Return to Transcripts main page

Early Start with Rahel Solomon

Israeli Strike Targets Hamas Leadership In Qatar; Macron Appoints Sebastien Lecornu As New French Prime Minister; DOJ Charges Man In Fatal Stabbing Of Ukrainian Refugee. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired September 10, 2025 - 05:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:32:20]

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN ANCHOR: Well, there's growing international backlash to Israel's attack on Hamas leadership here in Qatar. U.S. President Donald Trump says he's "very unhappy" about every aspect of how Israel carried out that strike on Tuesday. The White House says the strike does not advance Israel or America's goals.

Well, many European, Arab, and Asia Pacific leaders condemning the strike in the strongest of terms saying it jeopardized efforts to end the war in Gaza and could further destabilize this region.

Well, Hamas says the strike killed five members but failed to assassinate the group's negotiating delegation and very specifically, Khalil al-Hayya, who is the lead on that delegation. We do not know what his condition is nor his whereabouts at present, but we are told that he avoided assassination.

A Qatari security official though was killed, and his funeral will be held as I understand it this afternoon.

Israel's prime minister says the targets were directly responsible for the October the 7th attack. Benjamin Netanyahu described the strike as a peacemaking action.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: And this action can open the door to an end of the war -- end of the war in Gaza. Israel has accepted the principles -- the proposal put forward by President Trump to end the war beginning with the immediate release of all our hostages, which have been held in the dungeons of Gaza for 700 days. If President Trump's proposal is accepted the war can end immediately. We can begin once again to pursue the expansion of peace in our region for the benefit of all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: While those efforts to end the war were being described to me at a crucial phase here in Doha.

CNN's Paula Hancocks has been closely covering this and is with me here in the city.

At 12:30 in the afternoon here the actions -- Benjamin Netanyahu describes it, the targeted strike on the residence where Hamas negotiating leadership were house -- happened at 3:46 in the afternoon. So we're not 24 hours on from that strike.

[05:35:00]

As we understand it the Hamas negotiating team were due to catch up once again later that afternoon around about 5:00 in the afternoon to give their response to this new U.S. initiative that Benjamin Netanyahu was talking about there -- Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel had signed up to. That response though to Qatari mediators undone, of course, by the action that Israel took, which leaves us where?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's the thing. We don't know what the Hamas response was going to be. We do know that the Qataris had been putting significant pressure on the Hamas delegation here -- on the chief mediators -- to agree to this deal.

We do know that the U.S. President Donald Trump was very vocally supportive of it. He wanted all of the hostages to be released on day one and then they figure out the rest after that. And that, as far as we knew publicly, of course, is what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was supporting as well.

So at this point we are very much in limbo. We heard from the Qatari prime minister last night. He did not say that negotiations were over. He did not say that negotiations would move forward. It was very much left as an open question. Clearly, he was reeling from what had happened on his territory.

ANDERSON: He was very angry and very frustrated.

HANCOCKS: And that is unusual. You do not see this kind of emotion and anger from the leaders in the Gulf nations. It's not like if U.S. President Donald Trump. He wears his heart on his sleeve. You see the emotion as soon as you -- as soon as you listen to him. You don't see that in this region.

So the fact that there was such evocative language used talking about the Israeli prime minister was a narcissist, a bully, the rogue nation in the -- in the region -- that's significant. That is a departure from the very coordinated, composed response we usually see in this region.

ANDERSON: This is a region that seeks deconfliction, de-escalation, economic integration. The Abraham Accords, as far as those who've signed up to them, were very much part of that bringing this region together. It has huge ambitions around the Gulf certainly for these very ambitious economic visions. But they need safety, security and stability in this region. And it is for that reason I think we saw such choice use of language by Gulf leaders and others around the Middle East in response to this attack. It is not clear at this point why it is that Benjamin Netanyahu

decided to launch an attack, which effected the strikes at 3:46 in the afternoon here yesterday. But the response around the region was that this risks further escalation, further instability, further insecurity.

HANCOCKS: Absolutely. I mean, this -- the U.S. security guarantees, for example -- this is what Doha thought it had. It's what Saudi Arabia, the UAE think they have. But it was just four months ago that the U.S. President Donald Trump did a tour of these nations -- his first foreign overseas trip. And they believed that they were building up this very strong relationship where they had guarantees from the United States.

So there is a feeling of betrayal. There is a sense of who is immune to Israeli attacks if very close U.S. allies are not immune to these attacks. If Qatar, for example, who was in the midst of negotiating between Israel and Hamas is not immune to these attacks.

And, of course, it begs the question going forward who would be a mediator in these kind of -- who would -- who would take on these kind of roles in the future? Because it's not just Gaza that Doha has been involved in. We know that they've been involved with the Taliban. We know they've been involved in other Gulf nations as well when it comes to Russia-Ukraine. There are mediation techniques that these nations have been -- have been using and will they want to do that going forward.

ANDERSON: Yeah, it's a very -- it's a very big question and one that we seek, or we will continue to seek answers on.

But as things stand at present not clear when and if these talks to try and get these hostages released in Gaza and an end to that war will continue. I mean, the word that I am getting and certainly there is some atmospherics around the words -- the narrative that we hear that suggests that this will not end -- those negotiated efforts to find peace and a framework for a day after in Gaza. Gaza, the through line for so many in this region and around the world for peace and security going forward.

[05:40:00]

We will continue to work through our sources here to find out what exactly happens next.

