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@THISHOUR WITH BERMAN AND MICHAELA
Insider Attack in Afghanistan Kills U.S. General; Another American With Ebola is Back in U.S.; Man Quarantined in NYC Hospital With Ebola-Like Symptoms; Hopeful Three-Day Ceasefire Holding in Gaza; Hamas Spokesman Makes Controversial "Blood Libel" Comments
Aired August 5, 2014 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOHN BERMAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR: @THISHOUR, the second American patient with Ebola expected to arrive in Atlanta for treatment.
MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN CO-ANCHOR: Test results are expected today or tomorrow for a third suspected case of Ebola now quarantined in a New York City hospital. We have a live report, straight ahead.
BERMAN: Hopeful eyes on the Middle East, a three-day cease-fire, fragile but holding. Question is, is a more substantial peace on the way?
Hello, everyone, great to see you today. I'm John Berman.
PEREIRA: And I'm Michaela Pereira. We have those stories in just a moment, but first, we start with breaking news out of Afghanistan.
An attacker has opened fire on coalition forces. The Pentagon says one American has been killed. Fifteen coalition troops, including Americans, have been wounded.
BERMAN: This happened at a camp in Kabul. We're told the attacker was wearing an Afghan military uniform, a so-called green-on-blue shooting, the situation still very fluid. I think we have CNN's chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto with us.
Jim, are you there?
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: I am here, John. How are you?
Listen, we have some more details on this now. One, one American killed and I can tell you now that that one American was a general officer, what we know as a general, so a senior officer, 15 other wounded, including Americans as well as other nationalities in this attack.
As you mentioned, it was someone dressed up in an Afghan military uniform, still an open question whether it was an actual soldier or a member of the Taliban, a terrorist, a militant who acquired a uniform and dressed up as a soldier.
I'm told he was using a light, Russian machine gun, very heavy firepower in this attack. And this attack took place at a training center for Afghan military officers, members of the Afghan national security force in Kabul.
It's called Camp Qargha, this really one of the keystone efforts of U.S. and coalition forces there, training the Afghan military to take over the security role after U.S. and coalition forces leave.
And these attacks, so-called green-on-blue attacks, Afghan ally attacks on coalition forces, they've been a real problem there over the last several years, and this one, one of most shocking ones with a very high at this point casualty toll.
PEREIRA: Jim, we'll ask you to stay where you are for a second. Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona joins us live here in the studio.
We're talking about this green-on-blue type of attack. This has happened before. What can be done to mitigate this kind of situation?
RICK FRANCONA, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: The problem is we don't control the vetting of the Afghans. The Afghans do. So we have very little control who has access to these facilities.
And as we draw down, we have less and less control over the facilities. The Afghans are almost completely in charge, so they control who has access and we have to take their word for it.
So this really worries the U.S. troops because they look at their supposed counterparts, and you just don't have that element of trust that you need if this is going to work.
BERMAN: I don't want to bury the lead here because Jim just reported a short time ago that it was a general officer, a U.S. general, who was killed.
Jim, at this point any information about his identity, who he was leading in this area, and how on earth an Afghan soldier, an armed Afghan soldier could get so close to a general officer?
SCIUTTO: Well, let's start first with his rank. That is pending notification of his family to give the exact rank and certainly the identity, but I can tell you for certain that it was a general officer who was killed.
So how do Afghans get in there? Well, listen, it's a training facility for Afghan soldiers. This is the role. And that has righted an entry point for attacks like this both today but going back in previous years, either for soldiers who have been turned, as it were, by the Taliban to become attackers on their own, on coalition forces, or another method, are Taliban fighters, terrorists who acquire Afghan security forces uniforms and then carry out the attack that way.
But, yeah, agreed, this is a vulnerability. You are training Afghan forces. You have to be with them. This is a camp for training Afghan forces. And it just presents a problem that you can mitigate, but you can't eliminate.
PEREIRA: Mitigate but not eliminate. I'm reading more information here that you are talking about this. An international coalition of troops, I understand that a soldier of brigadier rank, of German descent, a German general, was injured as well. He's said to be recovering from his injuries.
But you talk about the eliminate -- mitigate but can't eliminate, and that's a very vulnerable position to be in.
FRANCONA: Yeah. And you can do some things like restrict where you can carry weapons. Like on a U.S. military installation, you can only carry weapons in certain areas and they are very tightly controlled.
