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U.S. Launches New Attacks on Iran; Trump Meets With President of Lebanon. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired July 21, 2026 - 11:00   ET

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

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now, breaking news: a dramatic escalation. President Trump vowing that Iran will pay after the deaths of several U.S. troops, as the two countries tilt closer and closer to all-out war.

And rushing Air Force One. What we now know about the rapid effort under way to make sure President Trump's new presidential plane is actually prepared to protect him.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer. Pamela Brown is off. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BLITZER: And we begin this hour with the breaking news. Any moment now, President Trump will meet with the president of Lebanon, Joseph Aoun, at the White House. This comes as Israel has now started to withdraw some of its troops from Lebanon under a U.S.-brokered cease- fire agreement.

Meantime, there has been a major escalation in the Iran war. The United States military now launching yet another round of attacks overnight. All this comes as the Pentagon now says that, in the last two weeks, nearly 100 U.S. service members have been wounded in the conflict.

Let's go to CNN senior White House reporter Kevin Liptak.

Kevin, the president is set to meet with the Lebanese president any moment now in the Oval Office. The Lebanese president's going to be arriving at the West Wing. What do we expect from this meeting?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Right.

And I can see his car just outside the gate. So he will be pulling in here any minute now, Wolf. It's been 16 years since a Lebanese president was last here at the White House, and I think that gives you a sense of how President Trump has become very invested in boosting Joseph Aoun in a bid to isolate Hezbollah and to try and broker a broader peace agreement with Israel.

And the withdrawal of Israeli troops from some Lebanese villages earlier today, I think, gives you a picture of how, in the administration's view, their plans are working so far. You know, these are so-called pilot zones. They were part of an agreement that the U.S. brokered between Israel and Lebanon stretching out over the last several months.

And it is something of a bright spot for Trump in what is otherwise a fairly bleak picture in the Middle East. Now, there's some big outstanding questions in this peace deal. For one, Hezbollah was not party to the negotiations, and they have in fact rejected this agreement.

There's also an open question about the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who is under political pressure to keep up the fight in Lebanon, and he faces elections in October. And I think it's likely that in this meeting in the Oval Office, Aoun will put pressure on President Trump to try and exert his own pressure on Netanyahu to ease up on Lebanon going forward.

But one thing that is clear is that this is something of a linchpin. Remember, in that memorandum of understanding that the president signed with Iran, ending the war in Lebanon was the first paragraph. Now President Trump says that MOU is dead, but it seems clear, in order to make any progress on the Iran front, that this conflict in Lebanon will also need to be resolved -- Wolf.

BLITZER: We will see how that works out. We will see what happens in this Oval Office meeting.

The Pentagon, meanwhile says, Kevin, that nearly 100 U.S. service members have been wounded in this war in just the last two weeks. But 96 percent of them, the Pentagon says, have now returned to duty. What more are you learning?

LIPTAK: Yes, and this was coming from the Pentagon spokesman, Sean Parnell. He said that the vast majority of injuries were minor concussions and that they were -- quote -- "determined to get back in the fight."

But I think the injuries, as well as the deaths of those Americans that we saw over the weekend really underscore the risks that American service members who are arrayed across the Middle East face in this conflict, even as President Trump stops short of ordering a ground invasion.

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And I think it adds up to the calculations that President Trump is making at this moment. He faces something of a decision point. Does he launch the war again? Does he try and allow diplomacy to prevail? He will be up at Dover tomorrow observing the dignified transfer of the remains of those fallen servicemen.

No other moment, I think, for a commander in chief really reiterates the weight of responsibility on their shoulders as they weigh these kinds of decisions, Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, the dignified transfer of Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, that's going to be taking place tomorrow, and the president will be there.

Kevin Liptak at the White House, thank you for that update.

Also happening now: an Israeli source telling CNN that, in June of last year, Iran moved its advanced centrifuges and part of its uranium stockpile to a fortified underground facility. The removal of that near-bomb-grade uranium is a key war goal for the U.S. and Israel.

Joining us now is the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander retired U.S. Army General Wesley Clark.

General Clark, thanks for being with us.

How significant is this new development that we're learning about?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, I think it's very significant, Wolf.

It's not unexpected, because after what the United States has done in the attacks, of course, Iran wants to get nuclear weapons. They have seen that Korea got them and we didn't attack Korea, so sure Iran wants nuclear weapons. So it's not -- it's just to be expected. The question is, now what are we going to do about it?

