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Amanpour
Interview with Lebanese Ambassador to the U.K. Rami Mortada; Interview with Tampa Bay City Council Member Bill Carlson; Interview with The Wall Street Journal Reporter Anat Peled. Aired 1-2p ET
Aired October 09, 2024 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[13:00:00]
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, and welcome to "Amanpour." Here's what's coming up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: Benjamin Netanyahu speaks directly to the Lebanese people, pushing his plan to reshape the Middle East. What does the government there
think? I asked Rami Mortada, the Lebanese ambassador here in the U.K.
And --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You want to pick a fight with Mother Nature, she's winning 100 percent of the time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: A historic hurricane barrels towards Florida. We get the latest on this deadly super storm the second in two weeks.
Plus --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANAT PELED, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: They were seeing months leading up to the October 7th attack basically practice drills.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: -- the women who tried to warn about the Hamas invasion. Wall Street Journal reporter Anat Peled tells Michel Martin how the massacre of
ignored female soldiers came to symbolize October 7 failures.
Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London. For the first time in 49 days, President Joe Biden and Israel's prime minister,
Benjamin Netanyahu spoke about the rapidly expanding war in the Middle East today. It's a time of extreme tension with the U.S. appearing to lose
influence over its ally Israel's intentions about taking on Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran.
Presidential candidate and Vice President Kamala Harris also joined today's phone call which was set to focus on how Israel will respond to Tehran's
missile attack. Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says Israel is closely coordinating with the United States, but in the end, will make its own
decisions.
Gaza though, where Israel started its counteroffensive remains under fierce Israeli bombardment. In the northern part of the besieged enclave
Palestinians are trying to flee whilst under fire. And our Jeremy Diamond reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Civilians fleeing a war zone. Suddenly, sprayed with bullets. The Israeli military
ordered these people to leave Northern Gaza and move south, but the hail of bullets they faced now a testament to why so many are choosing not to
leave, or simply cannot.
Nine-year-old Dana is among those wounded in the attack. Her pink shirt smeared red with her own blood after she was shot in the neck. At the
hospital, her mother says an Israeli drone opened fire as they were fleeing south.
The quadcopter started shooting intensively, she says. Everyone was running. There were so many bullets. Even my children's backpacks were full
of bullets.
The Israeli military declined to comment. But the attack came as it ordered nearly all of Northern Gaza to evacuate, even as it says its renewed ground
offensive is focused on just one city, Jabalya.
But many are trapped like 15-year-old Zamzam (ph). For anyone who hears my voice, help us, try to get us out, she pleads. She says her mother was
killed by Israeli forces. I watched her take her last breaths, and I couldn't do anything, she cries.
Calls for help are flooding into Gaza's ambulance service. But this medic explains his team will be shot at if he tries to mount a rescue. The tanks
are there. They will fire at the cars. Just get to the street and I will reach you quickly, he promises.
Inside Kamal Adwan Hospital, a dire situation risks getting worse. As 17 people wounded in an Israeli strike pour into the hospital's emergency
room, the hospital's director says he's been given 24 hours to empty the hospital.
The Israeli army is now demanding that we evacuate these patients and move them elsewhere. This will endanger their lives, and it is a catastrophe for
these children.
[13:05:00]
Human rights groups now warning that the military sweeping evacuation orders risk forcing more than 400,000 people out of Northern Gaza and into
a humanitarian zone that is already overcrowded and under resourced.
Where do we go, this woman asks. In Southern Gaza there are assassinations, and in Western Gaza they are firing shells at people. Where do we go?
Gaza City, others say they will not leave.
I will die and not go to the south. I have 20 family members. I have children. Where do they want me to go? He says he would rather die than be
displaced for a sixth time.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Jeremy Diamond reporting there. Now, as Israel broadens its offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Netanyahu spoke directly to the
Lebanese people.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: Stand up and take your country back. You have an opportunity that hasn't existed in decades. An
opportunity to take care of the future of your children and grandchildren. You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a
long war that will lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza.
I say to you, the people of Lebanon, free your country from Hezbollah so that this war can end.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: This message follows a similar video that Netanyahu had sent to the Iranian people. A clear indication that the Israeli prime minister sees
now, as he says, as the chance to remake the Middle East.
Now, Rami Mortada is Lebanon's ambassador to the U.K., and he is here on set. Welcome to the program.
RAMI MORTADA, LEBANESE AMBASSADOR TO THE U.K.: Thank you.
AMANPOUR: I guess I want to ask you, as the representative of the sovereign government of Lebanon, what you make of the prime minister of
another country urging your people to essentially to shake off Hezbollah?
MORTADA: Well, this is cynical propaganda. I think it will fall on the dead bodies that he killed more than 2,000 in the last two weeks. It will
fall on the demolished hospitals that he ordered the demolishment. It will fall on the 1.2 displaced that he managed -- made sure that they would be
displaced. It will fall on the humanitarian crisis that he's causing in the country and the immense pain and killing.
This is cynical propaganda, and I think the Lebanese still have in mind the successive wars that Israel launched against Lebanon and the suffering that
it has caused.
AMANPOUR: You've heard, and I'm sure you know her, the -- your counterpart here from Israel, Ambassador Hotovely, has said on the radio that -- from
Israel, that this is an opportunity to remake and reshape the Middle East. Would you welcome that? I mean, let's face it, your country appears to be
essentially held hostage by a militia.
