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Israel And Hezbollah In Lebanon Exchange Strikes; Israel Conducts Preemptive Strikes Against Hezbollah; Hezbollah Says It Fired More Than 300 Rockets. Harris Campaign Says It Raised $540 Million Since Launch; Both Campaigns Target Battleground States, Prep For Debate; Hamas Delegation Arrives In Cairo For Ceasefire Talks Resuming Today; Israel And Hezbollah In Lebanon Exchange Strikes; Hurricane Nearing Hawaii's Big Island With 75 Mph Winds. Aired 6-7a ET

Aired August 25, 2024 - 06:00   ET

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

[06:00:36]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking news is out of the Middle East this morning. There is a major escalation and the simmering tensions between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah. I'm Victor Blackwell.

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Amara Walker. Let's get you caught up on latest developments now. Israel and Hezbollah have traded strikes across the Israeli-Lebanese border. The latest round of attacks began early this morning when Israeli forces launched what it called a preemptive strike against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.

BLACKWELL: Hezbollah says it launched more than 300 rockets and several dozen drones toward Israel. Hezbollah calls it the first phase of its retaliation for the recent killing of its top military commander. It also describes the attacks as a complete success. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said this about those strikes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (through translator): This morning we detected Hezbollah's preparation to attack Israel. Together with the Minister of Defense and the Chief of Staff, we instructed the IDF to act proactively to remove the threat. The IDF has since been acting vigorously to thwart the threats, and destroyed thousands of rockets aimed at the north of the country. It also thwarted many other threats and operates with great strength both in defense and attack.

I ask you, citizens of Israel, to comply to the directives of the home front command. We are determined to do everything to protect our country, return the residents of the north safely to their homes, and continue to uphold a simple rule, whoever hurts us, we hurt them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Now CNN is covering the breaking developments as only we can. CNN's Ben Wedeman, Nic Robertson, and Nada Bashir are in the Middle East. Camila DeChalus is standing by watching response from the White House. And our military and global affairs experts are here as well.

We start at Beirut though with CNN senior international correspondent, Ben Wedeman. Ben, let's start first with what we know about the success, the effectiveness, as we should describe it, of this attack what -- people killed in Lebanon.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: In terms of the effectiveness, Victor, we don't know yet. What we know is that Hezbollah has put out several statements saying that their military strikes have been completed successfully. They say they launched more than 320 missiles at 11 military targets along the border with Israel, all of them, for instance, surveillance observation, and air control posts along that border.

And they said that the purpose of those 11 strikes was to open the way for drones it said, to go into the heart of Israel. One statement claiming that the target of those strikes in the heart of Israel, one of them was a major military facility. We have yet to hear any comment or details of whether that site was hit, what that site was, and the extent of the damage that occurred there.

As far as the situation in Lebanon itself, the official national news agency of Lebanon has described the strikes by Israel this morning as the most intense that Lebanon has seen since hostilities began last October. I saw one estimate that there were at least 25 sites that were hit in really just the course of a few hours and our understanding is there are still some strikes occurring in the south of the country.

Now, the ministry of health is reporting a preliminary death toll of three people. One individual was killed on a strike in a car in a town near the border. Two others were killed in a strike further away from the border.

Now, the situation in Beirut remains calm. We haven't seen any air -- Israeli warplanes overhead. There have been many cancellations of ingoing and outgoing coming -- and outgoing flights here in Beirut at the airport, which is right behind me, but other flights seem to be operating normally.

Now, Israel seemed to indicate that they had knocked out much of Hezbollah's rocket launching capability in the south of the country. But, Victor, it's important to keep in mind that Hezbollah's real serious weaponry, its long-range precision missiles, are not kept in the border area.

[06:05:08]

They are much further north in more fortified areas. We saw twice in the last week Israel did strike what appears to be weapons depots in the Bekaa Valley to the east of here. We saw some very large secondary explosions, but it's believed that Hezbollah has capabilities that it has not used in this round. It's 6:00 p.m. local time, which is in four hours Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah is going to give a speech. Now, the strikes of this morning, Hezbollah said were the first phase. In this speech we'll probably get an idea whether there actually will be a second phase or not. Victor.