Obviously, that did not happen here, but they need to look at that, and once again you are at the mercy of the Afghans because it becomes their facility.
BERMAN: You have to go back. I have to look at the records here, but I think you have to go back a long, long way to find when a U.S. general was killed in a conflict over seas.
This is a very high-value target for the Taliban, if it is the Taliban.
FRANCONA: Well, this is a training facility where they are training the future Afghan army officers, so you are going to have fairly senior U.S. advisers, U.S. personnel there because they are the ones that are shaping the future of the Afghan army, so it doesn't surprise me that you would have a general officer leading this effort.
PEREIRA: Give us an idea of what now happens, because I imagine they are going to have to lock things down. They are going to have to follow some different procedures as of now.
FRANCONA: Right. They are going to review the security procedures. They will probably try and change the weapons-carry policy, but in the end we have to rely on the Afghans to provide this first level of security, and you can see how easy it breaks down.
BERMAN: And, Jim, give me the context here, because this all comes as the U.S. Is drawing down its troops very rapidly in Afghanistan. It comes in the middle of the summer fighting season, and it comes as there are some reports saying that the Taliban is actually gaining ground in some key areas.
SCIUTTO: It is. You make a good point. U.S. forces are drawing down there. They are going to be out completely in a number of months, and because of that, the focus is on training up the Afghan forces, really the U.S., the coalition, relying on them to take over the role of securing this country.
And to do that, you have to train them, both at the infantry level but also at the officer level, and this, as Rick noted, was an officer training camp. It's known as the "Sandhurst in the Sand," Sandhurst being the British officer training academy, very famous worldwide, in the U.K. The British had a very major role in setting this camp up here.
So you are trying to train the best and brightest in Afghanistan to lead the Afghan security forces to take over the role from the U.S. and coalition forces. And, as Rick said, you are there.
You can take some mitigation efforts where you can be armed, et cetera, but at the end of the day, you are face-to-face with these Afghan troops and that provides unfortunately a vulnerability.
Now, in this particular case, you have a general, a U.S. general officer killed. You have reports, according to the German military, of a German general officer wounded in this attack.
I'm told that this was a meeting of senior officials taking place there, so it was a tremendous target of opportunity. Whether the attacker knew that a meeting of senior officers was taking place is an open question, or just took this opportunity when he saw high-ranking individuals there, that's an open question, something that's going to have to be at the top of the military investigation as to how this played out.
BERMAN: This will have repercussions, no doubt. Again, the headline here, a U.S. general has been killed in Afghanistan.
Our Jim Sciutto, our thanks to you. Rick Francona, great to have you here. We're going to stay on this. When we get more details, we'll come back to you with that.
PEREIRA: Want to turn to another story that we're watching right now. American missionary Nancy Writebol is being transported aboard a specially equipped air ambulance
That plane arrived in Bangor, Maine, a couple of hours ago from Liberia. It refueled there in Maine and is now on its way south to Atlanta.
Now, once she lands, Writebol will be rushed to Atlanta's Emory University Hospital, one of four medical facilities in the country that have extensive isolation procedures.
Now it also just happens to be blocks away from the CDC, the Centers for Disease Control. Writebol is only the second person to be treated for Ebola in the U.S.
BERMAN: She will join Dr. Kent Brantly the first America to be treated for Ebola in the U.S. who got here three days ago. They were both working with Ebola patients in Liberia last month when they became ill.
They have both been given a highly experimental serum to treat Ebola that has not -- had not been tested on humans yet. So far, at least on those two patients, the drug seems to be working.
About half a dozen people who recently worked from West Africa with symptoms have now been tested.
PEREIRA: One, in fact, has been hospitalized in New York City in strict isolation. He is waiting to hear if he indeed has the disease or not.
Also a man in Saudi Arabia has now developed symptoms after traveling to Sierra Leone.
Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta is live outside Emory University Hospital in Atlanta where we're told any moment now a second patient that is infected with Ebola is expected to arrive for treatment.
Jason Carroll is in New York, outside Mount Sinai Hospital, where a man waiting to learn his fate, whether he has the disease, is being treated.
Jason, we'll get you to stand by. I think we should start with Sanjay, because obviously, Dr. Gupta, Nancy Writebol is expected to arrive there any minute now. The biggest question is, what precautions are being taken during this transfer?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, that is one of the big questions. Obviously, after you make sure the patient is medically stable enough for the transport. You want to make sure the health care team and the transporters are all kept safe as well.