Well, France has a new prime minister just one day after the government there collapsed, and he faces an uphill battle in leading a government bracing for nationwide unrest. We will get you live to Paris up next.

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:45:05]

BRIAN ABEL, CNN ANCHOR: Just a day after the French government collapsed yet again, President Emmanuel Macron has named Sebastien Lecornu as the country's new prime minister. The outgoing defense minister and Macron loyalist will become his fifth prime minister in less than two years. Lawmakers ousted Francios Bayrou from the position on Monday as the country sinks deeper into political and economic turmoil.

Meanwhile, France's far left is organizing nationwide protests and highway blockades set for today.

CNN's Melissa Bell joins us now from Paris with so many developments in this tumultuous political moment for the country, Melissa.

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think tumultuous is exactly the right word, Brian. This is Paris' "Galgano." That big day of demonstration that you mentioned ago that they're calling "Let's Block Everything" is now well underway and this is across the country.

You can see riot police are positioned here to try and keep this, one of Paris' main train stations, running. For the time being that is the case. And yet, this kind of crowd is what you're seeing at many different strategic areas of the country. So, big highways, train stations, schools, hospitals, anywhere they can try and cause the country to come to a standstill.

The difficulty for the police today -- and there are some 80,000 of them positioned across the country, Brian. That is a lot of police on the street to try and keep order. The trouble that they're having is that often when these days of strike and blockages are announced by trade unions say you'll have what the French call a cortege. You'll have a big parade -- a big march through the city.

Today it's much more disparate. So what we've seen over the course of the day not just here in Paris but in many big urban centers in France are groups of protesters trying to get in the way of all kinds of things throughout the day. And already we've seen a bit of confrontation with the police where there are -- there were, at 9:30 this morning, which gives you an idea of how awkward this is going to be for the police -- by 9:30 there had already been nearly 200 arrests. So it gives you an idea of the determination of some of these protesters.

And again, the strategy of having these very disparate actions across the country very difficult for the police to deal with.

So it is another day of protests here in France. This despite just a day after the nomination, as you say, of Sebastien Lecornu. This had been originally planned well before the latest government fell originally by the far right groups that were calling for a day of action to protest the government's policies. And then it sort of morphed into a day of action on the part of the far left.

Certainly, what you're likely to see across France today are representatives of both of those groups taking to the streets to make their anger plain. And it's far from clear that they'll be in any way pacified by the nomination of a prime minister who after all is an Emmanuel Macron ally, a loyalist. He may have come from the political right before but since 2017 has served as minister in the government of a man who in terms of the people who are on the streets certainly is a subject of a great deal of anger -- Brian.

ABEL: Melissa Bell, we know you will continue monitoring the situation. Thank you.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:52:45]

ABEL: Welcome back. I'm Brian Abel. Here are some stories we are watching today.

Poland is accusing Moscow of an act of aggression. That reaction after the military shot down Russian drones that had violated Polish airspace during Russia's attack on neighboring Ukraine. The EU's foreign policy chief says early indications suggest it was intentional; not accidental. An operation has since been launched to recover those downed objects.

A flight from South Korea is enroute to the United States right now to repatriate more than 300 nationals detained last week in an immigration raid in Georgia. The U.S. and South Korea struck a deal to allow the workers to return home after they were taken from a Hyundai LG plant in what some attorneys have called a "unique agreement."

President Trump's 30-day federal emergency declaration allowing him to deploy troops in Washington, D.C. is set to expire today. Congress has yet to step in and extend the contentious order originally billed as a crime deterrent in the nation's capital, but federal law enforcement is expected to continue to have a heightened presence in the city.

A manhunt is underway in New York after an elderly couple were found beaten and killed in their burning home. Police say the attacker was caught on surveillance video knocking on the back door of a home in Queens on Monday. He was let inside by a 77-year-old man who lived there with his wife. Once inside authorities say the suspect beat the couple and killed them before setting fire to their house.

Police are now searching for Jamel McGriff, a 42-year-old man from the Bronx, in connection with the attack.

The U.S. Justice Department has filed a federal charge against a man allegedly responsible for fatally stabbing a Ukrainian refugee in North Carolina. Decarlos Brown has also been charged with first-degree murder by the state. He is accused of attacking 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska unprovoked with a pocket knife inside a light rail train car last month. The DOJ says the incident remains under investigation and Brown could have additional charges.

[05:55:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) RUSS FERGUSON, U.S. ATTORNEY FOR WESTERN DISTRICT OF NORTH CAROLINA: We built a city that people want to live in, but we can lose that all if we allow violent crime like this to go on on our streets. And I'm here to tell you the federal government is going to save our city from that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Stay with us. After the break we'll tell you how to get tickets to next year's World Cup.

(COMMERCIAL)

ABEL: The first round of ticket sales for next year's FIFA World Cup begins in just over five hours from now. The 2026 World Cup -- it kicks off June 11 next year and will be hosted in 16 cities across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico.

[06:00:00]

The presale draw starts at 11:00 a.m. Eastern today for qualifying VISA cardholders. Tickets start at 60 bucks for group stage matches but those prices could rise. FIFA says it's using a dynamic pricing system which means tickets will be more expensive for matches in higher demand.

Thank you so much for joining us here on EARLY START. I'm Brian Abel in Washington, D.C. "CNN THIS MORNING WITH AUDIE CORNISH" starts right now.