>> love to be with you. it's good to wake up to poppy harlow. >> i appreciate that. chris and alisyn are on vacation. we begin with president-elect sparring with president obama. saying no way an obama would have defeated him if the >> donald trump firing back in a series of tweets to comments that the president made in a new interview we first shared with you yesterday. the president-elect also defending his charitable giving and dismissing the united nations as a club for people to have a good time. we're now just 24 days away from inauguration day. 24 days. we have it all covered for you. let's begin with cnn's jessica schneider live in palm beach, florida. >> reporter: good morning, don. for the past few days, the president-elect has staid mostly out of the public eye here at mar-a-lago. of course, late yesterday his twitter account sprung into action with those flurry of

tweets. the president-elect going after president obama after obama speculated he would have won a third term if it was possible, using his message of hope and inclusion. >> i'm confident that if i had run again and articulated it, i think i would have mobilized a majority of the american people to rally behind it. >> reporter: trump tweeting, obama said he thinks he would have won against me. he should say that, but i say no way. then boasting, the world was gloomy before i won. there was no hope. now the market is up nearly 10% and christmas spending is over a trillion dollars. trump seemingly overlooking obama's record of cutting unemployment to a nine-year low and taking credit for holiday spending figures that aren't final numbers. trump also going after his favorite target, the media, over his charity. the president-elect claiming he gave and raised millions, tweeting, all of which is given to charity and media won't report. but tax records show trump has not donated to his foundation

since 2008. no one can confirm any other charitable giving since trump has not released his tax records. the trump foundation itself admitted to violating irs regulations and is currently under investigation by the new york attorney general. >> right now we need to have a president who is free of conflict of interest. that means dissolving the foundation. it also means president trump selling off his business interests that create conflicts of interest, making sure there's no foreign government money coming into his operations. >> reporter: trump also continuing to air diplomatic grievances on social media, questioning the united nations' value following the israeli settlement resolution. trump tweeting that the u.n. has such great potential, but right now it's just a club for people to get together, talk, and have a good time. so sad. and after that tough twitter talk, it is back to work here at mar-a-lago today for the president-elect. after a few days off for the christmas break, he does still have a few key cabinet posts to fill, including director of

national intelligence and also secretaries of both agriculture and veterans affairs. poppy and don? >> jessica, thank you so much. >> thank you very much. let's discuss this with our panel. correspondent for the washington examiner, mr. david drucker is here. cnn political commentator errol lewis joins us. as well as selena zito. good morning to all of you. good to have you on. it's no surprise donald trump reacted to president obama saying he would have won. he tweeted this. there's no way obama would have beaten him. what do you think of that? i'll start with you, david drucker. >> it sounds like a case of my dad can beat up your dad. >> and we won't know. >> a bunch of us like to joke that somewhere on earth, too, john kasich is president and he hired, you know, donald trump to be his trade czar. who cares. it's all a big fantasy.

look, i understand they're both competitive. president obama is competitive. donald trump is competitive. you don't run for president, you don't win if you're not sort of ruthlessly competitive. i don't think the american people care about any of this. i don't think they care about donald trump tweeting. i think they'll care about him tweeting if, you know, six months to a year from now they don't think their lives are any better or they think their lives are worse. what's important for him to do is just get the job done as president. obviously president obama, like any ex-president of his age, is planning a post-presidency, and he's going to be active. >> he's looking out for his legacy right now. >> which they all do. donald trump is looking out for his legacy and he hasn't even started yet. >> some things you can't do to shape your legacy are fudge the numbers. the numbers are good for the sitting president. 57% approval rating. unemployment is at an all-time low. these are numbers that will

stick. this is good for the president. in the midst of this, here's what the president-elect tweeted yesterday. the world was gloomy before i won. there was no hope. now the market is up nearly 10% and christmas spending is over a trillion dollars. we don't have the final christmas spending numbers. it looks like those are from a report before the holidays. but i digress. i wonder, what's the point in this, and what does it tell us about what perhaps his inauguration speech will be like? >> yeah, let's just say i remember it differently. this question of who would be the better president, let's keep in mind it's not entirely hypothetical. back in 2011, donald trump was seriously floating the idea of running. he published a book, or there was a book that had his name on it. he was going around giving interviews. that's when i interviewed him. he was talking about running. he got humiliated at the white house correspondents' dinner around that time. but he was very much sort of thinking about it. look, as far as the numbers go, donald trump is going to -- i