I mean, your army is not in power, your government has not been able -- or they haven't been able to elect a president because of opposition from
Hezbollah. Do you feel that there needs to be a moment where you as a sovereign people are enabled to take back control, so to speak?
MORTADA: Well, definitely, there needs to be reshaping of the Middle East and of Lebanon, but this has to be homegrown. This needs to become from
within, from Lebanon. There is a will for change for reform in Lebanon that is in the making, but it will definitely not come from the Israelis. And I
think the Middle East that the Israelis want to show they're not hiding it. They showed it on the map than that Netanyahu showed at the U.N. General
Assembly, the evil and the blessing.
They want a Middle East free from a Palestinian State. They want a Middle East where Israel would have the supremacy. And this is a delusional goal.
I think the Middle East we want to see is a Middle East of peace, a Middle East of opportunities, a Middle East of economic growth. That's the Middle
East we want to see.
And unless and until there is peace and real peace, there is no way that the Middle East could be reshaped. And Israel stands today with the current
government as opposite to any prospect for peace, and I think that partly explains why they're exporting the conflict towards new frontiers to
distract attention of the fact that this current government in Israel is sterile, is unable to deliver any plan for peace or any strategy. The only
strategy is a forever war strategy.
AMANPOUR: So, they say. I mean, there are a lot, even the American backers will say, what is the exit strategy? Where is the political strategy that
this military strategy would back up? So, a lot of people believe that there should be some kind of stated political objective for Gaza.
[13:10:00]
But they will also say, and this is their term, that there is a ring of fire around Israel. And let's just take from your country, Hezbollah,
which, as you know, started firing into Israel on October 8th, a year ago, in support of Hamas.
It was, at that point, an unprovoked attack, and it has caused casualties, and they are still firing into certain places, including today. Do you
feel, again, that you are disempowered? OK. There's a big political issue in the Middle East, but you have a group that you haven't been able to
control. It's not your army, right? And so, Hezbollah is doing this and wreaking or bringing down what Netanyahu admitted himself, the potential
Gazification of Lebanon. He said it.
MORTADA: Well, the Israelis are good at taking a snapshot date, a snapshot event --
AMANPOUR: No, but this is serious.
MORTADA: No, no, I know. I know. I'll answer your question.
AMANPOUR: Why did Hezbollah feel that it had to put Lebanon at risk by -- it felt that it was able to, right? Because --
MORTADA: Well, we as Lebanese government were not part of this decision- making. But Hezbollah would tell you that they were trying to play out the cost profit equation for the Israelis to hold them back and to stop them
from committing the crimes that they ended up committing in Gaza.
But again, we in the Lebanese government were not part of the decision- making of what happened on the 8th of October. But things come in a context in this region. It's not that the Israelis that always good at taking a
snapshot event or a snapshot date and acting as if history started on that date.
Prior to October the 8th, the Israelis were occupying and still occupy part of our land. They were undertaking daily incursions off our airspace. It's
not that it is a snapshot moment that anything matters only on October the 8th. And yet, we have said since the early beginning, we want a sustainable
solution for the situation in South Lebanon.
We have all the ingredients for that. We have a U.N. Security Council resolution that can address all the concerns. We have a U.N. peacekeeping
force. And we would be ready to address all the concerns as long as our concerns are also addressed. It should be symmetrical. And unless and until
it is symmetrical, there is no way that any arrangement could work. Security is based on mutual security.
AMANPOUR: How do you do it? Because, you know, there was a resolution, 1701, after the 2006 war, and it hasn't really -- I mean, they haven't
pushed back and you haven't been able to enforce, right, pushing Hezbollah back 20, 30 kilometers behind the Litani River.
MORTADA: That's what I said.
AMANPOUR: Right, right. But so, who's going to do that? Who is going to do that?
MORTADA: That's what I said. It should have been symmetrical. The Israelis never observed 1701. Since 1701, I think they had 35,000 incursions into
our sovereign.
AMANPOUR: OK. So, you've made that point.
MORTADA: They continue to occupy parts of our territory. What we're saying today is that we put all these elements together and address them and come
up with a solution that addresses all concerns.
AMANPOUR: Do you think that what you're saying is falling on receptive years in Israel or in the United States? Because we saw the deputy leader,
I think that's who he is, of Hezbollah say yesterday that they would be willing -- they talked about a ceasefire.
MORTADA: Yes.
AMANPOUR: But hasn't that horse bolted from the barn? I mean, we're talking a huge bombing campaign, ground incursions, potential, I don't
know, you tell me, occupation again of Southern Lebanon. They've already raised a flag in one of those villages in Southern Lebanon, the Israelis.
They've expanded the air campaign.
MORTADA: Yes. They've tried occupation before, and we saw the results.
AMANPOUR: No, but right now, right now. What is happening right now on the ground?
MORTADA: Well, it's a full-scale war, sparing no civilian lives, sparing no hospitals, sparing no medical teams, sparing no support teams. It's a
full-scale war. And besides being brutal and violent, this war is really unnecessary, because countries go to war because they want to impose a
post-war arrangement, except that this time the arrangement exists under the form of a Security Council resolution, again, 1701.
I know that the Israelis belittle this resolution, but this resolution worked well, notwithstanding the violations from the Israeli side.
AMANPOUR: And the firings from Hezbollah.
MORTADA: Since 2006 up until October 2023, the Lebanese borders in the south were among the calmest in the region. And everyone from our side held
back and we fully observed -- of course, there is always room to do better. But as I said, security is based on mutual security.
