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Trump to Soon Begin Day Two of Middle East Trip; Israel Targets Hamas Leader in Gaza Hospital Strike; Russia Using Social Media to Keep Grip on Occupied Mariupol; Combs's Ex-Girlfriend Cassie Ventura to Resume Testimony; MLB Reinstates 'Shoeless' Joe Jackson, Pete Rose, Others. Aired 12-12:45a ET
Aired May 14, 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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JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Mega deals and mega friendships in the Middle East, ahead on CNN NEWSROOM.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I do, I like them a lot. I like them too much.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Donald Trump gushing over the Saudi crown prince, announcing new trade and investment deals with hundreds of billions of dollars.
Is he dead or is he alive?
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JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Israel on Tuesday evening tried to kill Hamas's leader in Gaza.
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VAUSE: Mohammed Sinwar, brother of former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, targeted by an Israeli strike on a Gaza hospital.
Freak-offs, blue dolphin ecstasy and male escorts.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The prosecution's star witness, Cassie Ventura, is finally taking the stand.
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VAUSE: Testimony of Sean "Diddy" Combs' former girlfriend, Cohen's girlfriend, I should say, was graphic and damning.
ANNOUNCER: Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with John Vause. VAUSE: It's 7:00 a.m. in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, and the start of
the second day of Donald Trump's visit to the Middle East. The U.S. president and Saudi crown prince are scheduled to attend a meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council, where President Trump is expected to meet informally with the new president of Syria.
On Monday, Trump announced an end to U.S. sanctions on Syria, which were imposed during the long, brutal reign of Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted back in December. President Trump also heaped praise on his host, the de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, who rolled out a lavish royal welcome for Donald Trump's first major international trip of his second term.
The U.S. president seemed so taken with MBS, as he's known, he told an investor forum that he wants to make their relationship closer, stronger and more powerful than ever before.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We are rocking. The United States is the hottest country with the exception of your country. I have to say. Right? I won't, I'm not going to take that on. No, Mohammed, I'm not going to take that on. Wouldn't that be a terrible thing if I made that full statement? But I will not do it. You're hotter. At least as long as I'm up here. You're hotter.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: More details now from CNN's Becky Anderson.
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BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR (voice-over): A royal welcome for U.S. President Donald Trump as he touched down in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday. The Gulf State putting on a lavish reception to greet America's self-styled dealmaker-in-chief.
This is Trump's first major overseas trip of his second term. And the guest list made clear business deals are top of the agenda. Tech CEOs and leaders of large U.S. firms joining Trump's top political team in Riyadh.
TRUMP: We have the biggest business leaders in the world here today, and they're going to walk away with a lot of checks for a lot of things that you're going to provide.
ANDERSON: This is Trump's chance to prove himself a major dealmaker on the global stage. He suggested two million U.S. jobs could be created as part of his visit.
MOHAMMED SOLIMAN, SENIOR FELLOW, MIDDLE EAST INSTITUTE: The region is the new Europe and the mindset of President Trump. Clearly he sees this region as a big priority area for his own economic agenda when it comes to securing deals for American companies that want to make sure that they have access to overseas markets. ANDERSON: But while the fanfare was obvious, the finer details of what
was signed not immediately clear. Multiple economic, trade and defense agreements, including the White House, says a $600 billion commitment from Riyadh to invest in the United States. Officials here who have huge economic ambitions themselves, insist this is no blank check, saying the deals will bear fruit for both sides.
TRUMP: And I use trade.
ANDERSON: In his keynote speech on Tuesday, Trump highlighted what he described as he, quote, "modern Middle East."
TRUMP: Before our eyes a new generation of leaders is transcending the ancient conflicts of tired divisions of the past and forging a future where the Middle East is defined by commerce, not chaos, where it exports technology, not terrorism, and where people of different nations, religions and creeds are building cities together, not bombing each other.
ANDERSON: It was a welcomed message to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Gulf States' de facto ruler, and a key Trump ally since the president's first term in office. The visit here is the first on a four-day tour of energy rich Gulf Arab nations.
TRUMP: Getting bigger and bigger.
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ANDERSON: Next stop, Qatar and the UAE, also keen to cast themselves as indispensable business partners and key intermediaries in conflicts from Gaza to Ukraine.
Becky Anderson, CNN, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Columnist, commentator and geopolitical analyst Bobby Ghosh joins us now from New York. Bobby is also a former senior editor with Bloomberg.
Thank you for being with us. It's good to see you.
Pleasure, John.