think we know, from his commercial life, from his political campaign, and from these most recent tweets, that he's going to portray the world, no matter what the facts are, in a manner that is favorable to donald trump. it'll be up to the rest of us to correct the record on economic expansion, the doubling of the value of the stock market during the obama years, for example. i don't remember hope being entirely gone. if donald trump wants to say so, maybe hope was gone for him back before he got into politics. >> that was actually funny, as i watched the news with my mother yesterday, that hope was gone. selena, this is for you. here's what newt gingrich is saying to the whole point we're making. trump supporters -- newt gingrich says obama might have increased voter turnover among african-americans, but he may have increased voter turnout among those repudiating his presidency. while he had a good approval rating, there is a flip side to all of this as well. many people who voted for barack

obama also ended up voting for donald trump this time. >> yeah, absolutely. especially in my state, in pennsylvania, ohio, wisconsin. you saw counties that went for obama twice that went for trump this time. for a lot of people outside of the beltway and outside of new york, there is this sense of hopelessness. there is this sense that things have not gotten better for them. yes, the unemployment numbers have gone down since the president took office, but a lot of those jobs that people lost have not been replicated in the same sort of salaries that they had before the recession. >> but he was also speaking in terms of hillary clinton. he didn't think -- i don't think he believes hillary clinton animated the democratic party and animated those voters in the midwest and the rust belt. he believes he could have with more of a message of inclusion and what he had done for the

auto industry and other jobs. >> and he was very, very good at communicating that in 2008 and 2012. and he was good for himself personally, politically. but for his party, he's not been that great. he's lost over a thousand down ballot state legislative seats in both chambers and 69 congressional seats. so the party itself has suffered while he personally has been very popular. >> to that point, you heard in that interview he did with david axelrod this week, he said we, being democrats, and obviously talking a bit about clinton's campaign, were not there on the ground communicating. in his press conference about a week ago, he said democrats are characterized as coastal liberal latte sipping, politically correct, out-of-touch folks. i sort of stopped in my track when is i heard that. david, how much do you think

that the president contributed to that? >> well, i think the president's policies contributed to that. i think selena makes a great point. the president went everywhere and communicated to everybody. trump and obama in many ways are the opposite sides of the same hope and change coin. they both sort of had a populist message, trump more so. they both sort of engendered a lot of just belief in what they're able to do personally without any proof that it's able to happen. now, the president never stopped communicating on that level, but when you look at how many americans, especially in the areas selena is talking about, what they think of obamacare, the affordable care act, what they think of a lot of the president's social policies and economic policies, they perceive the president as that sort of cliche of a coastal liberal. >> how much is it perception versus reality? >> perception is all that matters. >> the facts don't matter? >> i think we have to say this. if voters decide -- and they did this to republicans because of the iraq war in '06 and '08.

if voters decide you're not getting it done, maybe you're not getting it done. because your job as a politician, sometimes you have to do things people don't want, but people aren't stupid. if they don't think -- if your policies are not helping them, it's not because you have a lousy message or you're not good at communicating it. it's not turning out the way you intended. obamacare is the best example. you still have rising premiums. you have a lot of people that lost their doctors and their plan and had to go through that whole thing. so if voters in the heartland don't think obamacare helped them, maybe it didn't help enough, even if it helped a little. >> thank you, david. thank you, errol. thank you, selena. we're also following this. israel temporarily suspending working ties with 12 nations. the move comes amid increased tension between prime minister benjamin netanyahu and president

obama. the question is how far does this go. they summon the ambassadors. now this is basically cutting working relations. what does that actually translate into? >> reporter: it has little practical effect. it's more a symbolic statement. it's netanyahu saying i'm going to hold off meeting with ambassadors that voted for this resoluti resolution. it's temporary. as a statement, it is a big one. netanyahu has been unapologetic in how he's expressed his anger, specifically at president barack obama and secretary of state john kerry for allowing this resolution to go through. and they have, in fact, netanyahu as well, stepped it up, accusing the u.s. of being behind the security council resolution, drafting it, writing it, and pushing it forward. here's david keys on cnn. >> we have ironclad information from sources in the arab rorld and internationally, and we're going to share that information with the incoming administration through the proper channels.