What you're probably going to see, as we did with Dr. Brantly, is the people who are in the immediate vicinity who are actually traveling with Miss Writebol in these suits, these bio-protective suits, that are the spacesuits, so-called, to try and prevent any bodily fluids from Miss Writebol who is sick from Ebola from getting on them. That's the real goal.
We know that the bodily fluids of someone who has -- who's sick with the Ebola infection contains the virus, and if that gets on somebody, that can cause an infection. So those are the main precautions.
When they get to the hospital, there is this special isolation unit we've talk about. It's basically to try and keep the person isolated from anybody else in the hospital. It's not near any other patient care floors, but when health care professionals walk into the room, like you've seen now, several times, they will still be wearing these suits for the very same reasons. So that's how you protect it.
But, look, I just point out the hospital we're talking about is there, just behind me. Dr. Kent Brantly is in this hospital in an isolation ward. It's business as usual down here. You don't see people walking around in the spacesuits down here because there is no risk to them if you are not immediately in the vicinity of the patient inside that area. So it's --the protective measures are in place but specifically for the people most involved.
BERMAN: All right, Dr. Sanjay Gupta outside the hospital at Emory. We are expecting the plane to land in Atlanta carrying Nancy Writebol in 15 minutes. When that does that happen, we're going to head back to Sanjay. We have a lot more questions for you later in this show.
A lot of people want to know what happens to those people who are recovered from Ebola? Is this something that affects them for the rest of their lives?
Plus, we're going to have you ask some questions, and Sanjay will try to answer them. PEREIRA: But we want to head back to the patient in New York City.
Doctors at Mount Sinai Hospital here in New York, seriously monitoring a man who recently returned from West Africa.
He had some symptoms that presented a bit like Ebola. He was quickly isolated within minutes of arriving at the hospital yesterday morning.
BERMAN: Our Jason Carroll, outside Mount Sinai, joins us live.
Jason, so doctors at this point say they do not think that this man has Ebola. Obviously, they are not taking any chances. When will they know for sure?
JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's the big question. We might know today. At the very latest, those test results from that unidentified male patient could come back as late as tomorrow.
Right now, we're in a holding pattern. That's what doctors are telling us, waiting those test results. In the meantime this unidentified male patient is in isolation, in strict isolation.
He's been in strict isolation ever since yesterday morning when he walk through these doors, showed up with flue-like symptoms, and once he had told doctors, John, that he had been in West Africa, they immediately went into action and within seven minutes got him isolated and got him treated.
Based on what doctors have been telling us, which is they have been monitoring him, they have been treating him, they have been in contact with the CDC, they've been in contact with the New York City health department, and based on all of that, it leads them to believe that odds are this is not a case of Ebola, but they have to act as if it is until they have those test results in their hands.
PEREIRA: So let me ask you then, if it is -- again, slim chance, but if it is -- what happens? Do they treat him there? Do they transfer him?
We know that Emory is one of the four hospitals that has these specialized isolation units. What happens to him?
CARROLL: Well, there is a division here of infectious diseases, and doctors say that they are well equipped to handle. If this was an Ebola case, they are equipped to handle that. They have several doctors at least on staff who they say are experienced and ready.
What they basically need are , again, those test results to come back to let them know how they should proceed, but I think what you can do is, in a way, Michaela, you can take a cue from what doctors have been able to observe from the patient so far.
PEREIRA: Absolutely. All right, Jason, thank you so much for that. We appreciate it.
BERMAN: As we mentioned, we're about 10, 15 minutes away from this flight landing at Dobbins Air Reserve Base just outside Atlanta. It will be carrying Nancy Writebol. She will then be taken to Emory, the hospital at Emory. We will bring that news to you as soon as it happens.
PEREIRA: Many of you have all sorts of questions about Ebola, and we understand that, about this very rare and deadly disease.
As John mentioned you can ask our good doctor, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and also Dr. Anthony Fauci. Both of them will join us in about 20 minutes from now to answer your questions.
Hit us on Facebook. Hit us on Twitter, @THISHOUR. Include the #Ebola in your Twitter questions of course.