WALKER: Yes. It was notable to hear him say this is the first phase. What does that mean? Where does it go from here? Ben Wedeman, thank you for that.

Let's go now to CNN international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson, who is in Tel Aviv. Nic, let's just take a quick step back because this all started with Israel launching what it called a preemptive strike, an act of self-defense to thwart what they said was an imminent attack from Hezbollah. Walk us through this timeline and also Hezbollah's strikes. Was that a reaction to Israel's preemptive strikes? Or was that more an act of retaliation for the killing of Hezbollah's military commander?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: You know, I think if we go back about a week, you can see there was a significant escalation of strikes between Hezbollah and Israel. And over the past couple of days Israel seem to be indicating that it was detecting an increasing level of threat coming from Hezbollah. The security cabinet met in the early hours of the morning as the IDF said more or about 100 aircrafts were hitting 40 locations, taking out what they say were thousands of missile launch barrels, not the -- not the missiles themselves, but launch barrels. And that was the preemptive strike.

And as you say, Hezbollah was able to launch what they claim were 320 missiles and drones back towards Israel. It's not clear, you know, what was preemptive and what was Hezbollah actually at the ready. Not normal for Hezbollah to have so many weapons at the ready to go at any one time.

So, it seems that the intelligence Israel was basing its preemptive strike on, had a degree of accuracy because Hezbollah had more weapons than normal ready to go and they did fire. The IDF say that the targets were mostly in the north but somewhere in central Israel.

The IDF has not given any specifics about any of the military sites that -- the 11 military sites that Hezbollah claims to have targeted. And the IDF is also saying that the damage was very little, very little damage. We know of one civilian only who was wounded by falling shrapnel. And that was in the north, in Acre to the north.

The country went on to a higher state of alert. Planes were stopped from flying out of Ben Gurion Airport here in Tel Aviv. They've restarted. Now they're delayed, many of them. But there were -- there were stricter conditions put on social gatherings, leisure, and cultural activities banning -- was banned on the beach here in Tel Aviv until a half an hour or half an hour ago.

And now closer to Tel Aviv, and extending closer to the northern border, some of those restrictions have been lifted. But tighter controls are in place in northern Israel close to that border, warning people to stay close to their shelters as Israel analyses Hezbollah's next move and the impact Hezbollah has had on them.

WALKER: Yes, Israel on alert -- has been on alert for weeks now as it also awaits retaliation from Iran as well. Nic Robertson, thank you very much.

Let's bring in CNN military analyst, retired Air Force colonel as well, Cedric Leighton. Good to see you, colonel. First off, what is your take on what's happening now? I mean, this is the heaviest fighting that we are seeing in months between Israel and Hezbollah. In terms of this preemptive strike launched by Israel, what kind of intelligence do you understand they must have been acting on and what kind of targets were hit?

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes. Good morning, Amara. As far as we can tell what the intelligence of the Israelis had was extremely precise. Based on what we hear from the IDF and also from what Hezbollah is telling us, it seems as if the Israelis had an indication that equipment and the rockets themselves that Hezbollah has were being moved into a launch position.

[06:10:01]

And given that, the Israelis decided that they needed to strike and take them out before they could hit Israel. Now, of course, over 300 rockets and missiles did make it into Israeli airspace. That is to be expected given the volume of rockets that Hezbollah has. But the preemptive attacks, as well as the Iron Dome system which is Israel's air and missile defense system, were I think critical in mitigating as much damage as possible to the Israeli side.

So, this is basically reiteration of what the Israelis have done before but it is, I think, a very critical component that indicates that the Israelis are still very capable of interdicting the Hezbollah efforts to attack them.

BLACKWELL: Hezbollah says that phase one, the goal was to attack some of those defenses, disable them so that on phase two, rockets, drones can go deeper into the heart of Israel. Do you expect that that will be successful on phase two? What do you know about the Israeli defenses that might suggest that they are more vulnerable now after phase one?

