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Early Start with Rahel Solomon

Gulf States Repel New Iranian Attacks; Kerry: Iran War Is "Very Dangerous" Situation. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired March 13, 2026 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Doing very well. Our military is unsurpassed. There's never been anything like it. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And we're doing what has to be done. Should have been done during a 47-year period. Could have been done by a lot of different people. They chose not to do it. But they really are a nation of terror and hate. And they're paying a big price right now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN ANCHOR: And these images coming to us from different cities throughout Iran now. Massive crowds marching this morning to mark Al-Quds Day, an annual international rally in support of Palestinians. You can see many holding portraits of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei and his slain father, Ali Khamenei.

Well, for more now, we're joined by CNN senior producer, Bijan Hosseini. He is in Doha in Qatar. Bijan, just get us up to speed on the picture there and around the region.

BIJAN HOSSEINI, CNN SENIOR PRODUCER: Well, Becky, as you mentioned, at least three Gulf countries continuing to stave off attacks from Iran today. This comes after we heard from Iran's new leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, purportedly heard from him.

This was a message that he wrote that was delivered across state media, Iran's state broadcaster. We haven't actually seen him or physically heard from him since the attacks began on February 28th. But in that message, he said that Iran would continue to attack U.S. bases in these Gulf countries if those bases were not shut down.

And he also said they would continue to choke the Strait of Hormuz, to use it as a tool of leverage. We've obviously seen that play out through the last couple of days. The two oil tankers off the coast of Iraq and Iraqi waters, they were hit yesterday by an Iranian attack, killing one person on board.

We know that dozens of crew members had to abandon ship there. We've also seen attacks on fuel storage tankers in places like Bahrain and in places like Oman's port of Salalah. Civil defense on scenes there, video we've seen of them battling these massive fires for hours and hours.

But a little bit of good news as well coming from the Gulf, and that is stranded passengers finally being able to make it back home to their countries. We have new footage showing passengers arriving in Athens and as well as in India. These were from flights leaving from Dubai and from Doha.

Here's what one passenger in India had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We had our flight scheduled to the U.S. from Dubai. We entered the airplane, but the flight didn't take off. We realized there was some problem. Around seven, eight hours had passed, and we were told the war had broken out and that we can't fly. Some of the flights that took off were also called back, and then there was all chaos at the airport. Things were very uncontrolled.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOSSEINI: So, Becky, as you can see, still a lot of attacks happening, those attacks you mentioned across the UAE and Saudi and Bahrain, but some hope for those passengers getting home today.

ANDERSON: Yes, and just by word of mouth, a number of people reporting to me who have left the region in the past 24 hours, that flights have been easy to access or easier to access. Not all flights have been full, and the passage through the airports has been pretty seamless. So like you say, good news for people who had been wanting to leave the region. Not everybody is, of course, leaving the region. Many people feeling that they will stay and that they feel relatively safe and secure. Bijan, thank you.

Well, we heard the purported words then of the new supreme leader, and part of the statement read out by state media late yesterday in Iran included the threat that American bases around this region of the Gulf and further beyond must close.

My next guest has said American forces will eventually, "Pack up and leave the Middle East." In an article for my colleagues at CNN Digital, Bader Al-Saif is quoted as saying, "They've left Afghanistan. They're leaving Iraq, and they are going to leave our region as well. So we need to take matters into our own hands."

Well, Bader is a professor at Kuwait University and a fellow at Chatham House, joining me now from Kuwait. And just give us up to speed on the perspective there before we talk about the sort of the wider narrative here, Bader.

BADER AL-SAIF, PROFESSOR, KUWAIT UNIVERSITY: We've been sustaining a multimodal warfare in the last two weeks, Becky. No mode of operation or front has been spared across the Gulf States. We're looking at air and sea attacks. We're looking at cyber attacks, disinformation campaigns, and the targets have been wide ranging. [04:35:07]

We've been hit in airports, hotels, residential buildings, military sites, you name it. And it was hit in the last two weeks. And let me tell you, we've had also victims across the six Gulf States. Not as much as those casualties in Iran and Lebanon, namely. But our victims are more than those that have been sustained by Israel, for example.