VAUSE: So clearly, this is a business trip for Donald Trump. He's not brokering any kind of historic peace deal. He's not there pushing for better human rights, which seem pretty obvious by the lavish praise he had for his host, the Saudi crown prince. Here's the president.
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TRUMP: It's an honor to be here, my friend. I was so impressed, as a young guy, who was very wise, wise beyond his years. He was a very wise, and we became friendly. And I really believe we like each other a lot. I like him a lot. I like him too much. Thats why we give so much, you
know? Too much. I like you too much. What a job. You have done some job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Yes. The wise young man who the president is talking about is Mohammed bin Salman, who, according to U.S. intelligence, approved the murder of "Washington Post" columnist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Notably, the previous U.S. president, Joe Biden, traveled to Riyadh. He also met with MBS, as he's known. Biden was widely criticized for this fist bump greeting as well.
At the time, Biden said being a leader means you have to deal with those you would prefer not to. It's sort of the hold your nose approach because you've got to do it. But then there's the flurry of compliments for MBS from Donald Trump. So that sort of sets the tone for this trip. But what does it say about Trump's priorities and the way his own moral compass?
BOBBY GHOSH, COLUMNIST AND GEOPOLITICS ANALYST: Well, it's very much in Donald Trump's style. This is a man who said similar things about Kim Jong-un. He said similar things about Vladimir Putin. He -- this is the way he operates. It has always been the way he operates. I suppose if you wanted to go far back enough this is the way -- this is very much part of a real estate business culture that he comes from.
He says flattering things about people, how sincere he is about the flattery, well, it matters a lot more now that you're the president of the United States. And when you use language like that, that carries a great deal more weight. Whether you intended it or not, it carries a great deal more weight.
He wants to show that he's turning a page with relations with MBS. There are ways to do that. And it may be a practical way to go forward. After all, MBS is going to be king of Saudi Arabia one day soon and will probably remain so for a very long time to come.
VAUSE: Well, the flattery seem to work, at least in terms of trade deals and investments. The White House says it secured $600 billion in commitment from the Saudis. And the biggest weapons sale to date. Here's the president again.
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TRUMP: You know, nobody makes military equipment like us. We have the best military equipment, the best missiles, the best rockets, the best everything, best submarines, by the way, most lethal weapon in the world. In addition to purchases of $142 billion of American made military equipment by our Saudi partners, the largest ever.
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VAUSE: But at the same time, normalization of ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel, which is a priority for the Biden White House, it was mentioned briefly and barely. President Trump saying it will happen at their own time. But without a U.S. president smoothing the way for both sides, pushing both sides to make it happen, will it happen at all? Because right now it seems the momentum has stalled.
GHOSH: It's not going to happen while Israel is at war in Gaza. The Saudis have made that very plain. I think there were attempts by the Trump administration early on to try and push that through, but there's been such strong resistance to it from Riyadh that I think what Trump is expressing there is a recognition and an acknowledgment that the United States does not at this moment have the ability to move the needle on that.
And that's not surprising to those of us who've been paying attention to what Riyadh has been saying. Even the Biden administration, despite its public proclamations that it wanted this to happen in private, senior officers from the administration were acknowledging that it was very unlikely to happen. And I think this is Trump simply facing up to the reality.
VAUSE: Well, the next stop for the U.S. president is Qatar. That's where the royal family is planning to give Donald Trump a luxury jumbo jet. You know, just because it's an unprecedented gift in value, which has sparked a lot of backlash. And that backlash is now also coming from some of the president's most high-profile supporters in MAGA land. Listen to this.
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BEN SHAPIRO, RIGHT-WING COMMENTATOR: If we switch the names to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden, we'd all be freaking out on the right. President Trump promised to drain the swamp. This is not, in fact, draining the swamp.
BATYA UNGAR-SARGON, AUTHOR, "SECOND CLASS": This is not a gift. This is Qatar, a state sponsor of terror that has Hamas in the palm of its hand, giving a bribe.
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ERICK ERICKSON, CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATOR: I do not think the president of the United States of America should sit and fly on a plane purchased with the same money used to murder American citizens. And that's what Qatar does.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: What are the chances this gift never actually goes ahead, it never happens?
GHOSH: Well, Donald Trump can be very stubborn about these things. It'll depend on how much he is willing to risk, and knowing that section of his supporters, because there are plenty of other people within that support base who are actually trying to smooth the way for this to go through. You have senior Republican leaders saying that as long as the attorney general has cleared this, it's all right. Never mind that the attorney general used to work for the Qatari government as a paid lobbyist. There are others who are saying, yes, it doesn't look great, but we
trust the president to make it -- if the president is making that decision, then he must have gotten good advice and he must be doing the right thing. So he has to balance off these two different points of view from within his party.