LEIGHTON: Well, Victor, it depends on what the Hezbollah forces were able to do. If they did, in fact, take out radar installations that the Israelis have that would increase Israel's vulnerability. It doesn't seem as if they have been able to do that based on what we know at the moment, except for maybe one location where that could have occurred. But we'll have to see if that's the case.

But generally speaking, the Israeli air defense system is a layered air and missile defense system, and it allows for basically different altitudes to be managed. And in this case, they have a system that allows all of those incoming missiles and rockets to be shot down if they are within certain altitude range. So, generally speaking, low altitude to medium-range, they can handle those fairly well with the existing Iron Dome system. And then they, of course, have other systems like David's Sling and the Arrow system to take care of more ballistic missile style threats.

WALKER: Colonel, if this is retaliation for the killing of Hezbollah's military leader, Fuad Shukr, in July by that drone strike does that lessen the likelihood that there will be a coordinated attack between Hezbollah and Iran? As you know, Iran also saying that there will be retaliation for the killing of Hamas' leader Ismail Haniyeh.

LEIGHTON: Well, it looks as if, Amara, the attack, if there is going to be some coordination, or has been some coordination between Iran and Hezbollah, it looks as if the attacks are not going to occur simultaneously. Based on what Hezbollah has done right now, if they have started their process now it is possible because Hezbollah has a lot of weaponry at its disposal that they could still mount a coordinated attack in that sense. But in this particular case, it appears to be a coordinated but sequential attack, not a coordinated at the same time attack.

BLACKWELL: All right. This is, obviously, a dynamic situation. Colonel Cedric Leighton, thanks for helping us understand what's happening here. And we will revisit this with you coming up a little later this morning.

WALKER: And we will have much more breaking news coverage from the Middle East after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:18:28]

WALKER: We are following breaking developments out of the Middle East this morning. Both Israel and Lebanon confirm more Israeli airstrikes are happening this morning in Lebanon. This is in addition to Israel's preemptive strikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon overnight to stop an alleged attack plan. The IDF says it has destroyed thousands of Hezbollah rocket launcher barrels.

BLACKWELL: Not long after Hezbollah says it did launch more than 300 strikes toward Israel in retaliation for the killing of a top military commander in July. The extent of the damage is not yet clear as both Israel and Hezbollah are giving conflicting reports.

But despite the attacks, ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas are still expected to continue in Cairo today. We continue our team coverage now. Let's check in with CNN global affairs analyst Kimberly Dozier in a moment. But first let's go to White House reporter Camila DeChalus who is in Rehoboth Beach where President Biden will return today.

What are we hearing, if anything, from the White House in reaction to these strikes?

CAMILA DECHALUS, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, White House officials tell us that President Biden is closely monitoring the situation and that he has been actively engaged with his national security team as well as senior U.S. officials in constant communication with their Israeli counterparts. Now, Victor, something really important to note that there was a real fear among White House officials, just even given last week that any potential escalation and tensions in this region could potentially disrupt the ceasefire talks that are constantly in the works right now and that are still going on.

[06:20:09]

And just last weekend, President Biden issued a warning to Iranian backed proxies saying that they did not want any escalations to occur, because they were worried that it could potentially disrupt the ceasefire talks that are going on. And this has been something that President Biden and his U.S. senior officials have been constantly working towards the goal is to secure a ceasefire deal and that may potentially go away or potentially be stalled because of the escalating situation that's at hand at this moment.

We are constantly standing by for any updates coming out the White House. We are told that he is continuously monitoring the situation.

WALKER: All right. Camila DeChalus, thank you very much.

Let's go now to CNN's global affairs analyst, Kim Dozier. OK. What do you make of what's going on right now in terms of Hezbollah's response? It says that it's retaliating for the death of its military commander. So, it's retaliating for his death versus these preemptive strikes?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, what the Israeli Defense Forces did is they saw Hezbollah preparing, according to statements from the IDF overnight. And so, they staged what they saw were groups of missile batteries, drone launch sites, and they hit them with a couple of hundred jets.

What's notable to me is that Hezbollah could have chosen civilian targets but instead chose military targets. I think that's why we're not seeing many reports of damage this morning because if it's on a secured military base the Israeli Defense Forces will choose what to share. If there are any fatalities, we might hear about that, but we're not going to see the damage.