And for some reason, the Iranian state has decided to award the UAE and Kuwait with first and second place awards when it comes to the highest hit in those last two weeks. We were even hit more than Israel. The UAE sustained over 1,800 distinct attacks.

Kuwait sustained more than 500 distinct attacks. Some of these attacks took its toll on normal people, including an 11-year-old Iranian citizen child in Kuwait, as much as there were others that were taken. So, obviously, this is something that needs to be put into account, and we need to look at this in a very much wider manner.

And this is not helping Iran in its case, because we're looking at double talk. We're looking at discussions of good neighborly relations with Iran, whether it's coming from the president during his short gig in the leadership council, or from the latest statements, purported statements from Mojtaba Khamenei, the supreme leader, yesterday. And the actions on the ground don't translate to that good neighborless relations.

ANDERSON: Well, you are in Kuwait. Gulf countries, including yours, and here in the UAE, as you say, have absorbed thousands of Iranian missiles and drones. The interception rate, thankfully, has been extremely high.

You've said, and I quote, whatever is hurting us is also hurting the Iranians, and their capability to persevere is less than ours. We can manage, and I don't think they can sustain this. If Gulf states are proving resilient and Iran's attacks not breaking their defenses to all intents and purposes or economies, although let's underscore this isn't easy, does this shift the calculation for the rest of this conflict? I mean, you're talking to sources around this region regularly, as I am. What are they telling you at this point?

AL-SAIF: Becky, our resolve is strong. We feel vindicated in the amount of investments and trainings and capacity building that the Gulf States have been going into in the past few decades. The moment has come for them to show up their skill set, and they have been delivering, whether it's our brave men and women across the Gulf defending our lands, or the use of the technologies in which we've, you know, invested in these partnerships with various countries around the world.

And this is not limited to the Gulf alone. I mean, you saw the death of a French serviceman yesterday and the injury of others. We saw the Italians being hit in Iraq as well. And we saw the interests of various countries being put on the line with the closure or attempted closure of the Strait of Hormuz by Iran. So it's hitting the various parties across the world. And it needs to be taken with very serious undertones that this cannot continue as it is.

The Gulf States have been holding themselves. And I think this is something that has shown that the brand is working. Many have been undermining how we've been managing this conflict in the past two weeks. If anything, Becky, we've been through so many conflicts in the past. This is not the first time that the Iranians have hit us. Go back to the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s.

We've sustained attacks then, and we survived. We overcame an occupation. My country was occupied for seven months in 1990, '91. We overcame that. The war on terror in the early 2000s hit across various Gulf cities, and we also overcame that as well as the Houthi attacks on various Gulf cities. So this is one among various episodes that have come across the Gulf. We've confronted it, and we've moved to a stronger path forward.

ANDERSON: That's right. And just by observation here and talking to people in the UAE, it is remarkable how this multilayered defense system, years in the making here and around this region, is in action now and is as effective as it is. And as you rightly point out, this, of course, isn't just a Gulf issue anymore. When it comes to oil with Kuwait Petroleum, Qatar's LNG, and other producers already cutting output over these Iranian drone threats and disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, we're now entering the early stages of, you know, real concern about energy security and an energy shock.

[04:40:15]

And again, we hear from the Supreme Leader in these purported words suggesting that the chokehold that Iran holds on the Strait of Hormuz is a weapon to all intents and purposes to be used against the enemy. So I guess the question now is, as you sit in Kuwait, day 14 of this, March the 13th, you know, around about midday, what's your sense of what happens next?

AL-SAIF: The Gulf States have been listening to these statements, both from the new Iranian leadership and the Israeli prime minister. I mean, the Israeli prime minister was even much clearer when he stated yesterday in his first press conference since the beginning of the war that they're changing the Middle East and that Israel is coming out as a superpower.

Now, Mojtaba Khamenei did not use these words, but he's also implementing them through his actions or the reactions of his armed forces. And this is worrying for us on both fronts. We have a different vision of this Middle East.

