide.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: CNN's Matthew Chance has more on the international outcry at Israel's targeted killing of the journalists.
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MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CHIEF GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): There's been broad condemnation of the killing of several Palestinian journalists reporting on the conflict inside Gaza. Five staff members of the Al Jazeera news network died in an Israeli strike on their tent near the main Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. One of those killed, 28- year-old Anas al-Sharif. He's one of the most high-profile Arabic language reporters who's been extensively covering the crisis in Gaza.
The Israeli military says that they targeted and killed him after accusing him of leading a Hamas cell responsible for involvement in rocket attacks against Israeli troops and civilians.
But these are allegations that have been categorically denied by al- Sharif and by his news organization, who called his killing a desperate attempt to silence voices ahead of Israel's planned occupation of Gaza. The U.N. called the killings a grave breach of international humanitarian law. The Committee to Protect Journalists and their statement pointed out that at least 178 journalists have been killed in Gaza by Israel in just under two years of war.
Well, earlier, the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended his controversial plan to evacuate and assault Gaza City, insisting it's the best way to end the war and to and to free the hostages despite growing international condemnation there of Israel's action in, in in Gaza and the worsening humanitarian situation there.
Matthew Chance, CNN, Jerusalem.
(END VIDEOTAPE) CHURCH: I'm joined live now from Tel Aviv by Gideon Levy, columnist for Haaretz Newspaper and former adviser to Shimon Peres, appreciate you being with us.
GIDEON LEVY, COLUMNIST, HAARETZ NEWSPAPER: Thank you for having me.
CHURCH: So, five journalists were killed in a targeted Israeli air strike late Sunday night, resulting in widespread outrage and condemnation across the globe. The Israeli government justifying the killings by saying Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif was a Hamas operative, despite providing no evidence to support such a claim. What's your response to this?
[02:05:13]
LEVY: Anas al-Sharif was a courageous journalist who really endangered his life on a daily basis. And essentially it was a courageous journalist who really endangered his life on a daily basis, and was one of the last journalists with boots on the ground in Gaza to inform the world what Israel is committing there.
Israel claims that he was the head of a cell of Hamas. There are no evidences, as you just said, and let me have deep doubts that that's the truth.
But in any case, let's say he was a head of a cell. Why to slaughter five journalists? And this makes it so suspicious, because I don't buy the Israeli explanations. Israel has a record of mass killing of journalists in Gaza for the last two years, it's almost 200 journalists killed, more than any other war.
So, this ridiculous story of heading a cell is really insulting intelligence, and Israel is killing journalists, and we have to face it, it was this time targeted. Israel is proud of this. Israel does not covering up. Israel does not say it was by mistake. No, it was deliberate. And the consequence every person of conscience can take his own consequences out of such a -- such an act.
CHURCH: So, Gideon, what are the ramifications of a government killing journalists, the only remaining witnesses to this war in Gaza, apart from the civilians themselves, of course. And what should the international community be doing about this in the way of holding Israel accountable?
LEVY: What is the justification to destroy 33 out of 36 hospitals in Gaza, to kill so many medical teams, dozens and hundreds even of medical teams. What is the logic of this? The logic is to make Gaza an unlivable place and to try to minimize the possibility of the world to know about it.
Therefore, Gaza is closed for journalists -- for any journalists for 22 months. Therefore Israel is killing so easily. Journalists, brave journalists, really, journalists of conscience. We have to adore those journalists.
I'm watching Al Jazeera, and I see the work they do day and night now, in terrible conditions, starving by themselves many times. But in any case, you ask about the international community, you know, I think the international community knows exactly what to do with a state which violates the international law in such a dramatic way over such a long period, but I don't see the international community recruiting itself into real actions, and not only condemnations and recognition of Palestine.
CHURCH: And Israel is expanding its war in Gaza with the intent to take over full control of the Enclave. What will that mean for Gaza and indeed the region?
LEVY: It means exactly what Israel means to do, namely, to make an ethnic cleansing in Gaza. Israel does not hide it. There will be no other possibility, because the plan of Israel, which is not yet clear if it is achievable at all, but the plan is to push all the population into the south to make Gaza unlivable, which was almost achieved by now and then, to let the people choose between living in a concentration camp for the rest of their lives or going out of the -- of the Gaza Strip.
This is called in any international language, ethnic cleansing. This is called in any international language, or defined in any international language as crimes against humanity.