It could have been a lot worse. So, what we could be seeing right now is a face-saving measure by Hezbollah. Remember, Israel claimed responsibility for killing its Hamas military -- Hezbollah military commander, Fuad Shukr. And Hezbollah has been holding fire literally in the three weeks or so since.

So, best possible worlds, they've carried out this attack. They've done what they think they have to do in terms of their popular support, and hopefully it can end here.

BLACKWELL: You know, we could forgive the casual viewer or someone who's kind of reading in occasionally. They hear retaliation against Israel and they know that there has been some anticipation that Iran would retaliate for an attack on a Hamas leader in Tehran. This is separate from that, but what do you make of Iran not joining in and participating in this, separating themselves at least from this chapter, phase one as Hezbollah calls it, in this attack on Israel?

DOZIER: Absolutely. Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy. They normally coordinate things together. And therefore, Israel had been worried that Hezbollah would launch tens of thousands of rockets, not a few hundred, together with airstrikes from Iran, thereby overwhelming Israel's air defenses. That hasn't happened.

Now, either that's because Iran decided not to do it at this time, or it's holding that type of strike in reserve. Its thought that that type of overwhelming strike could trigger a massive response from both Israel and all of that U.S. firepower that the Pentagon has moved into the waters around Iran to both defend and possibly go on the offense against Iranian missile positions.

WALKER: We're expecting in about five hours from now to hear from Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah. I guess, the expectation is that, you know, he will call, you know, what Israel is calling these acts of self-defense, these preemptive strikes, as baseless claims that they were trying to thwart an attack from Hezbollah. What will you be listening for?

DOZIER: What will be the next step that Hezbollah takes? They've been calling this the first phase. So, are we going to see night after night of hundreds of launches? If so, that would be likely just enough for Israel to be able to stop, for Israel to be able to cope with and prevent civilian casualties.

Because the moment you've got civilian casualties, that's when all bets are off. And that's when you get into the escalation sort of dimension where we're worried about a possible Israeli incursion into Lebanon as it did back in 2006.

WALKER: All Right. Kim Dozier, appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much.

[06:25:00]

And we have much more breaking news to get to this morning, including the new record fundraising numbers for Vice President Kamala Harris' presidential bid. Stay with us. You're watching CNN THIS MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: We're watching the tense situation in the Middle East, the massive exchange of fire between Israel and the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah.

WALKER: The Israeli military said about 100 of its fighter jets destroyed thousands of Hezbollah rocket launcher barrels at dozens of launch sites. Three people there were killed. After those strikes, Hezbollah said it launched 320 rockets and a barrage of drones toward Israel.

[06:30:01]

The Israeli military says Hezbollah planned a wide attack on targets in both northern and central Israel but were unsuccessful. Hezbollah said it carried out the strikes towards Israel in response to the killing of its top military commander last month.

All right, new this morning, Vice President Harris campaign announced it raised $540 million since she launched her presidential bid just last month. Her team is calling it record breaking numbers for any campaign in history for this time span. Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz, will kick off a bus tour in Georgia this week, hoping to build on their momentum coming out of the Democratic National Convention.

And former President Trump will be in Michigan and Wisconsin attempting to reclaim the spotlight from Harris.

BLACKWELL: With the party conventions officially over, the focus now shifts to the upcoming presidential debate. Both Harris and Trump have already started preparing for the debate on September 10th.

Joining us now, Sophia Cai, national political reporter for Axios. Before we shift our attention to the debates, we got to stop at 540 million in essentially 35 days, a little more than a month. It is a massive number. How do you think that is resonating in the Trump campaign?

SOPHIA CAI, NATIONAL POLITICAL, AXIOS: Well, I think they're definitely looking at that and getting a little bit nervous just to put that into perspective, you know, when we talk about how much presidential campaigns cost, we look at the $1 billion figure for each side, Republicans and Democrats.

And so, when you look at more than $500 million in just 35 days, that's significant. That's more than half of, you know, the entire cost of a likely presidential campaign. So, you know, it's significant and they'll definitely raise eyebrows in the Trump camp.

