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Trump Says Phase Two Of Gaza Ceasefire Deal Begins Now; U.S. Strike Kills 6 Alleged Narco Boat Off Venezuela Coast; Socialists Vow To Not Topple French Government After Concessions; Teen Describes Moment Parents Taken By ICE Agents; Meta Update Makes Instagram Settings PG-13 For Teens. Aired 12-12:45a ET
Aired October 15, 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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MJ LEE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello, and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world. I'm MJ Lee, live in Washington.
Ahead on CNN NEWSROOM, with the relief of the Gaza ceasefire comes the questions. Donald Trump says phase two of the deal is underway. But what that means on the ground is anything but clear.
The U.S. throws Argentina a lifeline. But is the $20 billion bailout enough to help its president's party win the midterms?
Plus, a teenager steps up to take care of her younger siblings and shield them as their parents are taken by ICE right before their eyes.
U.S. President Donald Trump says phase two of the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is now beginning, even as major questions remain about the path forward in Gaza. An Israeli source says negotiations on critical next stages in the agreement are still ongoing in Egypt. In a social media post, the U.S. president also said the job from phase one is not done yet, as Hamas has yet to release all of the deceased hostages.
When asked if Hamas is holding up its end of the deal, President Trump said, we'll find out, and issue this warning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If they don't disarm, we will disarm them, and it will happen quickly and perhaps violently, but they will disarm. Do you understand me?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Yes. You say --
TRUMP: Because you always -- everyone says, oh, well, they won't disarm. They will disarm. And I spoke to Hamas, and I said, you're going to disarm, right? Yes, sir. We're going to disarm. That's what they told me. They will disarm or we will disarm them. Got it?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: Hamas has so far released just eight of the 28 deceased hostages held in Gaza, sparking anger and anguish among families still waiting for the return of their loved ones. Earlier, a convoy carrying the remains of four of the deceased hostages arrived in Tel Aviv at a forensic institute where identification procedures will take place.
CNN's Jeremy Diamond is following all of these developments.
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JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: The bodies of four more hostages are now back on Israeli soil after Hamas handed them over to the Red Cross late Tuesday night.
You can see in this video from inside of the Gaza Strip. These Red Cross vehicles arriving at some kind of Hamas building where the bodies were indeed handed over.
This now makes eight bodies total that Hamas has handed over to the Red Cross. From there they were handed over to Israeli forces inside of the Gaza Strip, and then made their way into Israel where they will undergo forensic analysis at Israel's National Forensic Institute. The primary purpose of that, to confirm that the bodies are indeed those of the hostages that Hamas claims them to be.
But despite the handover of these additional bodies, there are still 20 bodies being held by Hamas inside of Gaza. And that's why we've been seeing the families of some of these deceased hostages going public and making clear that the fight for the hostages is not over yet until all of those bodies are handed over, calling on the United States, calling on Israel to ensure that Hamas is held to its end of the bargain.
And amid those calls, we've heard from President Trump directly in a Truth Social post saying that, "While a big burden has been lifted, the job is not done." He says, "The dead have not been returned as promised."
Now, given the slow pace of Hamas handing over these bodies, the Israeli government seems to be planning to take action now. Israeli authorities informing the United Nations that aid shipments into the Gaza Strip will be reduced or delayed as a result of not all of the bodies having been handed over yet. In addition to that, Israel security establishment recommending that Israel not open the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt on Wednesday as previously scheduled, seemingly in retaliation for Hamas not returning more bodies of hostages.
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And all of this is a reminder of just how fragile this ceasefire agreement actually is. And that's before we even start talking about the next phases of this agreement, which we are told are currently being negotiated in Egypt as we speak. Those next parts of the agreement, of course, revolve around everything from Hamas disarming, Hamas handing over power in Gaza to a transitional authority, and of course, the Israeli military withdrawing from the rest of the Gaza Strip, ensuring that this end to the war in Gaza, as President Trump has said, it is actually sticks in the long term.
Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Tel Aviv.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: I'm joined now by H.A. Hellyer, a senior associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies.