[13:15:00]
AMANPOUR: Do you think now you have a choice, or a chance rather, to have another election and actually elect a president, which Hezbollah has been
blocking?
MORTADA: Well --
AMANPOUR: Do you have -- do you think you have a chance to impose the sovereignty or the power or the authority of your own national army or not?
MORTADA: This is Lebanese internal dynamics and there is no way that the Israelis could trigger such a dynamic.
AMANPOUR: No, but I'm asking you --
MORTADA: But for the sake of the country, I know as Lebanese, I want my country to address its chronic challenges. But this is totally different
from the war, the aggression that Israel is launching against Lebanon. Actually, it will lead to the opposite direction. It will entrench
Hezbollah. It will increase frustration among the population and it will play to the benefit of whatever Hezbollah has been saying for 40 years,
that you see Israel only understand the language of force.
AMANPOUR: Well, on the other hand, you remember Nasrallah, who's been assassinated, said to the Lebanese people, and he asked for their -- he
apologized after 2006, saying that, had I known what would have happened, had -- you know, when we kidnapped those two Israelis -- I think it was a
kidnap, in any event, they triggered that war, I wouldn't have done it. He apologized because it created such devastation. And --
MORTADA: Yes. But this -- does this justify the devastation?
AMANPOUR: Well, I'm wondering whether he would have apologized for what he did on October 8th.
MORTADA: I don't know.
AMANPOUR: Because now you guys are suffering the brunt of it.
MORTADA: Yes.
AMANPOUR: And I just wonder how you think you're going to get out.
MORTADA: But let's not forget why we're suffering. We're suffering because we have an invasion launched by the Israelis against Lebanon. And again,
it's totally pointless, absurd, and useless, besides being brutal and violent. Because the post-war arrangements already exist, and they have
been on the table since --
AMANPOUR: But do you think they were working?
MORTADA: They were working. Well, 2006, 2023, always there is a room to do better, but they also have to respect this resolution. It needs to be
reciprocal. And we said we would be ready to address their concerns, but I'm afraid it's not about their northern population. This is a pretext, as
they did in Gaza, as they do everywhere. They just take a false pretext in order to launch -- and they've said it, they want to change the strategic
paradigm and the region. So --
AMANPOUR: Iran.
MORTADA: Yes.
AMANPOUR: Lebanon, Gaza, and the West Bank.
MARTIN: That's totally destabilizing for the region.
AMANPOUR: Do you think there's any chance -- I mean, you might not like it, but do you think there's any chance that this war will actually defang
these, whatever you want to call them, militias, militants, you know?
MORTADA: I'm afraid it could lead to the opposite outcome. The way we Lebanese would want to deal down the line with this, call it,
unconventional situation is in an inclusive Lebanese context, but you need to address their grievances. And Israel has been doing everything to make
our argument harder and harder with them.
When they tell us, what do you intend to do, you Lebanese government, with the occupation in the south? What do you want to do with the overflights?
What can we tell them? We need to have cooperation from all parties in order to be able to address this situation.
AMANPOUR: So, sorry. When who tells you that? When who says what you intend to do?
MORTADA: When the militias or the non-state actors you're referring to. So, it needs to be addressed in an inclusive Lebanese context in due
course. But this is -- has nothing to do with the Israeli aggression. The Israeli aggression will lead to the opposite dynamic being encouraged.
Down the line we would need to deal with it, but this is a sideshow. The Israelis are masters of creating a collateral distraction from the essence
of the problem. The essence of the problem is occupation. The essence of the problem is a brutal and violent act against Lebanon, against Gaza,
against now -- I don't know where they will end up.
We were talking about a ceasefire in Gaza. Now, we have -- we're talking about two ceasefires. We have Gaza and Lebanon. Soon, maybe we would be
talking about a third ceasefire. So, it's time to reverse the trend. As I said, we in the Lebanese government, we don't want this war and we would be
ready to cooperate in order to address the concerns. According to this 1701, we have a U.N. peacekeeping force. We already started the preparation
for enlisting 1,500 soldiers, additional soldiers to send to the south.
[13:20:00]
And that, I think, is conducive for a sustainable solution, but the Israelis have chosen a different path. They now want to change the whole
strategic paradigm in the Middle East. And that's totally destabilizing.
AMANPOUR: Ambassador, thank you very much for being with us.
MORTADA: Thank you, Christiane. Thank you.
AMANPOUR: Lebanon's ambassador to the U.K.
MORTADA: Thank you.
AMANPOUR: And now, to Florida and catastrophic forecasts about the Category 4 Hurricane Milton which is expected to make landfall as soon as
this evening. Around 7 million people have now been told to evacuate. That's more than the population of Ireland.
This comes just after Hurricane Helene battered the state and as the ravages of climate change make weather events like this more common and
more severe. Climate Correspondent Bill Weir visited St. Petersburg, Florida, as residents were scrambling to prepare in the final hours before
landfall, all while still picking up the pieces from Helene.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Both physically and emotionally, they were already picking up the pieces on Florida's Gulf
Coast.
BETH CALDWELL, LONG KEY, FLORIDA RESIDENT: It's like hysterical, can't sleep, can't eat, one minute and then clang the next and then you're like,
it is what it is. You got to keep living.
WEIR (voice-over): Now, Beth Caldwell must cut short her search for her mother's wedding ring to evacuate for the second time in as many weeks.