BLITZER: Iran's president now says his country is engaged in what he calls a -- quote -- "full-scale war" -- end quote -- with the United States. Do you agree that's the state of things?

CLARK: You know, that's what's in his mind.

What I see the United States doing is working to get the Strait of Hormuz opened. And this is the center of gravity. This is what gives the Iranians leverage, and it's what puts the pressure on the United States. Once we get the Iranians out of the range to be able to affect the merchant shipping going through there, then the clock works against them, not against us.

And so I think CENTCOM is every night finding targets, going after those targets, taking them down and moving closer and closer to being able to create a zone in which the Iranians can't operate against the shipping, and that's the objective.

BLITZER: Yes, reopening the Strait of Hormuz is clearly a major U.S. goal right now. But President Trump keeps saying the number one goal is to make sure Iran never has the capability of building a nuclear bomb, and that has to be the U.S. number one objective. You agree?

CLARK: Yes, I think that's a really important, the important objective.

But I don't see right now how we're going to prevent them from doing that. I think they're very close, despite what the intelligence reports say. We know that this facility in Pickaxe Mountain has been created to be impervious to our bunker-busting bombs. Are we going to go in there on the ground? What is it that we're going to do to stop this?

And so this is a real challenge, and I'm sure the president's wrestling with this right now. But in the meantime, in order to have -- be able to...

BLITZER: Let me interrupt for a second, General. The president is now welcoming the Lebanese president, Joseph Aoun, to the White House. He just arrived. This is an important meeting, as we all know.

The potential for some sort of deal between Israel and Lebanon is clearly on the table right now, and that could be potentially very significant. Let's listen and see if they're saying anything. They're going to go in to this meeting that they're having in the Oval Office.

What's your assessment right now of what's going on? Because Lebanon is an important country bordering Israel to the north, and they have made some agreements lately. They're moving in the right direction, but what do you sense?

CLARK: Well, I sense that Iran still has the leadership of Hezbollah. Hezbollah is really an Iranian army there that's embedded in the population. It's going to be very difficult when Iran wants to pull the trigger.

Right now, Iran's working on pushing us out of our bases in the Gulf states, pushing us back into Jordan and trying to even eliminate our ability to base aircraft and tankers in Jordan and so forth.

And Hezbollah is rearming and capable of striking. So there's no indication from Hezbollah that it has ever changed its aim of the destruction of Israel. And it is a direct arm of the Iranian government. So I think it's great that President Aoun is there with President Trump. I hope there will be an agreement.

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I see Israel making some slight moves there, but I don't think anybody in the security business has any illusions about Hezbollah, what their aim is, and where this is likely to go, and that is more conflict.

BLITZER: As you know, Iran has successfully used its attack drones and its missiles to target U.S. bases and energy facilities in several of the Arab Gulf countries across the region.

The Pentagon says nearly 100 U.S. service members have been injured over the last two weeks alone. Did the U.S. and its allies expect this vulnerability?

CLARK: Wolf, I couldn't address that, because I'm not on the inside of the planning.

But if we didn't expect it, we should have expected it. The problem is that there's a limited supply of interceptor missiles. We were slow in adopting the drone defenses that the Ukrainians developed. They are deployed now in most of the region. They're pretty effective.

And we have just got to do more and more to protect our friends and allies in the Gulf, as well as our own bases. Iran has adopted a -- they can't stop what we're doing to their positions in the Strait of Hormuz. So they have adopted a countervalue strategy to go out against our allies like Kuwait by trying to take out their desalination plants and their energy plants.

And so that's all the -- that's what they're pushed back to. And we have got to be able to protect our friends and allies from that.

BLITZER: And the Houthis, the Iranian proxies in Yemen, they're going after Saudi Arabia right now as well.

General Wesley Clark, let's continue this conversation down the road, to be sure. Thank you very much for joining us.

CLARK: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: And still ahead: CNN's new reporting about the Army veteran accused of attacking a New York City federal building with an incendiary device. We have new details about the arsenal authorities say he had.

You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.

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BLITZER: All right, there's breaking news. The president of the United States and the president of Lebanon, they're in the Oval Office now. They have got an important meeting and lots at stake. Let's listen in.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And the relationship is very good. I think that Lebanon has been a very mistreated country for a long period of time. It's an amazing group of people, professors, doctors, lawyers, great intellects.