WALKER: What also is probably raising eyebrows is the fact that a third of this week's donations were first time contributors and two- thirds of those first-time contributors were women, obviously a key group that both tickets are trying to get to vote for them.

Let's talk about this upcoming week. And you have Harris and Walz they're going to be campaigning together. It'll be their first public event after the Democratic convention. They will be here in Georgia. Why are they coming to Georgia? What does that say about the significance of this state?

CAI: Look, Georgia, among the swing states prior to Harris coming to the ticket, was the state that Republicans felt most confident about flipping and that Democrats were most concerned about.

I think one of the reasons they're going to Georgia first is to say, look, we're here. And they're -- they're more confident about Georgia as a state that Kamala Harris could keep. And I think that's because she spent a lot of time in the state. The demographics of the state are also more favorable to her.

You know, she's someone who has shown that she can turn out crowds and get that Democratic enthusiasm. Whereas before her, you know, I think President Biden's team was really concerned that there wasn't someone on the ticket who could motivate the Democratic base. That's not the case anymore.

BLACKWELL: We were showing video from the Democratic National Convention. One of the more memorable moments and probably the second longest applause line of the night was for Massachusetts Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren actually brought her to tears as she was about to deliver her remarks The campaign is deploying her to Wisconsin for two days this week. How effective of a surrogate is she there especially?

CAI: Look, Elizabeth Warren is a progressive and deploying Elizabeth Warren really shows you how important it is for Harris to be able to turn out that base, right? Each camp has got those 46 to 47 percent of likely Democratic or Republican voters, and, you know, a huge part of Harris's strategy is turning out, you know, the base. And that's also the case in Wisconsin.

WALKER: What will you be looking out for as Harris sits down for presumably with Tim Walz for her first national media interview before Saturday?

CAI: I think definitely how she talks about policy issues and how she expands on them. Earlier at the DNC, we sat down with her advisors, a number of us reporters, and they kind of leveled expectations saying that, you know, she isn't likely to unveil, you know, large pieces of her platform before the debate, and really tempering expectations because there isn't that much time before the election.

But look, I think there's going to be increasing pressures for her to talk about policy in much more detail and then looking ahead to the debate. That's a place where both camps already putting a lot of their expectations. I think that Trump camp is just sort of waiting for her to mess up and waiting for an end to that honeymoon period.

[06:35:14]

And then I think Harris, this is the first time she's going to be facing Trump. So, she's going to be taking that preparation extremely seriously. We know that she's already started to do debate prep before the convention.

BLACKWELL: Yes. On the breaking news of the day, a lot of the convention focus, both Democratic and Republican was on domestic issues on the economy, on immigration, on reproductive rights.

But if this situation in the Middle East starts to escalate, how might that impact the campaign?

CAI: I think it will really expedite the need for Harris to come out there and show that she has the foreign policy chops and to really lay out a platform, a sort of vision for how she will handle this conflict as well as others around the world.

BLACKWELL: Sophia Cai, thank you.

Of course, we'll have more breaking news coverage from the Middle East.

We'll take a quick break now, but stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:41:00]

WALKER: Breaking this morning, Hamas says its delegation is in Cairo this hour for ceasefire talks that are set to resume today. An Israeli official tells CNN that they still expect a delegation to travel to Cairo later today as well.

BLACKWELL: Negotiators are trying to end the war in Gaza and release more than 100 hostages who have been captive since October 7th.

CNN international correspondent Nada Bashir is in Cairo for us. So, an Egyptian official tells CNN that both sides are still far apart on some issues. What's the degree of optimism there that a deal could be reached?

NADA BASHIR, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on-camera): Well, Victor, Amara, the fact that we are seeing a mass delegation arriving in Cairo to take part in these negotiations is a sign of progress here. We know, of course, during those talks in Qatar previously, last week, Hamas did not participate directly. It remains to be seen whether they take part directly in these talks today here in Cairo, whether they continue to communicate through mediators. They are here to listen to the Egyptian mediators with regards to this latest proposal put forward by the Israeli delegation.

And as you mentioned, there is expected to be an Israeli delegation present at these talks today as well.