WEIR: You're saying you're really worried about folks who made it through this one, but may not --
CALDWELL: Well, yes, because the amount of debris on the street and the winds, even if it slows down.
WEIR: Governor DeSantis said this morning that even with 24/7 debris removal, they wouldn't have all of Helene's damage cleaned up in time for
Milton to make landfall, and this is why there is one front loader over here waiting to fill up a line of empty dump trucks that's approximately
two miles long.
And this beach was covered in millions of dollars of fresh sand to try to protect this community, which just got washed away.
SUSAN GLICKMAN, VP OF POLICY AND PARTNERSHIPS, THE CLEO INSTITUTE: That's right.
WEIR: What does that tell you about how we prepare and how we have to adjust to this new Earth?
GLICKMAN: The fact is you cannot adapt your way out of the climate crisis,
WEIR (voice-over): Susan Glickman grew up around this bungalow where her husband a dear 90-year-old friend called Nanny survived Helene. But
ironically, she's also a community climate organizer in Florida, desperately trying to convince officials and neighbors that this is what
scientists have been warning about for generations.
GLICKMAN: It is beyond criminal if we do not dramatically address the root cause of the problem immediately. But if we keep putting climate pollution
and burning fossil fuels, we're just going to make a lot of this planet, in general, just unlivable.
WEIR: Here in downtown St. Petersburg, we're about 24, 36 hours before landfall, and it's obvious that the evacuation orders are taking -- being
taken seriously by folks. You do see some souls walking dogs, a few cars out, but mostly empty. Officials did voice some concern about -- in
addition to all the worries, the construction towers that are all over this growing city here in these Category 4 winds, those could come down and they
admitted they don't have enough time to disassemble them before landfall.
But honestly, even if they were to come down in a worst-case scenario, so much of this area is evacuated. It may not cost a lot of life. What is
really worrisome is that mound of water being pushed by Category 5 winds less than 500 miles away from this part of Tampa.
Keep in mind the last time a major storm hit this part of Florida, 100 years ago, the population has gone up by about 3.5 million people and sea
level has gone up by a foot.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: And those are really critical statistics that I want to discuss. Joining me more -- with more from Tampa Bay is -- in Florida, is the Tampa
City council member, Bill Carlson. Thank you, first of all, for being with us. I know that you have an extremely, extremely difficult job right now.
Can you just tell us what's happening? You're in an evacuation center, but you're still having to deal with trying to save lives.
BILL CARLSON, TAMPA BAY CITY COUNCIL MEMBER: Yes. We're -- thank you for inviting me on here today. We're continuing to try to warn anybody who's
still left to get out of their houses. Now, is pretty much the end of the time that they might be able to get out if they're in an evacuation zone
and we've been trying to help people all day. The police department and fire department have been going through evacuations zones A and B to try to
encourage people to leave. Uber has been offering free rides, bus services have been offering to get people out. And so, pretty soon we're going to be
at the time when people won't be able to get out.
[13:25:00]
AMANPOUR: And we're watching now, as you just said, that pictures, overhead pictures of, I guess, the interstate as people are leaving and it
looks pretty packed. Are people -- do they get it? I mean, obviously so many, but are there -- you know, often they're holdouts. They're those who
either don't think it's going to harm them or those who have no choice, no ability to, whatever, buy tickets or have a car just to get out. Can you
tell us about that kind of population?
CARLSON: Sure. Floridians -- and I'm 5th generation Floridian. Floridians are used to having hurricanes come through several times a year. And so, we
always think that we're not going to get the bad one. And then about every 10 years or so, we do.
Tampa Bay has been lucky. We haven't had a bad one since 1921, but we just got hit two weeks ago with the storm of the century. And now, we're going
to get hit with the next storm of the century just two weeks later.
People are still trying to recover from the terrible devastation from a couple of weeks ago. Their houses aren't even put back together. There's
pieces of their houses and their furniture and their appliances are many times laying out in the front yard because government has added time to
pick them up in the week in between. And now, we're going to face massive flooding again and rain and wind.
AMANPOUR: You know, we're looking again at those pictures too of all the rubble that is stacked, as you just described, outside people's houses and
on the side of the street. What do you think, you know, might -- could that in itself add to the -- you know, to the danger by the wind creating, I
don't know, missiles of a sort of all of that loose debris?
CARLSON: Sure. The wind could -- we faced massive wind before. We haven't had this amount of debris on the -- in the yards. By the way, the City of
Tampa is still picking up, I think up until 3:00 this afternoon, as soon as -- as long as it's still safe to pick anything up. But other cities don't
have it there yet.
The big difference between Helene and this storm is the massive storm surge. Think about if you're standing up in your house last week, if you
were on a first story house, you would have had six feet of water up to eight feet of water coming into your house. And so, as people have ripped
all that apart, now they're facing potentially 15 feet of water, and it's going to depend on exactly where the storm hits.
The latest report shows that it will hit just south of Tampa Bay and Sarasota, but the storm itself covers the entire state. The difference
between where the eye hits is, if you're on the northern side, you might get less of a storm surge. The National Weather Service is still predicting
12 feet in Tampa Bay, although other meteorologists in Tampa Bay say that if the eye goes further south, we may have a lot less. But from the eye
south, they're probably going to face 15 feet of storm surge. We haven't seen anything like that in decades.