if the new administration chooses to share that information, that's their prerogative. >> reporter: as for what that information or that evidence is, israelis won't say. we've pushed them both here and in the u.s. for what evidence they have, and they haven't put any of it forward. the next question is, don, there's an international peace conference in the middle of next month, january 15th. israel is furious about that and said it will not attend. what will come out of that, how will the israelis respond, and frankly, don, what will be its practical effect on the conflict. >> all right. good questions. thank you very much. the obama administration categorically denying it played any role in the crafting and pushing of that settlement resolution before the u.n. security council. the white house saying that it was egypt's work. this as secretary of state john kerry is set to outline a peace plan. cnn's global affairs correspondent is elise labott. she's live in washington. >> reporter: good morning, don. the white house is vehemently denying prime minister netanyahu's accusations that

they initiated this resolution, demanding it be passed in some ambush, is what the israels call it. take a listen to deputy national security adviser ben rhodes speaking on israeli television yesterday. >> by definition, it's not an ambush when president obama and secretary kerry have been saying in hundreds of conversations and in public comments that israeli settlement activity was pushing into the west bank in a way that was making the two-state solution unachievable. >> reporter: and that's why in the coming days, as early as this week, secretary of state john kerry, who spent the better part of a year trying unsuccessfully to get a peace deal, will deliver a major speech, laying out the obama administration's vision for how they see the conflict being resolved, where they see things in 2016 and beyond, as

unfortunately they conclude their term in office without there being significant progress towards peace. >> something ben rhodes admitted to in that interview, saying we wish we could have gotten further on that. elise, thank you. so what impact will israel's moves have on the new administration? our political panel weighs in next.

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israel is taking immediate action, cutting working ties with the 12 nations that backed a united nations vote, condemning settlement building in east jerusalem and the west bank. this as tension between the united states and israel seems to be getting worse. so what will the next administration mean? how will things change under president-elect trump? let's bring back our panel. david drucker is with us. errol lewis and selena zito. thank you for being here. as you heard, the implementation of this, you know, working ties being cut, it's more soymbolic than anything. what becominginges the role of united nations? here's what the president-elect tweeted yesterday about the u.n. the united nations has such great potential, but right now it's just a club for people to get together, talk, and have a good time. so sad. what do you make of that?

>> yeah, i mean, look, denigrating the united nations is something that you hear from time to time, but the reality is it's still indispensable. it still has a lot of peacekeepers who are doing really good work. you have organizations like unicef that are really important for the world. the united nations is not going to go away just because lindsay graham and donald trump want it to. i think more importantly, when the trump administration comes into power, they're going to find that israel can play its politics and refuse to meet with foreign ministers from senegal and new zealand and so forth and that will have no effect, but much more important will be the united states' efforts in the region, and those evefforts cant be dialed back and insulted and talked away, with egypt and saudi arabia, and syria. all of that really sort of ties back into this very difficult question of the settlements, the perception of israel and the world, the pinning of the international community and

whether or not this intransigent struggle that's been going on for 50 years between israelis and palestinians will continue to add fuel to those regional fires. i think they're going to have to have a much more nuanced approach to it than simply bashing the united nations. >> speaking to what you said, let's get back to the whole reason this came up. this is about the whole settlement thing. netanyahu suspending working ties with the 12 nations that voted for the u.n. resolution, condemning israeli settlements. ironically, that doesn't include the u.s., which abstained. what kind of message is he trying to send here, selena? >> well, i think that netanyahu is really upset with what happened. you know, while the resolution is, as you said, it's symbolic, it puts them in a weaker position. what trump is trying to say is that we're going to have a stronger, deeper ru eer relatio

than obama had with netanyahu. this whole frosty relationship began when president obama went to egypt in 2009 and gave that sort of great big foreign policy speech to lay out his plans and bypassed visiting israel. i think and i predict that trump will probably make israel his place where he goes and lays out his foreign policy plans. >> but it's also exacerbated when john boehner invited netanyahu over and didn't even consult the white house. >> right. look, a lot of people here on both sides can claim that they were slighted and that they've been really good to each other. i think ultimately the president's foreign policy toward israel has been something that deserves to be questioned. it's maybe not as bad as people think, not remembering past republican administrations, george h.w. bush for one. there are two things to watch here. a year ago, trump gave a speech to the republican jewish