Really appreciate you joining us. Let's start a little bit more big picture now that President Trump's lightning trip to the Middle East is fully in the rearview mirror. He is, as you know, hailing this moment as a historic dawn of a new Middle East. But the reality is, Hamas is still armed. The Israeli military is still in Gaza, and Israel absolutely does not support a Palestinian state. So is this actually a new dawn?
H.A. HELLYER, SENIOR ASSOCIATE FELLOW, ROYAL UNITED SERVICES INSTITUTE: Well, thank you very much. It's always a pleasure to be on the program.
So this is the question. Could it be a new dawn? It could, but it would require a tremendous amount of effort from the United States to ensure that Israel would be willing to allow that new dawn to actually take place. You mentioned the IDF being present in Gaza. There's more than that. The state of Israel occupies the entirety of the Gaza Strip. It occupies East Jerusalem. It occupies the West Bank.
It has all but annexed large parts of the West Bank already. So there is no opportunity for going forward from this hostage-prisoner exchange let alone birthing a new dawn for the Middle East. I think this talk of a new dawn is very aspirational. I think it's a good aspiration to have, not simply with regards to Gaza, but with regards to the entirety of the occupied territories and also Syria, and also Lebanon, where the Israelis continue to occupy and bomb territory belonging to their neighbors.
But it would require a lot more effort and investment from the United States to ensure that the state of Israel actually allows for this to take place.
LEE: Yes. So let's talk about that. Let's talk about phase two and what still remains aspirational, as you say. You know, this is essentially the parts that were so challenging for negotiators to figure out that they were essentially set off to the side so a ceasefire deal could be reached. I mean, the question of how Gaza is going to be governed is such an impossibly vexing one. I mean, how does that even begin to get answered, in your view?
HELLYER: So the issue with governing Gaza isn't actually a deeply complicated one. It's actually quite simple. If you want Hamas to be removed from power completely on the ground in Gaza, then you have to give Palestinians an alternative that is workable, and that only -- that only alternative which is workable is going to be the Palestinian Authority.
The Palestinian Authority is the state of Palestine. So if you want to ensure that there is disarmament of Hamas, which I think is in everyone's best interests, if you want to ensure that there is reconstruction of Gaza, then you -- and you want to ensure that there is an external stabilization force that will be willing to deploy to Gaza, then all of that requires there to be a political horizon. You need to be able to say to the stabilization force and to the Palestinians more generally, that at the end of this there is recognition of your right to self-determination.
LEE: And we're seeing right now on the screen some of the images coming out of Gaza since this latest ceasefire began. You know, we've seen pictures and images of families trudging back to what used to be their homes and just trying to process the fact that nothing is left.
H.A., there is sort of this physical, economic rebuilding of the strip you were talking about, just the physical building that needs to get done. And then there is, of course, the psychological recovery. I mean, how does a community that's been stripped of so much begin to do either of these things?
HELLYER: It's an extraordinary situation, and it's a question I'm glad you ask. The reality is, is that this incredibly horrible two-year period, what an independent U.N. commission, just recently, over the last month or so assessed was genocide on the Gaza Strip has wrought an incredible human toll.
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Whether one agrees with the appellation or not, it's irrelevant. It's so incredibly bad. Irrespective of what you want to call it, the human cost on several generations of people in Gaza is going to be, I think, you know, felt for many, many, many years to come. The amount of time and effort that will need to go into allowing for this healing to take place is extraordinary. We hear a lot about the families of the hostages among Israelis, which I think they will be incredibly ecstatic of the fact that their loved ones that there continue to be alive and survived were able to return home.
We have to keep in mind there will be so many not Israeli hostages, but so many Palestinians who will not be returning home. We don't even know how many people have died in Gaza as a result of the past two years. At the very least, we're talking about 65,000 to 70,000 people. Many estimates double and triple that number. And I think over the coming months, we're going to see the full extent of destruction and human cost, and it's going to be horrific.
LEE: Yes. You really can't overstate the human toll.