We see a Middle East in which there are connector nodes between different countries where people manage their differences with one another, where they can overcome and work together in these differences. This is not how we see the Middle East moving forward. Going from one war to the other is not a solution for all of this.

And that's why we hope that the Gulf States can collectively come together to influence the U.S. to change course and to look at how we can bring the sanest of minds together to resolve this problem. ANDERSON: Bader, it's always good to get your perspective where you are there in Kuwait. Your insight and analysis so important as we continue to cover this evolving story. But Al-Saif, thank you. And we will be right back.

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[04:46:59]

RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back.

Former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says that the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran is one of the worst crises in decades, and he says that no one should underestimate Iran's abilities. Kerry led negotiations with Iran during the Obama administration. He spoke at a CEO summit hosted in London by King Charles for his Sustainable Markets Initiative. And in an interview with CNN's Max Foster, Kerry warns that this war could get more out of control. I think it's very dangerous.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KERRY, FORMER U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: I think it's very dangerous. I hope that diplomacy will reenter in a very forceful way in the next days. I think it's incredibly important for the world that folks find an off-ramp here and begin a very legitimate and important dialogue about the road ahead. But this is underscoring to everybody in the world the importance of energy independence, of not being held hostage to other people's choices. And as it did in 1973 when we had the oil crisis, I think this will remind people and perhaps speed up some of the transition in energy.

MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Would you say it's one of the worst crises in decades?

KERRY: I would. I think it is because it has the potential of getting even more out of control. I mean, I think if people have a feeling that there's no off-ramp it's going to have a profound impact. You've already seen what's happened to oil production, gas production. You've seen what's happened to prices. That will flow down into everybody's economy if it goes on too long. And I think it's really important to avoid the potential of somebody completely misreading or further misreading how one choice will affect others.

FOSTER: I want to ask about the environmental damage you might be concerned about because overnight we saw thick black smoke over parts of the Middle East. They are targeting installations. Are you concerned about that?

KERRY: Well, needless to say, in any war the environment is probably the last thing that anybody thinks about. And clearly there are huge costs that occur as a result of environmental catastrophes that are man-made because they were hit by a missile or hit by an artillery shell. And that's all part and parcel of what needs to be addressed in the context of getting an off-ramp, figuring out, you know, when you have achieved the goals that you've set out to achieve. FOSTER: You've led on negotiations under Obama with the Iranians. Do you think this administration has misjudged the asymmetric way that the Iranians are looking at this? I mean, it's an economic war.

KERRY: I have said many times in answer to questions about what happens if this happens that no-one should underestimate Iran's capacity to conduct asymmetrical warfare. They've proven it previously, they are practiced at it, and I don't know to what degree, if at all, those considerations were taken into account here in the decision-making.

[04:50:02]

FOSTER: Can I ask you about energy security? This has exposed our reliance on Middle Eastern oil. Do you think this is a wake-up call for the world as well?

KERRY: Absolutely, clearly. That is one of the outcomes of what is taking place right now. No nation is going to want to leave itself exposed to the vagaries of other people's choices about war or environment or, you know, whatever else the considerations may be.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SOLOMON: Our thanks to Max Foster for that interview. We're going to take a short break and we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:55:00]

SOLOMON: Welcome back. Eight Muslim-majority countries have condemned Israel's closure of the gates to Al-Aqsa mosque during the holy month of Ramadan. The Al-Aqsa mosque is the third holiest site in Islam.

And for Jews, the site is known as the Temple Mount. Israeli police say that the closure was due to safety concerns. They said that all holy sites in Jerusalem's Old City would remain closed to visitors of all faiths.

Officials in California are downplaying recent unverified claims that Iranian drones could target the West Coast. Governor Gavin Newsom says that there is no imminent threat to the state. But with the Academy Awards just days away, officials are beefing up security and taking no chances with any threats.

Sheriff and police patrols have been increased at landmarks and places of worship in the Los Angeles area. And the FBI sent a memo alerting state officials of unverified claims by Iranian-affiliated actors who wanted to conduct potential drone attacks.

OK, that's going to do it for this hour. Thanks for joining us. Becky and I will both be back with another hour of Early Start after this quick break.

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