coalition in washington saying he wasn't going to pick sides in the israeli/palestinian conflict. so he's evolved on the issue, now says he's going to move the embassy from tel aviv to jerusalem on day one. >> is there a danger in that? >> well, in theory, the danger is that it could upset peace talks. but what peace talks? it could be a way for trump to reset the way we approach the conflict and say that this is how we're going to negotiate it going forward. i'm not sure it's the problem that a lot of people think it is. it could be. the other thing here is one of the things i think that has hurt israel over the past few years is the u.s. has really disengaged in many ways from the middle east. russia is in syria running the show. you have a rising iran that's active everywhere. i think a question for trump is not so much is israel in palestinian, but will he reassert u.s. influence in the middle east. there's not necessarily a sign that he wants to do that because he has talked so much about refocusing our resources here at home, not unlike president obama rebuilding bridges and roads and hospitals and schools. so does he believe in a robust

u.s. foreign policy that's present in the middle east, or is he going to defer to putin and the ayatollahs. >> he also doesn't like a deal he can't win. his predecessors haven't been able to win, figuring out peace in the middle east. it is the ultimate challenge, but in the face of all of this, errol, secretary of state john kerry, we've learned from elise's reporting, will come out later this week and will make this speech and talk about the path that they see forward towards that end goal. ben rhodes, the deputy national security adviser, said yesterday on israeli television basically we wish we could have done more and gotten further. what does john kerry say as this administration is winding down? >> you can expect some of the old chestnuts, the standard phrase being shared interest, mutual respect, sort of the obama doctrine to the extent there has been one. i think as well as an attempt to reset the table and suggest that

if the u.s. is going to be a player in the region, it's going to have to be even handed, it's going to have to sort of deal with situations like the netanyahu government, which for reasons internal to israeli politics has been intransigent and has sort of cut off the peace process, especially when it comes to the settlement. it's something netanyahu in this iteration of his government, the fourth netanyahu government, sort of had to do if he wanted to keep his coalition together. where kerry sort of -- what kerry sort of lays out for us you can expect to be completely undone when the next administration comes in. so this will be something of a swan song for the obama doctrine of the middle east. >> guys, thank you very much. appreciate it. >> thank you. i don't know if you've seen this story. brawls are breaking out at more than a dozen malls across the country. teenagers arrested, shoppers hurt. what sparked this violence? a live report is straight ahead. we live in a pick and choose world.

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you have to watch this next video. violent brawls erupting in more than a dozen malls all across the country, sparking panic among shoppers on a busy shopping day after christmas. look at that. many of the incidents caught on cell phone video and posted to social media. let's get straight to cnn's sara sidner in los angeles with more. what a mess, sara. >> reporter: good morning, don. pretty scary for families who were there trying to return christmas gifts they didn't want. this was a surprise. very chaotic day with disturbances at more than a dozen malls, including reports of gunfire that turned out to be false. there were brawls and fights at the food court. take a look at some of this

video out of manchester, connecticut. you can hear people screaming as punches are thrown inside the stores. a large chase ensues. you saw that video. then our affiliate that's there reporting on the scene said that one of the officers that was trying to break it up was assaulted. let's move on now to ft. worth, texas. that mall put on lockdown following this massive fight involving over 100 middle and high school students near the food court. officers had to go store to store, letting people out once the lockdown was lifted. now to aurora, illinois. this is the start of was evolved into a massive fight. teenagers had to sprint down the stairs after the fight broke out. the mall was forced to close for the day. in ohio, beachwood place mall put on lockdown as well, following unfounded reports of an active shooter. that turned out to be false, but it all began after a fight broke out among teenagers in the food

court there. then there was panic at hamilton place mall in chattanooga, tennessee, after police say teenagers set off fireworks. shoppers mistook those sounds for gunshots and several shoppers were hurt as they ran out of that mall. let's move on now to aurora town mall in colorado. that was closed and evacuated after several fights broke out outside the mall involving a load of people. there were at least 500 people that were crowded into that mall. police say it all started with a social media post promising a fight. at cross creek mall in fayetteville, north carolina, people forced to evacuate there as well as a massive fight broke out in the food court. police say reports of a suspected gunman there turned out to be false. you know, with all these incidents that are very similar, all near food courts, all involved several dozen people in some cases, there's a lot of concern as to whether or not this was planned out, maybe using social media. so far police haven't really been able to figure out if that's true or not or if this

was just kind of a fluke. really odd and bad for families in the mall. pretty scary for little kids. >> absolutely. you've got to think. how could these all happen at once without some sort of coordination. all right. we'll stay on it. sara, thank you. let's turn to your weather. dense fog, heavy rain likely to slow down your commute today. record-breaking warm temperatures gripping the south. cnn meteorologist chad myers has your forecast. i thought of you this morning when i didn't put a coat on because you said it was going to be 17 degrees warmer than normal. and it is. >> it is beautiful today. and it'll be colder tomorrow, but it is all the way across the southeast nice and warm. showers in atlanta, showers in charlotte. i get that. that may slow down the airport there in atlanta or charlotte, two major hubs here. a lot of fog around too. that's just part of the humidity in the air. that will continue throughout the day. record highs set across the country yesterday, at least south of that front that just went by. it does get colder. a cold front comes by, makes it more seasonal. around 40 in new york city, not