AMANPOUR: I mean, it just sounds awful. 15 feet in the middle of where you are. Can I just play for you something that, you know, goes to the human
desperation about this? A professional, a meteorologist, as you well know, was talking about this and essentially became very emotional. I just want
to play it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN MORALES, WTVJ METEOROLOGIST: It has dropped 50 millibars in 10 hours. I apologize. This is just horrific.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: I find that so extraordinary. I wonder how you reacted to see, you know, somebody whose job it is to try to help people understand himself
be overcome.
CARLSON: It's terrifying. And this is the sentiment that we've been facing the last week. I handed out -- or help hand out a couple of 1,000 tarps
just a couple of days ago. And most of the people that came in to pick them up had half their house washed away and they're -- they -- now they're
facing devastation again, but they were still smiling and upbeat because the people of Florida, the people of Tampa Bay are resilient. They know
that eventually we're going to get through this.
And I must say, please, whatever your religion is, people in the world, please say a prayer for the people of Florida. They need it right now.
AMANPOUR: It is really terrible and beyond human imagination, really, especially that this has happened -- is happening with -- you know, within
two weeks of two hurricanes. Can I ask you about the whole really ugly and unnecessarily political layer that's been spread all over this? The idea
about what is the truth, for instance.
As you know, President Biden and Vice President Harris had a briefing with the FEMA administrator just within the last hour, and she had explained all
the pre-positioning of everything, from water to, you know, ambulances and the like.
[13:30:00]
But she was asked by the vice president whether they needed to pay attention to any misinformation about evacuation and stuff that might be
confusing people. And the administrator said, on that issue, it's OK. We've got the message of the evacuation through. But on other issues, there's a
lot of misinformation. So, are you confident that everybody gets what you're saying to them on having to leave?
CARLSON: FEMA, the state, the city, the county, they're all coordinating right now, and there are many, many resources, including the utilities,
their resources stage, some of them inside the hurricane zone and many of them just outside. They're ready to be mobilized afterwards.
From FEMA itself, what we're going to need is help, especially with people who don't have insurance. After the last storm, we found that there were
families that had houses that had been in the families for four or five generations and insurance is so difficult to get in Florida that they
couldn't afford insurance. And so, their houses are washed away, but they have no way to replace them.
There was a lady I met with, her house was is 100 years old and she has a special needs son. He has very expensive equipment to help him get through
his day. And when the storm came across, about eight feet through her first floor, she had to pick him up and carry him to the third floor to keep him
from getting washed over with water. And now, she's trying desperately to replace the equipment and make her house habitable and she doesn't have
insurance. So, that's an example of the kind of horrible situation that we've been facing.
AMANPOUR: FEMA itself says that it's confident it can deal with both -- you know, both Helene and Milton. I want to play a little bit of the latest
press conference from your governor, DeSantis, talking about, you know, kind of the hopes about this hurricane potentially weakening, but, you
know, knowing that it probably won't. Just take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL): It is the hope that it will weaken more before landfall. There is high confidence that this hurricane is going to pack a
major, major punch and do an awful lot of damage.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: Do you hold out hope that it might weaken? Is that what people hope?
CARLSON: I'm sure they do. And some of my friends, even on my own street, have ignored the mandatory evacuation order and they're staying. We pray
that they all turn out OK. We had people -- just from the storm surge, which is different than the wind, we had people who were trapped in -- on
the first floor of their houses as the water rose. They couldn't escape from their houses and they had all the other issues with appliances
floating around and hitting them.
The wind -- I just got a report a few minutes ago. The wind is supposed to be 125 miles an hour and it's going to downgrade to a Category 3, but
that's still a very severe storm and it's a direct hit most likely the Sarasota area.
AMANPOUR: Yes, and it's a hurricane. Can I just ask you about the issue of climate change? Before we talk to you, our chief climate correspondent,
Bill Weir, was explaining some of the -- you know, some of the mitigating factors. And apparently, according to The Washington Post, there was a sort
of a heat wave, so to speak, in the Gulf of Mexico, which has exacerbated this terrible hurricane.
But a new study over here by the Imperial College in London found that major hurricanes are more than twice as likely to occur now due to climate
change, raising water, air temperatures, et cetera. And yet, the governor of your state has signed a bill earlier this year erasing most references
to climate change from state laws. And his policies have made it more difficult for cleanup, energy companies to operate there -- clean energy
companies rather.
Does this -- I realize you're in the midst of an emergency, but do you believe that there needs to be a much bigger, more consistent statewide,
nationwide, global effort to try to mitigate the factors that are making these storms wilder and more frequent?
CARLSON: Yes, I think certainly we need coordination on the state and federal level. But as you said, it's a worldwide issue. One of the speakers
you had on earlier is -- who is an expert on this is a friend of mine. And the issue that we've been discussing is that people will start to take it
seriously when the risk markets stop covering risks.
And so, I mentioned the people who don't have insurance, because they can't afford it, more and more of the people who live on the coast have enough
money that they don't have to have insurance and they don't have to have a mortgage.
[13:35:00]
And so, as you -- as it becomes impossible to get a mortgage or -- and/or insurance on the coastline, we will start to hear people pay attention to
this more. The other thing that happened with Helene and will probably happen again here is we're going to lose a lot of the missing middle homes,
some of the smaller ranch homes, single family homes from the 1950s and '60s were completely wiped out. Most likely they'll be replaced with larger
homes for wealthier people. And so, that just potentially exacerbates the housing shortage for the middle class.