H.A. Hellyer, thank you so much for this conversation.
HELLYER: Thank you.
LEE: Shifting gears now, Donald Trump says a $20 billion lifeline for Argentina is contingent on President Javier Milei staying in power. The two met at the White House on Tuesday, and the currency swap or bailout comes in the middle of the U.S. government shutdown and budget cuts from the Trump administration. Here's how the U.S. president defended this decision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: What's the benefit for United States in helping this way Argentina?
TRUMP: Just helping a great philosophy take over a great country. If the president doesn't win, I know the person that he'd be running against, I believe, probably, we probably have the person, a person who's extremely far left and a philosophy that got Argentina into this problem in the first place. So we would not be generous with Argentina if that happened. If he loses, we are not going to be generous with Argentina.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEE: Inflation has eased in Argentina as President Milei has slashed government spending, cut regulations and fired tens of thousands of public sector workers. He posted on social media, "The situation is crystal clear. If the country were to stray from the path of the ideals of freedom to return to populism, the United States would stop supporting our country."
And staying in the region, a U.S. Military strike has killed six people on board a boat that was allegedly trafficking drugs off the coast of Venezuela. It's at least the fifth time that President Trump has announced such a strike, which is likely to further inflame regional tensions and spark more questions over the legality of the U.S. operations.
CNN's Gustavo Valdes has the latest.
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GUSTAVO VALDES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The United States Military destroyed another alleged narco boat in international waters off the coast of Venezuela killing six people on board. It was President Donald Trump who made the announcement on his social media Truth Social, arguing that the vessel was trafficking narcotics and was associated with illicit narco terrorist networks but did not identify a criminal organization.
This would be the fifth known attack in this -- in the Caribbean in the past couple of months, killing at least 27 people that we know of. And this is an activity that has been controversial. The White House argues that the United States, the president, has the authority to conduct these attacks because they argue that the United States is in an armed conflict with international organizations.
But some, even Republicans in Congress, questioned this authority. The attacks have also been criticized by the experts in the United Nations, saying that the attacks go against international law and the president of Colombia said that in one of those attacks, recent attacks, they were Colombians on board of one of the vessels that were killed. He didn't offer any proof. And the White House refuted those accusations.
But this is another example of how President Trump is trying to escalate the attacks against what his administration perceived as a national threat to the United States, and also escalating tension in the region.
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Venezuelan government has condemned these attacks.
Gustavo Valdez, CNN Atlanta.
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LEE: The Socialist Party is throwing a lifeline to the French prime minister. Coming up, the key concession that was made to keep his government hanging on by a thread.
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LEE: The government of French Prime Minister Sebastian Lecornu will live to see another day.
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He has backed away from plans to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64, winning a pledge from the Socialist Party to not topple his government. But the political fight is hardly over.
CNN's Melissa Bell reports from Paris.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: France's Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has been outlining to the parliament his vision for 2026 and the budget that France so desperately needs to get passed in order for one to be in place for 2026. A lot riding on his speech since already and since he was reappointed on Friday night, the far-left and the far-right here in France have announced that they will be voting a no confidence motion on Thursday.
The big question, whether the Socialist Party, which have really become sort of kingmakers in all this, would follow suit. So a lot hanging on what Sebastien Lecornu had to say. A lot of moves specifically designed to woo the French left, including the suspension of the 2023 pension reform that had proven controversial not just in its substance, but also in the manner in which it was forced through parliament. This is what he had to say about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEBASTIEN LECORNU, FRENCH PRIME MINISTER (through translator): I will propose to the new parliament from this autumn that we suspend the pension reform of 2023 until the presidential elections. No rise in the pension age will take place from now until January 2028. Suspending for suspending does not make any sense. Would it be responsible to suspend without anything in return? The suspension must instill the necessary confidence to create new solutions.