57 or 60 like you're going to be today. even making a run at 70 in washington, d.c. look at these numbers from yesterday. houston hit 84. sarasota, 86. even louisville, kentucky, hit a record high of 76 degrees. enjoying the day to return the gifts, i guess, but it's going to get colder. pay back is you know what, guys. it will get much colder as a cold front comes by next week. winter is not over yet, don. >> you can make it happen, though, chad. you have the power. that's what i'm told at least. thank you, chad myers. i appreciate it. a day for the history books. japan's prime minister set to become the first japanese leader to visit the site of the pearl harbor attacks. we're going to take you live to hawaii next. al is to make you look awesome online. let's chat in football terms. this is the goal post. the end zone. the goal of every team. we know you have goals. like getting exposure for your idea or business. with godaddy website builder, you can easily create an awesome mobile-friendly,

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history is about to be made in hawaii. prime minister shinzo abe will become the first japanese leader

to officially visit pearl harbor for a memorial ceremony. this comes more than 75 years after the japanese attack on pearl harbor that left more than 2400 americans dead and brought the u.s. into world war ii. president obama will join abe at the uss arizona memorial. cnn's athena jones is live in honolulu with the details. this is a first. this is the first time that a sitting japanese prime minister has made this visit. obviously this comes in the wake of president obama's visit to hiroshima not that long ago. what do we expect the leaders to say? >> reporter: good morning, poppy. well, today kicks off with a bilateral meeting between the president and the prime minister followed by a wreath laying ceremony at the uss arizona memorial. then later the two leaders will deliver remarks, which we expect will focus on the power of reconciliation. this is a historic visit, as you noted, and it's one that one

witness to the pearl harbor attack i spoke with is welcoming. 95-year-old robert lee says he's glad to see japanese prime minister shinzo abe making this trip. >> i think it's the greatest thing in the world. i think we've already gone through quite a bit of healing. >> reporter: he remembers well the day of japan's surprise attack 75 years ago when more than 2400 people lost their lives. >> it's very vivid in my memory, very much so. >> reporter: still a young man, just two years out of high school rotc, he looked on from his bedroom, later dashing to his front lawn as japanese bombers flew low over his home, headed for battleship row. >> i grabbed my .22-caliber target rifle and shot all 16 .22 lead shots at the planes. >> thinking it would work? >> of course not, no.

>> reporter: he watched as the uss arizona just a mile away exploded. >> it was that orange, red/orange color. about three seconds and then it exploded. the fire went up hundreds of feet from the whole ship, and the crackling of the fire was overwhelming. >> reporter: as those who could fought back, lee helped to wash the oil off sailors who jumped to safety. their ships under attack. later helping transport the injured to treatment facilities. by midnight, he had joined the military, serving domestically throughout the war. it was a long, emotional day that left lee angry, but he isn't angry anymore. >> hate is the greatest destr destroyer of anyone. the idea that you can harbor hate will destroy you. >> reporter: it's that

understanding the president celebrated at hiroshima. >> since that fateful day, we have made choices that give us hope. the united states and japan forged not only an alliance but a friendship that is one far more for our people than we could ever claim through war. >> reporter: a message prime minister abe is certain to echo as he pays tribute at this watery grave, now a sacred site. the prime minister will offer his prayers to those who lost their lives in the attack, but don't expect an apology. his will be a forward-looking speech. abe's press secretary says he began thinking about making this trip more than a year ago, and he made those plans official when he met with president obama on the sidelines at the apec summit in peru in november. don? >> athena, thank you very much for that. sports now as the cowboys get ready to ride into the

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that means it's time for the bleacher report, that music. dallas cowboys shining once again in prime time last night, winning easily against a desperate detroit lions team. desperate, coy wire. he's got this morning's bleacher report.