VAUSE: He does have a weakness for a big luxury plane as well.
Bobby Ghosh, thank you so much for being with us, sir. Great to see you.
GHOSH: Any time, John.
VAUSE: The relatively new leader of Hamas in Gaza appears to be the target of an assassination attempt by Israel. Sources tell CNN Israeli intelligence believes Mohammed Sinwar was in an underground command and control bunker at a hospital in southern Gaza. At least six Palestinians were killed in the strike. So far, no word on the fate of Sinwar.
CNN's Jeremy Diamond has the very latest now reporting in from Tel Aviv.
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DIAMOND: Israel on Tuesday evening tried to kill Hamas's leader in Gaza. I'm told that Mohammed Sinwar was indeed the target of an Israeli airstrike on the European hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis. That's according to a senior Israeli official and two sources familiar with the matter. The Israeli military has yet to officially confirm that Sinwar was indeed the target of the strike, and they have also yet to confirm whether or not he was actually killed.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, at least six people were killed, though, in this strike and more than 40 others injured, and many more are still believed to be buried under the rubble, with one doctor at the European hospital describing a catastrophic situation there. The strike hit the hospital's courtyard, according to that hospital official.
Now the Israeli military is accusing Hamas of having a command and control center beneath that hospital where sources say Mohammed Sinwar was believed to be hiding. Mohammed Sinwar was elevated to the position of de facto leader of Hamas in Gaza, following the Israeli military's killing of his brother, the late Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, back in October.
But this strike, the timing of it, is incredibly notable. Coming just one day after Hamas in what's widely been described as a goodwill gesture, released the last living American hostage in Gaza, the Israeli soldier Edan Alexander, and following Edan Alexander's release, which was intended to kind of jumpstart these hostage deal and ceasefire negotiations, U.S. officials have been sounding much more optimistic about the prospects of a deal. But now Israel has targeted the man who would have to greenlight this
deal inside of the Gaza Strip, raising a series of questions about the feasibility of reaching a deal in the coming days and questions about Israel's commitment to this negotiating process, even as they sent a delegation earlier on Tuesday to Qatar to pursue these negotiations. And time is very much ticking down.
The Israeli prime minister on Tuesday making very clear that he intends to move forward with plans for the Israeli military to vastly expand its military operations in Gaza as soon as next week.
Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Tel Aviv.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Another dire warning that Gaza is inching closer to famine, a U.N. backed report has found 20 percent of Gaza's population is facing starvation by September. All of this has made so much worse since Israel ended a ceasefire with Hamas in March and imposed a blockade on humanitarian supplies. And aid groups have outright rejected an Israeli and U.S. plan for private groups to take over aid distribution across the territory.
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TOM FLETCHER, U.N. UNDER SECRETARY GENERAL FOR HUMANITARIAN AFFAIRS: We have a plan. We have shown we can deliver with tens of thousands of trucks reaching civilians during the ceasefire. We have life-saving supplies ready now at the borders. We can save hundreds of thousands of survivors. We have rigorous mechanisms to ensure our aid gets to civilians and not to Hamas. But Israel denies us access, placing the objective of depopulating Gaza before the lives of civilians.
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VAUSE: We will take a short break. When we come back, CNN investigates a Kremlin funded school in eastern Ukraine. It claimed life under Russian occupation in a city bombed to near oblivion is now just sunny and bright.
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VAUSE: Ukraine's president is taking up Vladimir Putin's offer of direct peace talks and will travel to Istanbul in Turkey on Thursday. And once there, he says he will speak with Russia's president and only him, not his envoys. When asked about the goals of a possible meeting, President Zelenskyy says anything other than a ceasefire will render the talks a failure.
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VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, If Putin will not come or if ceasefire will not be supported by Russians, by Putin exactly, by him. So it means only one thing that Russia is not ready for any kind of negotiation.
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VAUSE: Over the weekend, Russia's President Vladimir Putin suggested the first direct talks since the full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. But the Kremlin is refusing to confirm if Putin or anyone will actually attend that meeting in Turkey.
Meanwhile, Russia's propaganda machine continues to churn on with social media influencers painting a rosy picture of life under Moscow's rule. A new CNN investigation reveals that residents there, even schoolchildren, are being trained to become content creators, with support from the Kremlin.