AMANPOUR: Yes. I mean, it's just one thing stacked upon another. And before I let you go, we've got about 30 seconds. I don't know whether you
can see outside, whether you recently looked outside of your window. What's -- what does it look like? What's the sense of anticipation right now?
CARLSON: It's already raining and we're getting bands of rain. And so, that will continue until the night. One other thing, just to put in, think
about Florida, if it was a country, it would be the 15th largest economy in the world and the state has more than 22 million people and the majority of
them are impacted by this. So, this is a very serious international issue, not just a state issue. So, thank you for helping us on this.
AMANPOUR: Well, we appreciate you being here to tell us. And of course, our program is broadcast worldwide as well as across the United States. So,
Bill Carlson, Tampa City Councilor, thank you very much. And we wish you and everybody good luck.
CARLSON: Thank you.
AMANPOUR: Now, a year since October 7th, 101 hostages are yet to be brought home from Gaza. This includes five female Israeli soldiers who were
stationed at the Nahal Oz base near the Gaza border fence that day, and Hamas killed 15 in their unit. Months before the attack they had reported
suspicious activity by the militant group but their warnings were ignored.
In a recent report for The Wall Street Journal, correspondent Anat Peled investigates that failure and the tragedy that ensued as well as the wider
implications. And she discusses all of that now with Michel Martin.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHEL MARTIN, CONTRIBUTOR: Thanks, Christiane. Anat Peled, thank you so much for joining us.
ANAT PELED, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Thanks for having me.
MARTIN: Before we get into the details of your reporting, we are speaking now, we are acknowledging it's been a year since the October 7th Hamas-led
attack on Southern Israel. There have been a number of memorials. I assume there were memorials and commemorations happening throughout the country.
You went to one of them. Would you just tell us about it?
PELED: Sure. So, I attended one memorial in the evening, and it was organized by families of hostages and bereaved families, you know, people
killed on October 7th. And this was a ceremony separate from the government. They couldn't agree on a -- you know, a unifying ceremony. And
it was just giving space to all the stories. I mean, not all of them, but a lot of stories of victims, you know, people who survived, returned
hostages. It was just a very painful kind of way to reflect on a difficult year that Israelis have had.
MARTIN: It is interesting that the government wanted to have one observance and the family members -- many of the family members wanted a
different one. Can you just describe -- what was the point of difference? Do you know?
PELED: Definitely. So, basically, the government is very contentious in Israel. It doesn't have very high approval ratings and polling shows that
if elections were held right now, Netanyahu would not be able to form a coalition.
The families couldn't agree with the government on a common ceremony and the government decided to hold a pre-recorded ceremony without an audience.
And the families felt and other critics felt that this was to avoid protests during the ceremony, and they wanted a live audience. And so, they
tried to, you know, come to an agreement, but at the end, they held their own ceremony. And it just kind of gave voice to their pain.
MARTIN: Interesting. There's a lot right there, isn't there?
PELED: Yes.
MARTIN: We specifically wanted to talk with you about a report that you filed for The Wall Street Journal this week. It's titled, How the Massacre
of Ignored Female Soldiers Came to Symbolize October 7th Failures. I have to say, you know, of all the things that I've read and all the reporting
that I've seen about the events of October 7th, this has to be just one of the most painful. For so many reasons.
What was the specialized unit? What were they tasked to do?
PELED: So, these young women are known as field observers, (INAUDIBLE) in Hebrew, and their job is basically to watch borders. So, they will be
placed in dangerous areas, for example, near the border with Lebanon, with Gaza, you know, in the West Bank, and they will have to literally sit in
front of screens, and they watch, each woman, you know, part of the border area, and also a few hundred meters into Gaza, and they cannot take their
eyes off the screen. It's forbidden.
[13:40:00]
So, if they have to go, you know, to the bathroom, they have to be replaced. And what they did is they basically just had to alert, that means
forces in the field. They have phones and radio next to them. And if they saw something suspicious on their screens, they would have to alert the
forces in the field that something was happening.
MARTIN: Why is this an all-female unit?
PELED: Right. It didn't used to be, but it got changed I think around 2001.
MARTIN: The heart of your piece is this, these soldiers sent repeated warnings of unusual and suspicious activity at the borders. Your reporting
says that these warnings were sent up, it's not that they didn't see them, but they were repeatedly ignored. In fact, we focused on a number of the
soldiers, particularly one named Maya Desyatnik (ph). Walk us through what they were seeing, for people who haven't seen your piece yet. Walk us
through what they were seeing and what happened when they made these reports.
PELED: Yes. So, Maya (ph) is one of the observers who actually survived, one of two observers who survived that day. And what she was telling me and
others who were not on the base that day is that they were seeing months leading up to the October 7th attack, basically practice drills. So, one
young woman told me that she saw a trainee exercise, including a mock tank and a fake kidnapping going on inside Gaza, not too deep, because then they
wouldn't have seen it.
Other -- another girl said that she basically saw people in -- dressed in all black and their face covered, which they were taught to identify as
part of the Nukhba unit, which is the Hamas elite unit, and they were pointing at different observation points and then drove away.
And these young women basically saw tons of activity. They saw large groups of Palestinians coming closer to the fence several times a week. They would
try to breach, they would be armed, they would play with the cameras, and these young women were alerting their superiors that this was happening.
It's important to note that on Friday, October 6th, it stopped. There was silence that day. And that also probably should have raised alarms.