And it's been hit hard for many, many decades, really. It's been hit very, very hard. And yet I have people that live in Lebanon, people that are parents of friends of mine in many cases, and they would never leave. They would not leave under any circumstance. They love it. They love the country.

And it's probably a dangerous place in a lot of ways, but they live in areas. They say, we hear bombs going off all the time, but we want to live in Lebanon. They love the country, very smart people, very successful people, and they live there.

But it has been. It's been a country of great intellect. Great intellectuals, they still love it. They should want to be there. And we're going to help it. We're going to help it a lot. So it's an honor to have the president and your representatives here.

We have already met a couple of times and we have had some good meetings. And we are going to solve a lot of problems. We have already solved some of them for Lebanon. As you know, there's a Hezbollah problem. But we have done some things that I think the world will take notice.

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Again, it's been a very badly treated place and country, and we're going to have it properly treated and treated with respect that it deserves.

And, Mr. President, it's an honor having you. Thank you very much.

JOSEPH AOUN, LEBANESE PRESIDENT: No, thank you.

TRUMP: Thank you very much.

AOUN: I have been looking forward to this visit for a long time.

TRUMP: Thank you very much.

AOUN: Meeting such a great president like yourself.

TRUMP: Well, that's a very nice statement. See, he knows how to get to me.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: He knows. He can have anything. Now he can have anything.

Would you like to say something?

AOUN: No, really, I would like to thank President Trump, really, and his team for the historic visit and for the historic achievement that we did together by signing the framework, with the ultimate objective of ending the state of hostility between Lebanon and Israel forever.

I think, Mr. President, this will be your legacy. Together, we will be able to achieve this objective. It's about time for Lebanon and for the whole region to be stable and secure. And I know your vision is peace, your vision is stability, and I think my vision coincides with your vision.

And, together, I think we will be able to achieve and to score success in that regard.

TRUMP: I agree with that. I do agree with that. You have tremendous spirit on your side. You have people that love that country, and they're going to make it work. We got to make it work, right?

Thank you very much.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: I have two questions. One for you.

President Trump, as you work to expand the Abraham Accords, Lebanon still enforces a 1955 law criminalizing contact with Israelis for over 70 years. You previously stated you would push Lebanon on this issue.

And (OFF-MIKE) still going to prison last month. So did you raise it with the -- you will raise it with President Aoun today?

TRUMP: I will.

The Abraham Accords have been, I think, a tremendous success. I think you're going to see a lot of countries joining pretty soon. As you know, we have our original group and they are -- it's so successful for them, economically successful. It's been that. Nobody left even during this time of conflict.

So, no, I think Lebanon has a very important place.

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QUESTION: What is your level of concern of a blockade of the Red Sea by the Houthi rebels, opening up another front in the war?

TRUMP: Well, we will have to see what happens. So far, it hasn't happened. It might happen. But we take care of things. If something like that happens, we take care of it.

We have done that with the Houthis before, and we haven't heard from them in a while since we did what we did originally. That was about 45 days of very powerful action we took against the Houthis, and we have had no problem with the Houthis. They have had no problem with us for a long period of time, including during this conflict.

I think that if there is something like that, we will just have to take care of business.

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QUESTION: The speaker of the Lebanese Parliament rejected the agreement between Lebanon and Israel and said that -- he said it's a sedition, it's going to cause civil war. He's the speaker of the Lebanese Parliament and he speaks for Hezbollah. He's the Hezbollah's big brother.

What do you have to say about that?

TRUMP: Well, maybe I will let you speak to that.

AOUN: Actually, the framework doesn't require the endorsement of the Parliament, OK?It's part of our Constitution. It's a prerogative of the president, and we are committed to it.

And I think the speaker of the Parliament is really -- wants to see the end of this war. He's from the south, and he knows he did his best to rebuild the south, but, unfortunately, the south being destroyed in front of Israel. So he's actually supportive of what we are doing.

But we need to be careful. His position as a speaker and as a leader of the Shia community, we have to understand how critical is his position. But I can tell you that Speaker Berri is a man of state. He's supportive of what we are doing, and he's supportive of ending the state of hostility, ending the war once, for all.

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TRUMP: I think when he sees -- because I have heard that he's a good person, a good man. And when he sees the progress made, I'm sure he's going to come on board.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: ... from Lebanon,. I have two questions, please.