CHURCH: And Gideon, you have said that you want to live in a just state, and so you're speaking out. Why are other journalists within the Israeli media remaining silent on this issue?
LEVY: Because most of the journalists feel much more comfortable in the comfort zone in which they are reflecting the official view. They don't bother the readers and the viewers because they don't want to know, and the Israelis don't want to hear anything else except of the official statements and official narrative, so they are hiding Gaza and they don't see any problem in it. That's the biggest betray of Israeli journalists hiding what's going on in Gaza, because political views can be all kind of but betraying your professional duty to tell the full truth. This is really unbelievable betrayal.
[02:10:04]
Israelis don't see Gaza because the journalists chose not to shoot -- not to show Gaza. Nobody directed it to them. Nobody told them it's not Russia here covering the war in Ukraine. It's a free country in which a free press chooses to censor itself and not to show Gaza. I can't think about a more professional betray than this.
CHURCH: Gideon Levy in Tel Aviv. Thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate it.
LEVY: Thank you for having me.
CHURCH: U.S. President Donald Trump is already casting doubt on what if anything his upcoming summit with Russia's Vladimir Putin could accomplish, saying, "It's not up to me to make a deal."
The two leaders are set to meet this Friday in Alaska. President Trump says he wants to see what Putin has in mind for Ukraine, and he claims he'll know in the first two minutes if a deal can be made. This is what he says that deal could include.
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TRUMP: There'll be some swapping. There'll be some changes in land. And the word that they will use is, you know, they make changes. We're going to change the lines, the battle lines.
Russia has occupied a big portion of Ukraine. They've occupied some very prime territory. We're going to try and get some of that territory back for Ukraine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: Ukraine's president, meanwhile, is still not invited to the talks. Volodymyr Zelenskyy warns Putin has no plans for peace.
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VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): He is definitely not preparing for a cease fire or an end to the war. Putin is determined only to present a meeting with America as his personal victory and then continue acting exactly as before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: Donald Trump's casual comments about possible land swaps are striking fear in those living in eastern Ukraine, with the prospect of their cities and towns being traded away to the man who started this war in the first place. CNN's Nick Paton Walsh speaks to some of the Ukrainians who could lose everything after already losing so much.
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When President Trump talks about what parts of Ukraine, to, "Swap with Russia," this is ground zero, real towns where
bomb shelters loom over beaches.
MYKHAILO, SLOVIANSK RESIDENT: I feel like I just float away from this reality.
WALSH (voice-over): Here in Donetsk region, diplomacy has turned dark and surreal and threatens local journalist Mykhailo's medicinal swim.
WALSH: What do you think about the idea of Trump and Putin meeting so far away in Alaska and deciding the fate of a place like this?
MYKHAILO: We all -- people I know will have to leave but frankly speaking, I don't think it's going to happen. What Trump did wrong, if he just pull him out of the bog that Putin was just drown in the bog and he took him out and say, Vladimir, I want to talk to you. I like you. He didn't care that every day Ukrainians die.
WALSH (voice-over): Beaches, births and deaths, they all persist in ravaged Sloviansk. They've dug defenses around it to stop a Russian military advance, but never imagined high level diplomacy might just give their town and future away.
Taisiya gave birth to Azul (ph) yesterday, the calm of her maternity ward bed now riddled with complications she never saw coming.
TAISIYA, NEW MOTHER (through translator): That would be very bad. I saw the news. But we have no influence over it. it's not going to be our decision. People will just give away their homes.
WALSH (voice over): Staying here has been, for many an act of defiance and bravery. But for Sviatoslav and Natalia, it did not spare them pain. This is their daughter Sofia, with her husband Mikita and the grandson lev. They moved to Kyiv for safety. But 11 days ago, a horrific dawn Russian airstrike killed them and 28 others in Kyiv. Their three bodies found together in the rubble.
NATALIA HAPONOVA, SOFIA'S MOTHER (through translator): They left from the war and it was quiet there. And you see, how it is in Sloviansk. But the war caught them there.
SVIATOSLAV HAPONOV, SOFIA'S FATHER (through translator): To come to terms with that as a person is impossible. Impossible to come to terms with the loss of children.
WALSH (voice-over): They had been due to visit days later, bringing news that Sofia was three months pregnant.
[02:15:02]
WALSH: Do you remember the last time you spoke?
HANOPOVA (through translator): Yes, it was 8:30 p.m. and she called. She really wanted to come to Sloviansk to tell everyone the good news. But they didn't come. They arrived in a different way. All together.