We'll take a short break. Be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BERMAN: @THISHOUR, wary but hopeful, a three-day cease-fire in the Middle East appears to be holding given how the previous cease-fires have gone, though everyone be very careful to characterize this as any kind of major success just yet.
PEREIRA: Fragile, tenuous, are words being used to describe it. The Israeli military says it has taken their ground forces out of Gaza and has finished dismantling those tunnels that were the source of so much contention. The government says if this -fire holds, it will indeed send a delegation to Cairo to work on a more permanent truce. In the meantime, hundreds of people in Gaza, hundreds of thousands of civilians are taking advantage of the relative peace, trying to get supplies and then finding themselves returning to their bombed out homes to salvage what they can. But at least one resident tells CNN there is no home, no water, no power, and no peace for him.
BERMAN: We are going to get, now, to our Jake Tapper, anchor of "THE LEAD", who is in Jerusalem. Jake, you know, we have been through this cease-fire thing before, but speaking to people on both sides of border today there does seem to be this sense that this one is different.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST, "THE LEAD": Well I think one of keys to this cease-fire being different is that the group Hamas, which was elected to run the government in Gaza and also, of course, Israel and the United States and other countries consider it to be a terrorist group, Hamas has signed in to this cease-fire. They have complained about other cease-fires that they were not brought into the process at all, whether it was the Egyptian-proposed cease-fire three weeks ago or the ones proposed by other Palestinian leaders once week ago.
This one, there is buy in. What the Israeli government says is this new cease-fire is the same one they agreed to three weeks ago that the Egyptians originally proposed, so they are happy to do it, but all of the blood shed over the last three weeks could have been prevented if Hamas had just signed off on that one three weeks ago. But in any case, that seems to be the key difference right now. PEREIRA: But also, Jake, it has to be pointed out that the IDF has
also said it's finished dismantling those tunnels, which was key to their operation. They said they weren't going to stop until those tunnels were destroyed and they say they have done that now.
TAPPER: They do say that, although also there's a lot of tension among people who live near the border with Gaza. We were down there yesterday at one kibbutz, and people say even if they destroyed 95 percent of the tunnels, there's still 5 percent that we don't know about. What's going to happen with that?
But yes, you are right, the Israeli military is hanging their hat on the idea that 31 or 32 tunnels have been destroyed. As for the larger question about what else has been accomplished by all of this death and destruction, the Israeli government says we'll see if this cease- fire holds, if the cease-fire holds, then this military campaign perhaps in retrospect was worth it, but if not, then the jury is still out.
BERMAN: And if this cease-fire holds, Israel does say it will send this delegation to Cairo to engage in discussions either with the Egyptian or with the Palestinian authority. It will be interesting to see how close they ever get to Hamas officials. Jake, I know you are going to have a lot more on this from Jerusalem. Jake Tapper, anchor of "THE LEAD" from there today at 4:00 eastern. Please stay with CNN all day for that.
PEREIRA: All right, we are going to take a short break here. @THISHOUR, ahead, a Hamas spokesperson makes controversial comments claiming Jews use Christian blood to make matzos. We'll play that next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BERMAN: The 72-hour cease-fire in the Middle East does appear to be holding, but I think it is safe to say the hatred lingers.
PEREIRA: Here's a case in point, the public face of Hamas recently said quote, "We all remember how the Jews used to slaughter Christians in order to mix their blood in their holy matzos. This is not a figment of imagination or something taken from a film. It is a fact, acknowledged by their own books and historical evidence."
Osama Hamdan is referencing to a story that began in the Middle Ages and was used to stir up hatred and violence against Jews.
BERMAN: It's been used for more than a thousand years to stir up hatred. And in some case to persecute Jews. Our Wolf Blitzer asked Osama Hamdan if he stands by those comments.
(BEING VIDEOTAPE)
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR, "THE SITUATION ROOM": I just want to be specific, and just answer the question, maybe I will remind you what you said. I am going to play it in Arabic, here is what you said on el quds TV -- OSAMA HAMDAN, HAMAS SPOKESMAN: Wolf, I know what I've said. Wolf, I know.
BLITZER: Just listen to this and then you'll explain what you mean.
HAMDAN: I know - You don't know --
BLITZER: Let's play the tape.
HAMDAN (via translation) : We all remember how the Jews used to slaughter Christians, in order to mix their blood in their holy matzos. This is not a figment of imagination or something taken from a film. It is a fact, acknowledged by their own books and historical evidence.