Now, of course as you mentioned, there are still, according to one Egyptian official, wide differences in the positions of both Israel and Hamas. There are still key sticking points which need to be hammered out and discussed.

And one of the key issues continues to be the terms surrounding the presence of Israeli troops, or rather the long-term presence of Israeli troops within the Gaza Strip, and in particular, presence along the Philadelphi corridor, that buffer zone separating Egypt from southern Gaza.

Now, Hamas has previously said that it does not wish to see any long- term presence by Israeli troops. In fact, Egyptian officials have also said they don't want to see Israeli troops stationed along the Philadelphi corridor in any sort of post war structure.

And we know that Israeli officials have put forward a proposal which was flat out rejected by Egyptian officials seen as a non-starter. However, they have put forward a revised proposal which sees a reduced number of military posts and truth (ph) stationed along the corridor during the first phase of the proposed ceasefire, which would see a six week pause in fighting.

Now, Egyptian officials have transmitted that proposal to Hamas officials for their consideration, a sign. Perhaps an Egyptian officials see this proposal as being somewhat more serious, perhaps even more acceptable to Hamas officials.

But again, that remains to be seen. And this is just one of several key sticking points. There are other issues, including the free movement of Palestinians as well as terms around the release of Palestinian prisoners. And what we've been hearing from Hamas repeatedly, is of course their concern that this current ceasefire deal on the table does not include any guarantees for a permanent, lasting ceasefire. That is something they want to see, guaranteed.

And of course, given the news this morning of latest, crossfire and attacks between Hezbollah and Israel, there are concerns as well that that could, place a spanner in the work when it comes to these ongoing ceasefire negotiations. (INAUDIBLE) how the regional fallout will also impact these talks taking place here in Cairo today.

BLACKWELL: Nada Bashir for us in Cairo. Thank you so much.

WALKER: Thank you, Nada. And we'll have more breaking news coverage from the Middle East after this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:48:44]

BLACKWELL: Israel launched more strikes on southern Lebanon this morning. Now this is in addition to the overnight, what they call preemptive attack on Hezbollah strongholds there. Israel says it thwarted a Hezbollah plan to strike and destroy thousands of their rocket launcher barrels.

WALKER: Not long after the overnight attack, Hezbollah says it launched more than 300 rockets in retaliation for the killing of one of its top military commanders last month. The leader of Hezbollah is expected to speak within hours.

Let's go now to former Pentagon adviser on the Middle East, Jasmine El-Gamal. Jasmine, welcome to the program. So, when we listen, when we hear from Hassan Nasrallah the leader of Hezbollah, obviously we're going to be watching for what he says in terms of if there's going to be a phase two or phase three.

JASMINE EL-GAMAL, FMR PENTAGON MIDDLE EAST ADVISOR: Absolutely. And good morning to you both. Thank you for having me.

That's exactly right. What we're going to hear from the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, tonight will give us an indication of whether this was a one-time thing and it's over or whether this was the first in a series of responses that we can expect to see in retaliation for the assassination of Hezbollah's former, of the -- of the top military commander by Israel.

Now, the attack itself was -- was well known to be planned. He had spoken about it before. He had stated that Hezbollah was going to respond to the assassination of the -- of the military commander. And he had also stated that making the Israelis wait and kind of, you know, live in fear of an attack for a few days was part of the psychological response to the assassination of their commander.

[06:50:23]

Where it goes from here, we'll know much more about that once we hear from Nasrallah tonight.

BLACKWELL: We just had Nada Bashir up from Cairo talking about the talks aiming at a ceasefire deal and release of the hostages. And we talked about the influence of these attacks on the talks, but the timing of the attacks themselves, what do they suggest about confidence in those talks?

EL-GAMAL: That's a great question. That's a really important point. The fact that that Hezbollah chose this moment to try and proceed with this attack really goes to show how little confidence the group has in the ceasefire negotiations actually bearing fruit or coming to fruition. If the -- if there was indeed a breakthrough that was imminent in the talks, it is highly unlikely that Hezbollah would have done anything to jeopardize those talks.