i like the bow tie. >> thank you, sir. coming from you, my day is made. my week is made. might wear this every day now. good to see you, don. going into this game, the cowboys already had home field advantage throughout the playoffs. they were locked up there, so a lot of people thought, will they rest their starters, will they pack it in? no, they put on a show. even though the lions were fighting for their playoff lives, they could not stop dallas' offense or the nfl's leading rusher. you know his name. ezekiel elliott shot through a cannon for 55 yards on this touchdown run. zek needs 178 yards in the cowboys final game of the season to break eric dickerson's all-time rookie rushing record. that's good stuff. how about dez bryant? two touchdown receptions and a touchdown pass. three touchdowns in total for dez bryant. what a way to go. the cowboys are rolling, 13-2 on the season. they win 42-21. and we present to you something that hasn't been done

in the nba for over a quarter century. the granny style free throw. yes, indeed. that's the rockets rookie. he knocked down not one but two granny style free throws in the game against the suns. look at his teammates. absolutely loving it. this was his first ever nba game. he had six point, not bad. but this is something that hadn't been done since the '80s. 1980. rick berry is the only guy we've ever seen do this in quite some time. so a shoutout to onuaku. >> do you know what poppy said? bill nye called and wants his outfit back. >> that's funny. i've been getting that a lot. >> it is funny. >> it's 6:45 a.m. coy wire, thank you. >> she didn't say that, by the way. >> i love bill nye. all right. from terror attacks to the death of fidel castro, what a year it

was. 2016, a year full of global events. up next, we look back at the top ten international stories of 2016.

what a year it has been, right, from stunning elections to terror attacks, the death of fidel castro. our clarissa ward takes a look back at the top ten biggest international stories of 2016.

>> reporter: we begin our top ten with brazil, a country whose roller coaster of scandals and triumphs made news the world over. a mosquito-bourn zika virus outbreak leading to a spate of birth defects. >> brazil is losing the battle against this virus. >> reporter: then a political crisis that rocked the powers of corridor. >> the senate removed dilma rousseff as president. >> reporter: all this a backdrop to brazil's moment in the sun. >> the whole world will be watching brazil as it hosts the olympics. >> reporter: which see despite a few setbacks was widely considered a success. >> the turkish military announcing it has taken over the country and imposed marshal law. >> reporter: in the dead of night, machine gunfire rings out as a coup attempt takes hold, and almost as quickly as it began, it was over. the president survives the coup attempt but some 290 others

would not. seeking retribution, president erdogan would go on to detain and dismiss tens of thousands of people. a diplomatic thawing sees a u.s. president touch down on cuban soil for the first time in 88 years, infuriating fidel castro. eight months later -- >> breaking news out of cuba, fidel castro has died. >> reporter: for some, grief for the loss of a revolutionary. for others, celebration for the death of a ruthless dictator. cuban exiles thrilled as they remember a tyrant who imprisoned and executed his opponents and brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. a global migrant crisis worsening by the minute. 65 million people now displaced. >> 2016 has been the deadliest year ever for migrants and refugees trying to cross the mediterranean. >> among those rescued, this

5-day-old infant peering out of his pink blanket. >> reporter: war, terror, poverty. seeing migrant camps across the world swelling to unsustainable levels. one camp in france bulldozed to the ground. >> translator: what is this life? have mercy on us. have mercy. >> translator: i wanted to tell you that you're not alone. >> reporter: coming in at number six, seismic stations around the world pick up on the unmistakable signs of north korean aggression. but this time it's different. >> north korea exploding its most powerful warhead ever. >> the equivalent of 10,000 tons of tnt. >> reporter: the question now, will the next warhead be mounted on a missile. >> when you have this many tests, you're eastbound traffve to get it right. >> reporter: unimaginable acts of terror in the name of isis leave a bloody trail beyond the

borders of iraq and syria. >> two explosions rocking the main terminal at brussels airport. >> across town in the center of the city, a bomb exploded on a metro train. >> reporter: those three suicide bombers killed 32 people. three months later, another airport is hit. three men wearing explosive vests carrying, a k-47s exiting a taxi curbside, shooting at panicked travelers before blowing themselves up. 44 people would never make it out of that turkish airport. >> about six to eight gunmen have taken over this bakery restaurant in dhaka in this more affluent, posh area of the city in bangladesh. >> military commandos moved in. the siege ended with 13 hostages saved but 20 others dead at the restaurant. >> this is cnn breaking news.