CNN's Clare Sebastian has details.
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CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is blogger school in Russian occupied Mariupol, complete with beanbags and a selfie mirror. Run by a project called the Donbas Media Center, it offers free tuition and new skills.
Pavel Karbovsky, one of the teachers, only launched his own social channels two and a half years ago.
He tells me the school founded by a pro-Kremlin news outlet is not political. And yet the same can't be said for his own posts to his now 36,000 TikTok followers.
Just look at what Russia is getting up to in Mariupol, he says here. Oh, wait, they're building, not demolishing.
This is Mariupol, our Russian town.
PAVEL KARBOVSKY, TEACHER, DONBASS MEDIA CENTER (through translator): My key goal is to show what's happening here, to show the truth so people stop forming their opinion on Donbas by reading Ukrainian comments which say that this is Ukraine. It isn't. Why we have Russian flags here? Russian passports and Russian laws?
SEBASTIAN: Three years after Russia laid siege to Mariupol, destroying, according to the U.N., an estimated 90 percent of residential buildings and killing Ukrainian officials believe around 20,000 civilians, accusing Russia of disposing of bodies to cover up war crimes, which the Kremlin denies.
Mariupol is a key strategic priority for Putin. He even visited two years ago to highlight the rebuilding efforts, and Moscow is now increasingly looking to social media as a subtle, though powerful propaganda tool in these regions.
In January, Karbovsky was part of a group of Donetsk influencers invited to meet with Denis Pushilin, the Russian installed head of the Donetsk People's Republic. Not everyone understands the scale of the work that's happening, he
told them. The implication they can change that. And it's clear, revival videos get clicks. Some are couched in lifestyle content, well-stocked grocery stores, or stylish new cafes. Others directly focused on the reconstruction. The drama theater, flattened by a Russian attack three years ago as hundreds of civilians took shelter.
And look how beautiful, says this blogger, who goes by Masha from Mariupol, showing off brand new apartment buildings at sunset. Mariupol's Ukrainian mayor in exile says it's an illusion, one which he believes won't work.
VADYM BOICHENKO, MARIUPOL'S UKRAINIAN EXILED MAYOR (through translator): This propaganda, these made-up clips that they are doing now in Mariupol will not help. Russia has committed a crime in Mariupol and the people of Mariupol know it.
SEBASTIAN: Satellite images do show massive reconstruction and not only in the city center. What they don't show is who gets to live there.
Multiple videos like this are now also circulating a direct appeal to Putin by former residents of a heavily damaged eastern Mariupol neighborhood, who say they are still homeless. Russians, meanwhile, are being lured to the city with state-sponsored mortgage rates at least 10 times lower than the market average.
And perhaps by content creators like this. 21-year-old Yelizaveta Chervyakova, born in Mariupol, unboxing her gifts from the Donbas Media Center's blogger school. She was one of a select few who completed the course, awarded with a trip to Moscow to meet top Russian influencers.
YELIZAVETA CHERVYAKOVA, CONTENT CREATOR (through translator): I met guys I had never known before. And it's clear, especially with the Donetsk fellas, that they are showcasing their city, the photos and videos. I'm watching those, I thought, I want to do that, too.
SEBASTIAN: Her own city, she accepts, is now Russian, making her part of a generation of Ukrainians Moscow is hoping will help convince others to accept that, too.
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Clare Sebastian, CNN, London.
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VAUSE: In a moment, back on the stand, the longtime former girlfriend of music mogul and party thrower Sean "Diddy" Combs set to resume explosive testimony and for another day. Details in a moment.
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VAUSE: Welcome back. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM. I'm John Vause. Let's check today's top stories. [00:30:13]
U.S. President Donald Trump will soon begin the second day of his Middle East tour. He'll attend a gathering of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Riyadh, where he's expected to meet informally with the new president of Syria.
President Trump will then travel to his next stop, Doha, Qatar.
Israel launched a devastating strike on a hospital in Southern Gaza Tuesday, sources telling CNN the target of the strike was Hamas leader Mohammed Sinwar. At least six Palestinians were killed, dozens more wounded, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he will only hold peace talks in Turkey if the Russian president actually turns up. The Ukrainian president insists he will not speak with any other Russian representative.
The Kremlin refusing to say if Vladimir Putin will attend the potential peace talks, despite actually proposing these talks just days ago.
Reality TV star Kim Kardashian told a Paris court she thought she would be killed when she was robbed at gunpoint in 2016. The billionaire faced her alleged attackers Tuesday for the first time since the heist.