When will the Israeli army fully withdraw from Lebanon? Is there a clear timeline for that? And last question, please. Last week, you met with the Iraq prime minister and discussed him -- or described him as handsome and saying he could become one of the best leaders in the Middle East.

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How would you describe...

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TRUMP: Which one are we talking about?

QUESTION: The Iraqi prime minister. Yes. How do you describe President...

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TRUMP: Well, I'd say he's handsome also.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: And I think he could become one of the most important leaders in the Middle East, actually if we do this, because they have been doing -- trying to do this for decades, right, decades and decades.

So if I made that statement about somebody else, I would put him in the same category.

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QUESTION: When the Israeli army will withdraw from Lebanon? Is there a clear timeline for that?

TRUMP: They're in the process of doing that. They're in the process of redeploying at other sections. And, again, they get along very well. That was a great agreement they signed with Lebanon, and they're redeploying.

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QUESTION: Mr. President, the Lebanese army needs help, and the United States said that it's very important for the Lebanese army to take over the villages that Hezbollah withdraw from. How are you going to help him?

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Well, we're going to speaking about that today.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: ... making sure that they will be in the south as well?

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Yes. We will be speaking about that today with your president. And we have some very concrete plans already in store for that, with others going in and helping.

But they're also becoming much more self-sufficient. And we will be speaking about that. That's one of the subjects we're going to be talking about.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: My question is -- I'm sorry. Israel -- the Lebanese army said today that Israeli forces opened fire in proximity to the Lebanese trying to deploy in one of these pilot zones. This is day two of the pilot zones.

Are you prepared to take any steps, additional steps, to put pressure on Israel to withdraw, which I believe President Aoun is planning to ask you?

TRUMP: Well, look, I just heard about that before this conference just happened, and we'll be looking at that, yes.

QUESTION: Mr. President, there are no signs that Iran is ready to stop fighting. So what is the plan? Is the plan to just keep bombing until they give up?

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: How would you know there are no signs? Why? Do you know something that I don't know?

QUESTION: Well, they continue to attack our allies and kill them.

TRUMP: You don't know what the dialogue is behind the scenes that they want to meet desperately to try and end it, because they're getting decimated. You don't get that when you listen to your fake station.

But you don't know. You don't know anything.

QUESTION: So talks are still possible?

TRUMP: What -- do you know something that I don't know? Do you know something I don't know?

QUESTION: Well, tell us.

TRUMP: I will tell you, they want to desperately meet. And until they're ready to meet in a meaningful way, we have no interest in even...

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: Mr. President, are you planning on putting any pressure or consequences on China for what you announced about them meddling in the 2020 election?

TRUMP: Well, we're going to talk to them about it. It took place a long time ago. I think China is maybe a little bit different today than it was then.

But, look, they're -- they do things and we do things to them. I'll be honest. We do things to them too. It's not a one-way street. But we'll be talking to them, yes.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: It's something that doesn't get talked about a lot, but the Border Patrol reported 14 consecutive months no releases at the southern border.

This is something you talked a lot about on the campaign trail, that you couldn't run on the job that you did on the southern border. Do you feel similarly at this point in time with midterms, considering how well of a job you've done? What is the lesson to be learned about Border Patrol?

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Well, you for that question.

The fact is -- and maybe it pertains a little bit with respect to you and borders and everything else. We had a border that was totally out of control. I probably won the election, at least partially, on the border, would you say?

And the border now, we literally, in 14 months, I think it came out this morning, actually, it was just announced, that, in 14 months, we had nobody coming through, zero, zero people. You have to understand, millions came through, and we had zero people come in illegally into our country.

And that's made by people that happen to be Democrats, largely Democrats, the people that do those stats. And I'm sure they don't like saying it, but we really had virtually nobody coming in. And they actually say nobody, not even virtually.

So it's amazing what's happened there. And very people talk about that anymore. They don't like talking about that. They don't like talking about Venezuela, where we lost no people. I'll be going to Dover for something that I feel is -- it's a great honor for me to do it. These are people that wanted, and they feel like I do, that Iran

cannot have a nuclear weapon. Very simple. It's a very simple dictum. They cannot have a nuclear weapon, and they won't have. They're not going to have. They have no chance of having a nuclear weapon.