>> we are following breaking news out of france. >> more than a mile of carnage as the truck drove down the beachside promenade, killing as many people as the driver could. >> reporter: a day of celebration for french independence, ending with the slaughter of 84 people. while the so-called soldiers of isis waged war in cities across the world, back in iraq, the land they once laid claim to, was being taken back. >> the iraqi city of fallujah, we understand, has been liberated. >> iraq's military is claiming victory. >> a lot of coalition planning, american air power. one came right at me. >> reporter: cnn's own team would later make it inside the city limits of mosul and very nearly would not make it out.

we realize we're trapped. our m-rav takes a direct hit. >> [ bleep ]. >> reporter: we need to move, but every time we try gunfire drives us back. arwa damon and her team would spend 28 hours trapped, an estimated 1 million civilians are still within this embattled city. across the border in syria, another hellish landscape unfolds. its biggest city, aleppo, the epicenter of this horror. this is what hell feels like. >> the syrian regime's latest aerial assault. >> reporter: gallon drums filled with explosives and shrapnel, shoved out of helicopters. >> they're racing frantically to save nine people still trapped under that rubble.

>> reporter: a boy pulled from the wreckage of his home would become the bloody face of syria's suffering. >> he doesn't cry once. this is omran. he's alive. we wanted you to know. >> reporter: coming in at number two, russia flexing its military muscle at home. >> vladimir putin moving nuclear capable missiles to the border with poland and lithuania. >> reporter: and on a global stage. >> the u.s. is blaming russia for bombing a humanitarian convoy in syria. >> reporter: moscow using its superior arsenal to turn the tides of war in favor of syrian president bashar al assad. the diplomatic vacuum between the u.s. and russia intensified with accusations of hostile acts still shrouded in mystery. >> a series of cyber attacks on democrats indicate russia is try sway the election for donald

trump. >> reporter: and in our number one slot this year, the surge of populism across the west as voters rejected the establishment. many feeling ignored by politicians and left behind economically. >> this is cnn breaking news. >> the people have voted to leave the european union. >> dare to dream that the dawn is breaking on an independent united kingdom. >> reporter: it was a vote that took the world by surprise, one of the main forces behind brexit, anger over immigration. >> translator: they should go back to where they came from before we rip their heads off. >> reporter: and of course in the u.s., where president-elect donald trump capitalized on the issue. >> donald j. trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of muslims entering the united states. >> reporter: the rejection of globalization resonating with voters. >> cnn projects donald trump

wins the presidency. >> reporter: will the march of populism continue? with elections in france and germany coming up, 2017 promises to be an interesting year. >> my goodness. if as much happens in '17 and it did in '16. what got me most, arwa damon's reporting from mosul and the children involved. our very own keith bowen reacting the way everybody would. >> that toddler washing up on shore. i remember one depiction of it. if you try to flee, some of them die. those who stay, you remember that little boy in the ambulance, all bloodied in syria, his home in aleppo being bombed. no good choices for these children who have only known war. we're following a lot of news this morning. let's get right to it.

the president-elect is back on twitter, slamming president obama. >> trump says no way. >> if i had run again, i could have mobilized a majority of the american people to rally behind this vision. >> israel is not going to be kicked in the teeth and just not respond to this. >> barack obama believes that the two-state solution is dying. >> i look forward to working with the new administration. >> it's very, very disappointing to see an abandonment of israel at the united nations. >> by definition, it's not an ambush. >> violent brawls in more than a dozen malls across the country. this is "new day" with chris cuomo and alisyn camerota. >> good morning, everyone. welcome to your "new day." hi, poppy. good to be with you. alisyn and chris are off. poppy harlow is here with me. up first, president-elect donald trump sparring with the president now, obama. trump tweeting, there is no way obama would have defeated him if

the president could have run for a third term, that is. >> trump firing back in a series of tweets to those comments made by the president in that new interview we first shared with you yesterday. the president-elect also defending his charitable giving and his foundation while dismissing the united nations, calling it a club for people to have a, quote, good time. this as we're 24 days away from inauguration. let's begin our coverage this our with jessica schneider in palm beach, florida, where the sun has come up. what are you hearing? >> reporter: by the looks of it out a here at mar-a-lago, it is mostly quiet. the president-elect staying mostly out of the public view over christmas, that is of course except for twitter, where donald trump is fighting back and lashing out. the president-elect going after president obama after obama speculated he would have won a third term if it was possible, using his message of hope and