Obviously, we know that the Iranians who, at the end of the day, are the main patron of all of these groups that we're seeing right now as parties to this conflict, whether it be the Houthis or Hamas or Hezbollah. We know that Iran itself doesn't want this all-out region war that everyone has been afraid of.

And so, they have been waiting to see what these negotiations bring to bear. But the fact is that according to Israeli negotiators themselves, Prime Minister Netanyahu has been dragging his feed, has been adding new conditions to the -- to the negotiations and has really, they feel not given them a mandate to go ahead and sign a deal.

And so, we see, you know, 10 months into this conflict now that the deal seems farther away than ever. And that's probably the likely reason why Hezbollah felt empowered to be able to go ahead and try to retaliate for that assassination.

WALKER: I just wanted to clarify because you were saying that this was expected, and, of course, you know, Hezbollah had been signaling like Iran has that they would retaliate for the deaths of, you know, the Hezbollah military leader. And, of course, Iran still waiting to retaliate for the killing of the Hamas leader.

Are you saying then that Hezbollah's reaction sending over 300 plus rockets into Israel is separate from the preemptive strike that Israel launched early -- in the early hours?

EL-GAMAL: So, it's a part of it. The preemptive strike, according to the Israelis who are saying that they -- they -- they expected around 6,000 rockets to be lobbed at Israel from Hezbollah. And so, they tried to preempt that by striking when they did.

And so, what ended up happening is that out of those 6,000, that the Israelis were expecting, according to their own statements, around 300 of them made it. So, it could have been a much larger attack. And what the Israelis are basically saying is that they prevented that from being much more serious than it was.

BLACKWELL: Jasmine, what's the likely U.S. role here? The U.S. has obviously not been able to get all sides to agree on a ceasefire deal and a release of these hostages. What influence might they have on at least preventing this from escalating to a full-fledged war in the Middle East?

EL-GAMAL: That's right. Another really good point. The idea here that the U.S. has been trying to reach a ceasefire deal for several months. U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has been to the region almost every single month since the October 7th attack and the ensuing war in Gaza. And yet hasn't been able to get the parties to the table to really seal the deal and end the war and bring the hostages home.

Now, the U.S. Obviously is Israel's closest ally in the region. It is effectively the only outside party that does have any leverage and influence over the Israelis, and that could potentially compel Prime Minister Netanyahu to close a deal. And they haven't done that. We have seen some -- some forms of pressure throughout the last several months. We've seen, you know, angry public statements, leaks that the administration was upset, but we haven't really seen the U.S. bring fully to bear the leverage it has over Israel in terms of military -- military and other (INAUDIBLE) to get the deal done.

[06:55:01]

BLACKWELL: Jasmine El-Gamal, thank you so much.

And of course, we'll have more breaking news coverage from the Middle East.

We'll take a break. We'll be back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALKER: Right now, Hurricane Hone is growing stronger as it nears the Big Island of Hawaii.

BLACKWELL: The governor says, uh, have rather declared a state of emergency because of strong winds, heavy rain, fire concerns.

CNN meteorologist Allison Chinchar is tracking the storm for us. What's the latest?

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST (on-camera): All right, so it is now a hurricane. It became a hurricane at the 5:00 a.m. Eastern time update this morning, 75 miles per hour. You can see those outer bands just lashing portions of the Big Island of Hawaii right now. That's why you've got those watches and warnings in place. It is expected to continue westward, moving eventually away from Hawaii and then starting to weaken as we go through the next 24 to 48 hours.

[07:00:12]

But in the short term, you're talking a tremendous amount of rain that's already starting to hit the eastern slopes of the island and eventually that rain is going to spread starting to see some of those extreme outer bands even begin to reach Maui as we speak.

So flooding is going to be a huge concern. You've got a flash flood warning, a new one there for much of the big island and the flood watch. You're talking six to 12 inches of rain for a lot of these areas.

Now, yes, there's some drought conditions. They need the rain, but nobody ever wants to have 12 inches of rain especially in a very short period of time. Wind advisories also in effect. That's going to ramp up the fire concern too for a lot of these islands, Victor and Amara, as we go through the rest of the day.

WALKER: All right, Allison Chinchar, thank you very much.