BLITZER: So do you believe that Jews used to slaughter Christians to mix their blood to --
HAMDAN: Excuse me. You have to ask that for the -- which claims that. You know, this is the fact, you cut the words. Not you, the Israelis. In memory, they cut the facts and they start this propaganda to say that they are innocent. They want to cover the genocide which is happening in Gaza now. They want to cover themselves when they are killing 2,000 Palestinians, injuring more than 12,000 Palestinians, in a barbarian attack against Gaza and they are connected to the same old mentality which held the others.
This man, who is the deputy speaker, this Knesset, when he says, we have to put all the Palestinians in a concentration camp, what does it mean? When you -- when you talk about -- you can go there, who wrote Palestinians, genocide is permissible. What does it mean?
Those people are the people who are hating humanity while trying to kill the Palestinians. We don't have a problem with the Jews as they are Jewish people. In fact we believe in Moses, we believe in Jesus, we believe in Mohammed. We respect them all -- the three of them the same, and we believe that everyone has the right to choose his religion. No one will be questioned by the other humans for his religion. God will ask us all. No one is asked because of his race. The races are the same. We are all from Adam, but the people who are talking about genocide against the Palestinians must be questioned and asked because they are saying that and doing that at the same time.
BLITZER: We're going to leave it there, Mr. Hamdan. But I was hoping to get a flat denial from you that you would utter such ridiculous words, that Jews would kill Christians in order to use their blood to bake matzos. That sounds, as you know, that is an awful, awful smear.
HAMDAN: Wolf, Wolf, you have to be fair. You can't end that. I must end that, because you asked me and I want to answer. This was said by everyone. I was saying they are part of what was being said. He has to deny what he writes about the Palestinians, about the genocide against the Palestinians, which he called for, which he suggested to do as a member in the parliament or as a senior leader in the party.
BLITZER: All right. (END VIDEOTAPE)
BERMAN: You see right there, Wolf gave him every chance to deny, to repudiate, to explain his comments, but the official spokesperson for Hamas didn't do this. There is a name for this, it is called blood libel, it has been around since the Middle Ages, and still amongst -- a Hamas official, still very much, clearly, alive today.
PEREIRA: Well, earlier on "NEW DAY", right here on CNN, Bobby Ghosh, the managing editor of qz.com, spoke about those inflammatory comments and how they could hurt the peace process. Take a listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BOBBY GHOSH, MANAGING EDITOR, QZ.COM: It's not surprising if you spend time in Palestine. The idea of blood libel is very commonly accepted by a lot of Palestinians. Mainly because they don't know any better. They are taught that when they are very young and don't have the opportunity to correct themselves. Now Hamdan doesn't have that excuse. He's an educated man, exposed to the world outside. He certainly has had plenty of opportunity to fact check himself. The fact that he still says things like this -
KATE BOLDUAN, HOST, "NEW DAY": And saying it right now in the middle of all this --
GHOSH: To an international audience. It just shows you the extent of the hate - Mind you, it cuts both ways, there are people on the Palestinian side who have been calling for-- there's people on the Israeli side who have been calling for Palestinian mothers to be killed, for Palestinian women to be raped, for concentration camps. So that amount of hate is enormous.
BOLDUAN: I do want to get to that. But the fact that he's bringing up the blood libel, which has such a painful history with the Jewish people. This accusation, this ridiculous thought, dates back to like the 12th century and has been the pretext for violence against the Jewish people forever.
GHOSH: It is the root of anti-Semitism. It has been the root of anti-Semitism in Europe, this concept of blood libel. And it is non- sense. But in the Arab world and particularly in Palestine --
BOLDUAN: What does it get him?
GHOSH: It's a dog whistle to his own people. I have to assume that Hamdan knows better, I have to assume that given the exposure to the world he knows it's not true. The fact that he keeps saying things like this and not deny it when he has had an opportunity to do so has got to be a dog whistle to his own people back in Gaza.
Remember, he's not in Gaza. He's outside the political leadership outside. They're out of touch with the man in the street. This -- the only halfway rational, and it's not very rational, explanation I can think of, is this is his trying to make some kind of connection back to the streets in Gaza. It is completely counterproductive. As you point out, this is not the
way you approach the negotiating table.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PEREIRA: Bobby Ghosh put it very well.