Kardashian says she was tied up in her hotel room and had nearly $10 million in cash and jewelry stolen from her during Paris Fashion Week.
Ten people face charges, including armed robbery and kidnapping.
During her testimony, Kardashian said she worried her sister and a friend who were sleeping next door would be the ones to find her body. A verdict is expected later this month.
The former girlfriend of Sean "Diddy" Combs is expected back in a New York courtroom for another day of testimony in his racketeering and sex trafficking trial.
Cassie Ventura is the star witness for the prosecution and on Monday accused the music mogul of physical and emotional abuse, as well as using violence, drugs, and other forms of intimidation to coerce her into participating into group sex parties he called freak-offs.
More now from CNN's Elizabeth Wagmeister. And a warning: some of the details in her report are graphic.
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ELIZABETH WAGMEISTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From stardom alongside Sean "Diddy" Combs to star witness in the case against him, 38-year-old singer Cassie Ventura took the stand, saying Combs forced her to participate in drug-fueled sex marathons called freak-offs, where she'd have sex with male escorts, with Combs directing her.
The events involved drug use that led to dehydration, Ventura said, taking a big chunk of her life to recover from.
The jury was shown surveillance video of Combs kicking and dragging Ventura as she tried to flee one alleged freak-off in 2016, with Ventura saying Combs became a different person during those events.
"His eyes would go black. The version of him that I was in love with was no longer there," she testified, adding that the abuse was chronic. "He would smash me in my head, knock me over, drag me."
The prosecution insisting this was more than domestic abuse.
JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: This is his pattern of behavior, not only as it relates to her, prosecutors will say, but as it relates to how he treated people in general. This is part of the sex trafficking. This is how he ran his enterprise.
WAGMEISTER (voice-over): An enterprise that ran on control "over what I was doing every minute of the day," Ventura testified. And allegedly, with the help of others inside of Combs's professional world.
She described Combs as an "incessant caller." And if she didn't pick up the phone, Combs's assistant or security personnel would locate her for him.
The criminal indictment alleges Combs's staffers booked hotel rooms for the freak-offs, some in cities around the world, stocking the rooms with supplies, including drugs and baby oil.
That alleged involvement part of why Combs was charged with the federal crime of racketeering conspiracy.
He's pleaded not guilty to five charges that also include sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion; and transportation to engage in prostitution, since some sex workers crossed state lines.
Ventura met Combs when she was 19 and admits she was enamored by him, saying her career was in his hands, but eventually, she tried to escape the abuse after feeling disgusted and humiliated.
During testimony, Ventura dabbed her nose and eyes but broke down in tears when asked by the prosecutor if she enjoyed anything about the freak-offs.
"The time spent with him," she said of Combs, who she admits she loved early on. "As sad as it was, I thought it was the only time I could get."
WAGMEISTER: Cassie Ventura's husband was there in the courtroom to support her throughout her testimony, and Sean Combs had the support of his entire family, the first day his family was there.
But I have to tell you, during some graphic testimony on day one, his daughters walked out of the room. Today during the incredibly detailed, disturbing, graphic testimony of Cassie Ventura, they stayed. And tomorrow, Cassie will be back on the stand. Back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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VAUSE: With that, we'll take a short break. When we come back, they were banned from baseball for decades. Now, "Shoeless" Joe and Charlie Hustle are reinstated, making them eligible for the Hall of Fame. But why now?
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VAUSE: Two legendary baseball players have been reinstated by Major League Baseball decades after they were banned for gambling on the game.
The story of one of those players, "Shoeless" Joe -- Joe Jackson, was made famous in the movie "Field of Dreams."
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEVIN COSTNER, ACTOR: What are you grinning at, you ghost?
RAY LIOTTA, ACTOR: If you build it, he will come.
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VAUSE: Now that the other player, Pete Rose, has actually passed away, the league says that ban should expire. So, they will be lifted, making both players eligible for baseball's Hall of Fame.
Rose, the league's all-time hits leader, confessed to betting on every Cincinnati Reds game while he was the team's manager.
"Shoeless" Joe was one of eight Chicago White Sox players accused of conspiring with gamblers to lose the 1919 World Series. He maintained his innocence and was acquitted.
That's when we get (ph) to the movie "Field of Dreams."
I'm John Vause, back at the top of the hour with more CNN NEWSROOM. But first, WORLD SPORT starts after a short break.
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(WORLD SPORT)