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BELL: A speech that appears to have gone far enough in the direction of France's socialists to keep them on side. Still, it will be a very important vote on Thursday since when you consider the far-right and the far-left, it is just 25 votes that are needed from lawmakers in order for the government to fall. So it would take 25 lawmakers deciding to vote with those extremes in order for Sebastien Lecornu to become the sixth prime minister nominated since the start of Emmanuel Macron's second term, but also the sixth prime minister to fall.
For now, the government appears confident that it will get through, that it has won over enough of those parts of the center of French politics that it needs to govern. All eyes very much on what now happens Thursday in the French National Assembly.
Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: And still to come, a brother and sister speak out about the day their parents were detained by U.S. immigration agents and their concerns about their family's future.
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LEE: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm MJ Lee.
Let's take a look at today's top stories.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in a social media post that phase two of the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is now beginning. But he also said the job is not done while calling for all deceased hostages in Gaza to be released by Hamas. An Israeli source says negotiations on next stages in the ceasefire deal are still ongoing in Egypt.
Argentina's president is getting a major boost from the Trump administration. Javier Milei visited the White House on Tuesday, where U.S. President Donald Trump promised to stick with a $20 billion lifeline for Argentina as long as President Milei stays in power.
Donald Trump has posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The highest civilian honor in the U.S. is given to people who have made an especially meritorious contribution to national interests, world peace or other significant endeavors. Kirk was shot and killed at a Utah college last month. The Trump administration calls him a martyr for truth and freedom.
A Chicago teen tells CNN that she could barely keep herself together when both of her parents were taken by ICE agents, and it all happened on her 10-year-old brother's birthday. Video showing the confrontation and questioning by ICE agents has gone viral, and since then Yurthsi Enciso and her older brother have been left to care for her younger siblings as they wait for answers on what will happen next.
CNN's Maria Santana has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
YURTHSI ENCISO, PARENTS DETAINED BY ICE: It's OK. Please. It's OK, we're OK.
MARIA SANTANA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This video quickly spread across social media. A teenage girl on the side of the road shielding her younger siblings as ICE agents arrest their parents and older brother after a traffic stop in September.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your brother., is he a citizen?
ENCISO: We don't answer questions.
That's all I -- that's all I could say, like no other words came out of my mouth. I was not prepared for that.
SANTANA (voice-over): 19-year-old Yurthsi Enciso and her 22-year-old brother, Moises Junior, speaking publicly for the first time about that viral moment that they say turned their lives upside down.
ENCISO: My heart was just -- it kept pounding, kept pounding. My legs, my hands kept shaking.
SANTANA (voice-over): She says was only able to hold it together for her 12-year-old sister and her little brother who was turning 10 that day.
ENCISO: I didn't want them to see me crying because that was going to affect them more.
SANTANA: Yes.
ENCISO: So I just had to make sure they were calm. It's OK. We're going to be OK.
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SANTANA (voice-over): Moises Jr. says that morning he went with his parents to pick up supplies at Home Depot before the family's birthday celebration when they were pulled over for allegedly making an illegal U-turn.
He recalls three ICE vehicles blocking them in and agents surrounding their car, demanding to see their IDs.
MOISES ENCISO JR., PARENTS DETAINED BY ICE: And they just kept asking us these questions, and my dad kept looking back at me and saying, like, should I answer? What should I do? And I was kind of like also panicking. SANTANA (voice-over): Yurithsi and Moises Jr. both are awaiting
approval for deferred action for childhood arrival status, or DACA. Their siblings are U.S. citizens.
According to DHS, their parents, Constantina Ramirez and Moises Enciso Sr., are undocumented Mexican immigrants. They have lived in Cicero, a suburb outside of Chicago, for nearly 20 years, the family attorney told CNN. They are now being held in separate detention centers.
Y. ENCISO: And I remember that first night. The first thing I wanted to do was sleep in my mom and Dad's bed, because it felt like if I was sleeping there, I had like a part of them.
SANTANA (voice-over): That night marked the beginning of a new reality, one where they were suddenly left to care for their younger siblings.
Y. ENCISO: They haven't been doing good. They're always saying that they miss them. Whenever we're, like, about to eat and like, oh, we didn't -- like, they have flashbacks about my mom and dad: Oh, remember when momma did this? And then, they just like, go quiet. They're sad.