WALSH (voice-over): They came together to be buried on the town's outskirts, where the war permits. No calm for grief. Ukrainian jet roars overhead.
At the nearest train station, Kramatorsk. As many are coming as are going. Serhiy was allowed two days off from his tank unit to see Tetyana, his wife. Sirens greet the Kyiv train.
SERHIY, SOLDIER (through translator): Four years of war, how do you think it is? It would have been better if she had not come. Calm down --
TETYANA, SOLDIER'S WIFE (through translator): I just want him to stay alive and come home.
WALSH: Soldiers worried if they'll see their loved ones again, families torn apart by this war.
Imagine scenes like this to the thousand in the event of what seems to so many people here to be the surreal idea that a deal on Friday on the other side of the Earth, almost as far away as you could possibly imagine in Alaska between an American president and a Russian president without a Ukrainian there could potentially give this bustling town over to the Russians after them fighting for it for so many years and failing to take it. So many lives lost here and those traumas borne out on this platform every time a train comes in.
Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Kramatorsk, Ukraine.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHURCH: There's a new sheriff in town in the U.S. Capitol. Just ahead, President Trump takes unprecedented action to fight crime in Washington, D.C. We'll have reaction from the city's mayor.
Plus, a deadly explosion at a major U.S. industrial facility will explain what's known about the blast.
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CHURCH: Welcome back, everyone. Donald Trump says crime in Washington D.C. is out of control, and he's taking unprecedented action to clean up the streets. The U.S. president is placing the D.C. Metropolitan Police under federal control and deploying about 800 members of the National Guard to the nation's capital.
But the latest police figures don't support the President's rationale. They show violent crime down 35 percent compared to 2023 and another 26 percent versus last year, homicide, assaults with a dangerous weapon, robbery and sexual abuse are all on the decline, but the President sees things differently.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Our capital city has been overtaken by violent gangs and blood thirsty criminals roving mobs of wild youth, drug down maniacs and homeless people, and we're not going to let it happen anymore. We're not going to take it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is warning this move could turn into a disaster if communities lose faith in law enforcement.
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MURIEL BOWSER, WASHINGTON D.C. MAYOR: While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented, I can't say that, given some of the rhetoric of the past, that we're totally surprised.
I can say to D.C. residents that we will continue to operate our government in a way that makes you proud.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: More now from CNN's Jeff Zeleny at the White House.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: One of the things behind this move is this is something that President Trump has often gone to. It's a very familiar well. He's long been agitated by crime in American cities, as a private citizen in New York, certainly running for president, law and order has been a central message but one thing lacking from all of this was a sense of context.
I'm told by people who are close to him that he's been bothered when he travels, not that often, actually, from the White House out to play golf in Virginia, or perhaps out to Joint Base Andrews when he flies out. He sees things out the window, sometimes homeless encampments, sometimes other things that really has gotten to him.
But the bottom line is you got the sense today that the president was trying to make this the most important thing for the White House. The White House was trying to hold this up as the most pressing concern for the U.S. President, never mind an inflation report coming out tomorrow. Never mind that meeting with the Russian President, Vladimir Putin on Friday, which is a challenge in and of itself, never mind the Jeffrey Epstein matter. The President wanted to go back to that well, talking about crime.
The bigger question is, is anything that he's actually doing going to improve crime? There is no doubt people here in Washington, I've lived here for a long time. There is concern about crime, there is no doubt, but it is much better than it was during the pandemic.
So, that was the lack of the context that the president was missing. He declared an emergency today, exercising federal powers that we have not seen a U.S. president do.
So, right now on the streets of D.C., there are federalized police force, but there were no advanced conversations with the leaders of the police force how this actually will go. So, it's unclear who is in charge of the D.C. Police force is if the Attorney General, is that the Police Chief?
[02:25:12]
So, for all of the time spent here at the White House, there is very little discussion beforehand behind the scenes how this actually will play out and if it will actually help reduce crime.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHURCH: Authorities are investigating the cause of a deadly explosion at a U.S. Steel Plant near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that sent black smoke shooting into the air.
Two workers are now confirmed dead, and at least 10 others are injured. Another worker was found alive in the wreckage. U.S. Steel says the blast involved at least two coke oven batteries. The Clairton Coke Works plant converts coal to coke, a crucial part of steel making. Nearly ,1300 employees work at the plant each day. It has been sued for air pollution. Still to come, the U.S. and China kick a major tariffs deadline
further down the road, we'll tell you the sticking points, holding up a final deal. Back with that and more in just a moment.