MARTIN: What happened to this space and this group of soldiers?
PELED: Yes, it's really tragic on October 6th. They have a celebration. They have a party because one of the girls, Shahaf Nisani, it's her last
night on the base. And they have a meal. It goes until 11:00 p.m. And so, the girls get up at 4:00 a.m. And around 6:30, they start to hear sirens.
Now, it's not usual sirens. It's tons and tons of sirens, indicating that barrages of rockets are coming in.
So, we have the situation room, which is where they have their stands and they sit in front of the screens and watch the border of Gaza. And so,
those young women are watching the border, and suddenly, they see dozens of militants breaching, heavily armed with RPGs, grenades. We would learn
later that 100 -- more than 150 would be -- would come in and -- into this space, only the space.
And so, the young woman are calling, you know, kind of frantically, and we have some recordings of this, calling their superiors, calling the forces
in the field saying, guys, we have -- they're breaching, they're breaching the border. What happens is they also breached the base and they were never
prepared for an invasion of the base.
And so, Maya (ph), who's a survivor, told me that they basically hid. The young woman in a small office for six hours. Militants were outside, a few
armed soldiers tried to kind of fight them off, because these women are all unarmed, and failed. And the militants threw in grenades and set the
situation room on fire.
What happens is basically everyone is killed there and burned basically alive. Maya (ph) manages to escape through a small bathroom window. She and
a few others. Now, elsewhere on the base, we have the rest of the observers who are not on duty. They're in their pajamas, and we also have videos of
this. They escaped to a small concrete shelter where they basically send their parents goodbye messages, because they understand they hear shooting
around them, they understand the situation.
Then the militants enter, throw grenades, they shoot and they kill everyone, except for seven young women who are taken to Gaza. It's
important to know that before they were taken to Gaza, Hamas militants made a video of them. Basically, they're sitting bloodied in front of a wall and
you can -- this video has come out and you can watch it, but basically, what they're looking at is the bodies of their friends. And that hasn't
come out. And then they're taken to Gaza. So, basically, this -- they're killed. These girls who warned for months.
MARTIN: It's almost disrespectful to talk about the numbers, but just so that we understand the scope of this, how many people were killed that day
in this gruesome fashion?
[13:45:00]
PELED: We know at least eight other military bases and outposts that the Israeli army were breached that day. In this space, over 50 soldiers were
killed, of the of those soldiers, 15 observers, and they were unarmed. And seven of the observers, additionally, we're taking to Gaza.
MARTIN: Do we know whether any of these women are still alive?
PELED: So, two have come back. One alive in an Israeli rescue mission. One dead. Her body was retrieved. The five remaining women are believed to be
alive. And freed hostages that I've spoken to saw them in Gaza wounded, but alive around day 50. So, that's many days ago. But --
MARTIN: Many days ago.
PELED: But they still could be alive.
MARTIN: Just as -- there's so much here to try to understand, like, first of all, why are they unarmed?
PELED: Yes, they weren't considered combat soldiers. So, only combat soldiers in the Israeli army will -- you know, have arms with them. If
you're not a combat soldier, if you're a cook, if you're an intelligence, you may not have arms. That's one of the questions that the parents are
asking. And the IDF is going to have to investigate.
MARTIN: Well, why was the base so lightly defended? You said -- so, the women themselves were not armed. The observers themselves were not armed.
OK. So, you said that they were classified as noncombatants. OK. But why was the base, which was a forward -- at a forward position so lightly
defended?
PELED: We don't have a good answer to this. The IDF is conducting a more tactical investigation about what went wrong that day, and it hasn't
released the results of that yet. But we don't know. There weren't enough forces on that day. It was a holiday. It was a weekend. And so, it seemed
to have been more emptied out. We don't have a good answer to that. That's part of the tragedy.
MARTIN: And the third and most important question, obviously, which you're reporting clearly raises and which the families clearly want to know is,
why did no one listen to them?
PELED: Yes. So, first of all, say the parents are very upset about this. And these young women have become a symbol for Israel's intelligence
failure of October 7, which is the worst in its history and the failing to protect them. The operational failure.
There's two things we can touch at. One is structural. So, basically, as I said in the beginning, these women were not really seen as part of the
intelligence community in the military. So, in the military, you have 8,200 unit, which does kind of more fancy technology-based signals intelligence,
which is considered very valuable by the military. And you also have the Mossad, Israel spy agency, you have the Shin Bet, Israel's internal
security agency.
These women, over the years, were basically taken out of that community and treated more as kind of tactical low-level intelligence. We don't really
need what they're doing. We have fancy stuff. We have classified stuff that will, you know, take care of what we need.
And so, these women were basically alerting. And at one point, I spoke to a young woman who wasn't on the base that day, and she was a commander of the
observers. So, she compiled intelligence reports at the end of each shift with what kind of was unusual. And she even called up an intelligence
number that she had. She didn't know exactly who it was, but she basically asked, what's going on? And they said, oh, nothing. You have nothing to
worry about. She trusted them. So, that's one thing. That's one of the failures.
And the second thing, I mean, a lot of people asked me, you know, they were a woman. Was it because misogyny, you know? And I think it does play a role
here, but I do want to say that Israel has a really big intelligence failure here. It's not just about -- I think men were also ignored that
raised alarm, and it's more complicated.