SANTANA: What would it mean for your family if they were to get deported?
M. ENCISO: I try not to think about it.
Y. ENCISO: What?
SANTANA: Oh, so sorry. It's hard.
M. ENCISO: I think we don't know. That we don't know if my siblings can stay here with us. Like, we don't know if they have to go to Mexico. It's just a lot of, like, insecurity or uncertainty that we just don't know.
SANTANA (voice-over): According to DHS, if the parents have a valid claim, it will be heard by a judge. If not, they will be subject to removal.
But their children say they'll keep fighting until their family is together again.
M. ENCISO: I think listen (ph).
Y. ENCISO: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) They're hard-working people who -- I don't know, but I consider my parents were best friends. I know they're going to be there for me and support me.
SANTANA (voice-over): Maria Santana, CNN, Chicago.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE: Our thanks to Maria Santana for that interview. And next, Instagram is launching new safety settings for teenagers, and it's going to change what millions of young people see on the social media platform. Those details, when we come back.
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LEE: Instagram is tightening its safety settings for teenagers with guidelines that are similar to PG-13 movies.
The Meta-owned platform says it will now hide from teen accounts posts that feature strong language and encourage what it calls harmful behaviors.
More from CNN's Clare Duffy.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARE DUFFY, CNN TECHNOLOGY CORRESPONDENT: Instagram rolled out these teen accounts, privacy protections, and content restrictions last year.
And now --
DUFFY (voice-over): -- the company is making its content limits even stricter by aligning the content that teens can see on the platform with PG-13 movie ratings.
Now, what does that mean? That means that teens on Instagram will have a harder time seeing posts that include strong language, or posts that could encourage harmful behavior because they feature risky stunts or drug paraphernalia.
Instagram is making it harder for teens to search for terms like "alcohol" and "gore." They won't be able to follow or interact with accounts that regularly post age-inappropriate material.
And teens' conversations with Meta's A.I. chatbot --
DUFFY: -- will have to remain within those PG-13 guidelines, according to the company.
Now this won't necessarily catch every potentially harmful or risky post here's how Instagram head Adam Mosseri described it on "The Today Show" this morning.
ADAM MOSSERI, HEAD OF INSTAGRAM: The way it works is by default, every teen that has a teen account will have -- will be in the 13-plus rating, which means that the content they see on Instagram will largely align with a PG-13 movie.
Now, like in a PG-13 movie, where you might actually occasionally hear a swear word, you will occasionally come across content that it might be risky because we either missed it or because it was said by a friend. But generally, there is a lot more restrictions on what you can see.
DUFFY: Now this comes as Instagram has continued to face criticism from parents and online safety organizations who said that the previous teen accounts' safety settings weren't enough to keep young people safe on the platform.
So, Meta is trying to do more to make its guidelines clear and to give parents more control over their teens' experience on Instagram.
And a key feature of this Tuesday launch is with the old teen accounts' safety settings. Sixteen- and 17-year-olds were able to just go back in and change it back to the normal Instagram experience.
They'll still be able to do that for the teen accounts' privacy protections, but with these content restrictions that are rolling out today, all teens under the age of 18 will have these settings applied automatically. And they'll have to get a parent's permission if they want to go back to that more adult experience on Instagram.
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Back to you.
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LEE: And Apple CEO Tim Cook received a lookalike Labubu doll during a trip to Shanghai, complete, of course, with an iPhone.
Labubu creator Kasing Lung gifted Cook his own variation of the doll, which has become a cultural and commercial phenomenon. The fluffy, sharp-toothed collectible figures are typically sold in blind boxes that conceal the design and style of the creature that is inside.
Pop Mart, the Chinese company behind the doll, saw revenue surging to $1.8 billion last year, in part because of these Labubu sales.
Thank you so much for watching CNN NEWSROOM. I'm M.J. Lee. And I'll be back with more news at the top of the hour. And WORLD SPORT is next.
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