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[02:30:44]
CHURCH: Welcome back, everyone. The U.S. and China have agreed to hold off on raising tariffs for another 90 days. The decision came just hours before a Tuesday deadline where each country's respective import fees were set to surge. U.S. and Chinese officials have been attempting to broker a trade deal for months after President Donald Trump imposed reciprocal tariffs on Beijing and other trading partners. And although they've come to a temporary truce, several sticking points remain, preventing a final deal from going through. CNN's Kristie Lu Stout has more details on the tariff deadline extension from Hong Kong.
KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: U.S. President Donald Trump extended a trade truce with China for another 90 days. That's according to a White House executive order. Without this extension, tariffs would've snapped right back up to ultra-high levels that would be on par with a trade blockade. Now, this latest extension gives the world's two biggest economies some breathing space. It keeps lower tariff rates in place through early November, just in time for that surge of exports to America for the holiday season, like electronics, clothing and toys.
China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson said this. "We hope that the U.S. will work with China in accordance with the important consensus reached during the call between the two presidents to leverage the China-U.S. economic and trade consultation mechanism and strive for positive outcomes based on equality, respect, and mutual benefit. But sticking points remain. There is a long list of contentious issues in the U.S.-China trade relationship, including U.S. curbs on high-tech chips, including HBM or High Bandwidth Memory, critical for Chinese A.I.
China's export curbs on rare earth critical for U.S. tech and defense, China's soybean purchases. In fact, Trump says it's not enough. It wants China to quadruple it. China's purchase of sanctioned Russian and Iranian oil, fentanyl, namely the flow of fentanyl precursor chemicals from China, and the fate of TikTok with the deadline for a deal approaching on September 17th. That is a long list, but analysts say the extension will give both sides more time to untangle them. It could also set the stage for a meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping.
The former senior U.S. trade official, Wendy Cutler says this, "It's positive news. Combined with some of the de-escalatory steps both the U.S. and China have taken in recent weeks, it demonstrated that both sides are trying to see if they can reach some kind of a deal that would lay the groundwork for a Xi-Trump meeting this fall." Just last week, Trump said that the U.S. and China were getting close to a deal and in the event of a deal, he would meet with Xi before the end of the year.
Kristie Lu Stout, CNN, Hong Kong.
CHURCH: First responders across Europe are fighting an uphill battle as an outbreak of wildfires continues to spread beneath a summer heat wave. We will have the latest after a short break.
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[02:38:19]
CHURCH: Parts of Europe continue to suffer beneath a stifling August heat wave as dry terrain and strong winds help drive wildfires across the continent. This is video from Spain of a wildfire burning about 15 miles from Madrid. Winds exceeding 70 kilometers per hour fueled the flames. One highway in the area had to be closed.
Portugal has deployed nearly 700 firefighters to battle a blaze in the northeast of the country. So far this year, Portugal has witnessed at least 52,000 hectares burn. That's according to the European Forest Fire Information System.
Meanwhile, a wildfire in Northwestern Turkey has forced hundreds of people to flee their homes. The country's interior ministry released this footage of Coast Guard boats rescuing residents as flames grazed multiple city centers. Officials say 187 people were evacuated by sea and another 161 by land.
A nuclear plant in France is temporarily shut down due to some unexpected guests, a massive, unpredictable swarm of jellyfish likely drawn to the area's warming waters. The invasive species known as the Asian moon jellyfish was first spotted in the North Sea in 2020. But this particular species is not a threat to humans because their sting is not poisonous. The Gravelines Nuclear Plant is one of France's largest with its reactors producing more than five gigawatts of power. It's unclear when it will reopen.
[02:40:00]
Jellyfish have caused similar problems at nuclear plants in China, Japan, and India.
New details now on a mysterious meteorite that streaked across the skies over the southeastern U.S. in June. This is the moment the rare fireball was spotted over Georgia before it crashed through the roof of a home in the city of McDonough. Researchers now say the McDonough meteorite, as it's been named, is four-and-a-half billion years old. That's older than Earth itself. They believe it came from a main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Extraordinary.
Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Rosemary Church. "World Sport" is coming up next. Then, I'll be back at the top of the hour with more "CNN Newsroom." Do stick around.
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