MARTIN: You know, I understand why you're saying that there is sort of an array of failures there and over reliance on sort of high tech -- high --
you know, high tech sort of intelligence tools and so forth. But, you know, human intelligence has been a hallmark of Israeli defenses for -- since
forever, hasn't it? You could see why people are asking, is it that they didn't -- they ignored what they had to say because they didn't believe
these women would know what they were talking about?
I know you, you interviewed intelligence officials in the course of your reporting. Are you really convinced that gender wasn't a factor here?
PELED: No, I think gender did play a -- was a factor here. I think it did. They're young woman and they were seen as kind of the bottom of the barrel
doing the most basic job and not high rank. And yes, maybe just complaining. And yes, I think misogyny did play a role in this.
MARTIN: I know that the prime minister, Prime Minister Netanyahu, has said that inquiry should wait until the military campaign is over, but is that
really true? Is an inquiry -- are there any inquiries going on? And how do the families feel about that? Do they feel that the government is taking
this seriously?
PELED: They don't. And they're very upset about this. One of their big demands is to open a state commission of inquiry, which is the highest
level of inquiry you can basically conduct in Israel. And it has the authority to kind of point fingers and say, this person should not continue
in their position.
[13:50:00]
But yes, the government has not committed a year later to do -- to open such an inquiry. The army is doing its own investigation, but that's really
tactical. That's about improving its own, you know, how do we continue in the fighting and learn from this? The parents have told me that they want,
you know, people in the government and the army to take responsibility and that there should be some sort of justice.
And the parents have really -- with this demand, they've kind of come together as a group and they've done all kinds of things to try to get this
done. They've secured meetings with the president, with the prime minister, who did not commit in their meeting in July, that he would open such an
inquiry. And also, some of the families, including A. L. Esho (ph), who is one of the kind of leaders and his daughter died in the attack, he helped
open a civilian commission of inquiry, which is kind of a mock inquiry to kind of push the government to open its own. But they've also heard
witnesses.
So, they're kind of trying all these tactics. But at the end, they don't feel like it's getting anywhere and they're frustrated.
MARTIN: Obviously, the military campaign in Gaza has been going on for a year now, you know, literally since the day after the October 7th attack.
But now, there's a new front open in Lebanon. A very attention getting operation just recently involved planting these explosive devices in the
pagers of that -- were handed out to, you know, certain sort of Lebanese officials and so forth. They were able to, you know, assassinate certain
high-level officials in third countries with a fair degree of precision. And yet, they didn't see this massive operation being developed on their
own borders. So, I'm just wondering how these recent events are landing with these families.
PELED: It's part of the structural failures that the Israeli -- the country is dealing with. So, Israel, for years, just invested most of its
resources in the -- it's -- in its northern border with Lebanon, especially Hezbollah, Iran, while Hamas was seen as deterred by the Israeli
government, by the military, they thought they weren't as capable. And so, that's also another layer of this that we didn't really discuss.
But we're seeing these incredible capabilities, intelligence capabilities in -- you know, in Lebanon with Hezbollah that took years and year and
resources to build. So, that's part of it. And it just kind of shows the difference here. You know, we're seeing such impressive capabilities and
just such a disaster in -- with Gaza.
The second thing I would say is that there's still five, you know, female observers in Hamas captivity. And so, the families that I spoke to feel
that they've been forgotten and abandoned by the government because the government has moved on to this new front. And, yes, it says that it will
put pressure on Hamas and maybe it will help secure a deal, but I'm not sure the families buy that so much anymore. I think that they feel like,
you know, the country's moving on to a new front. And Gaza has been left behind and their loved ones.
MARTIN: Before we let you go, could you just summarize why this is so reflective? You think this particular incident is so reflective of the
bigger picture, the broader failures that led to October 7th?
PELED: So, this is the worst intelligence failure in Israel's history. And, you know, 1,200 people were killed, around 250 taken hostage. We've
never seen anything like that. And, you know, Hamas had capabilities. Israel discovered detailed maps of military bases, of kibbutzim.
But it's not just Hamas' capabilities, there's a huge failure here by the Israeli State, by the Israeli military, the security establishment to see
this coming. As Israel keeps fighting and this war keeps expanding, we're not -- I mean, the state hasn't taken time to really reflect, and society
hasn't really taken enough time to reflect on these failures. And these women represent the tragedy and the cost of what happened and they're the
victims and their families, a year later, just want answers. That's all they're looking for. And they can't get that.
They actually had to start investigating this on their own because they felt they were not getting answers from the military or from anyone else.
And they really just interviewed anyone they could. And by the time the military came back with some of its first answers, some of the families
already knew better than them what was going on because they had just done their own reporting in a sense.
MARTIN: Anat Peled, thank you so much for speaking with us.
PELED: Thanks for having me.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: It's an important investigation. And finally, tonight, earlier in the show, we showed you the terrifying capabilities of the natural
world, especially during this violent U.S. hurricane season. So, let's now reveal some of nature's beauty with the winning pictures from the Wildlife
Photographer of the Year contest.
[13:55:00]
From adorable animals to killer predators, these pictures are just a handful of the ones that will be exhibited at the Natural History Museum
here in London. First place goes to this extraordinary image. Western toad tadpoles. It's an image called the Swarm of Life.
That's it for now. If you ever miss our show, you can find the latest episode shortly after it airs on our podcast. Remember, you can always
catch us online, on our website, and all-over social media.
Thanks for watching, and goodbye from London.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[14:00:00]
END