And as far as Iran is concerned, I'll let Pete maybe say a couple of words, but we are doing very well. We are degrading them at levels that nobody thought was possible. They're being degraded really so seriously. They did slip something through in Jordan.

And if we had other operators, it would not have happened, unfortunately. But we -- because we have the best equipment in the world. We've stopped almost everything. But when you let other people do your job -- with the United States, we let other people do the job. And, sometimes, it doesn't work out so well.

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But we're going to be going and paying our respects at Dover.

Pete, would you like to say, but just how we're doing generally speaking.

PETE HEGSETH, U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, it'll be an honor as well to join you at Dover to recognize these incredible Americans who committed to the cause just like you are, something no president's been willing to do, 47 years.

They build up a conventional capability, like the North Koreans did. Remember, North -- that's how North Korea made their way to a bomb, so much weaponry that they -- no one was willing to stand up to them. And President Trump was, and continues to, to this day.

Iran's been given every opportunity to negotiate, to show that they're reasonable on the Strait of Hormuz. But if they're going to shoot at commercial shipping, then we're going to hit them, as the president said, 10 times harder, which every night we're degrading them further and further.

And the president has all the options necessary. If they want to talk, they can talk. Otherwise, they can deal with the War Department, and we're prepared to do that.

TRUMP: And the blockade is up and fully -- I mean, it's -- nobody gets through. Nobody gets through the blockade. It's like a steel wall.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.

Yesterday, there was another attack on an ICE facility, this time in New York City. What in your view is prompting these attacks, and do you have a message for those who are attacking ICE?

TRUMP: You're talking about the fire that was set in front of the federal building?

QUESTION: Yes.

TRUMP: Well, this is what's happening with the people that they allowed to come into our country. They shouldn't have allowed them to come in, and they shouldn't be here. They're radical lunatics, and I'm getting them out.

We're getting them out at a pace. We have gotten rid of more than any other president. I read stories. They try and give you phony stats. I was with Tom Homan this morning. He will give you the statistics if you want, but we're getting bad people out of our country at levels never seen before.

There's never been a time when more bad people -- and you take a look just here in Washington. We got almost five -- we took out almost 5,000 hard-line, hardcore criminals, most of whom came in during the open border periods of the previous administration, an amazing statistic.

And this is something that I hate to be talking about in front of the president of Lebanon, but he's got his problems, and they're different problems, but we don't have any problems in Washington, D.C. We have virtually -- we have wiped out about 92 percent of the crime, and we're going to get very close to -- I believe we're going to get close to 100 percent of the crime.

And if you take a look at this city compare this to what it was 15, 16 months ago, this was a dangerous city. I don't know how -- I better not compare it to Lebanon because I don't exactly have your stats. But it might have been Lebanon was safer. This was a dangerous city under the previous administration, Biden.

And now it's a very safe city. There was an article that came out two days ago that Washington, D.C., is -- has made the greatest progress of any city in the nation, now, Memphis also, and New Orleans also. And if they would ask us for help in Chicago, we would turn that around so fast.

If they'd ask us for help in New York, we would turn that around so fast. Los Angeles, we would turn that around so fast. But the stat that's so amazing is that 2 percent of the people create 91 percent of the crime. Think of that. It's a great stat, because if it was 70 percent of the people, that's a problem.

It was 20 percent, that's a -- 2 percent of the people create 91 percent of the crime. Think of that; 2 percent of the people, you can handle that easily. So, Washington, D.C., is now one of the hottest cities in the country. We have the hottest country in the world.

But Washington is now hot. And I do have to say one other thing. We just had the World Cup, as you know very well. And it was the most successful World Cup ever. We didn't even have a protest. We had no crime.

With all those events, was like having many, many Super Bowls. Each one was like a Super Bowl. And with all of that, we didn't have crime. We didn't have bedlam. Everybody left here with a different opinion than what they read in the fake news.

They love this country. I saw Scotland. I saw Norway. I saw all these countries, I mean, a level of love, that nobody wanted to leave. And I just want to congratulate everybody, the job that we did, and all of us, everybody in this room, because everybody in this room was involved.

The vice president was very much involved. It was amazing. I was with Gianni the other day, who's -- the job he did is great. But he said he never thought in a million years it could be so free of any difficulty. Think of it. We didn't even have a protest, not only no crime.

Now, there's a reason for all this, but part of it was that people just wanted to pull together. This country, for like a four-week period, just pulled together.