because, oh, about ten feet from me now, megyn kelly is standing by for a live edition of "the cell eye file". we'll see you

this is what he said, "we shot down an an-26, that is a military transport plane near the city of torez, donetsk people's republic. we warned, he tpz, don't fly in our sky. that post has been deleted. june 29th, russian separatists posted a photo on twitter about having overtaken an sa-11 anti-aircraft system from a base in eastern ukraine, the same type of missile system u.s. intelligence suggested could have actually taken down this aircraft. adding to the evidence here, the ukrainian intelligence service has put out a tape of an intercepted phone call between rebel leaders bragging about shooting down a plane and while we have no way of confirming the authenticity of the tape during

a second phone call the commander goes from excited to bewildered when he was informed not a military shot down but a commercial airliner shut down. who are the rebels and their leaders, is stralkopf a russian special forces or intelligence officer leading the rebels and perhaps more importantly as we come up right now on 24 hours since the shoot-down, the question is, who was actually in control of that surface-to-air missile battery, russian special forces or pro-russian separatists and as we learned, heather, when we were there on the ground in eastern ukraine, that san awfully blurry line. back to you. >> it is. quick question for you. i'm wondering if u.s. intelligence knew that the rebels had captured the surface-to-air missile system. did we have any knowledge of this beforehand? >> in the past couple of days all of a sudden a number of ukrainian military planes that were flying at relatively high altitude 25,000 feet were shot down that, is about the time

u.s. intelligence sr. began to believe the russian separatists had some type of anti-aircraft system that went beyond shoulder-fired missiles. it went from shoulder-fired missiles to something sophisticated like the type of weapons that would have been used to shoot down this airliner. >> all right, leland vitter in washington was there in the region not too long ago. we'll check in with you as news warrants. rnlts t rnlts. the united states puts sarngss with russia on the company that creates and builds these. new information is emerging about the victims, it's very confusing, 298 people killed, 23 believed to be american. david piper joins us live from ban k bangkok, thailand, with how the world is reacting. >> reporter: good morning, yes, there's a growing sense of revulsion here in asia other what's happened and also shock that it again involved a malaysian airlines jet four

month after mh-370 went missing. families of loved ones who were on the plane have been gathering in malaysia's main airport where the aircraft was due to arrive this morning. 298 people, three infants were on board but not allocated seats. they have now been included in those that were lost. malaysia airlines is contacting relatives and then will release the manifest of who was on board, it will be looked at to see if any known terror suspects were on board. reports suggest as many 80 children were on the plane, many nationalities, 150 from the netherlands, 27 australians, and at least 23 americans. they may be some of the 47 people whose nationalities haven't been identified yet. this woman didn't board the plane. >> i'm shaking. i don't know what to do.

i feel like physically sick. i was like from the hague coming to the airport, and just crying and thinking that i feel like i've been given a second chance. >> a number of those passengers were going to an international aids conference in australia. back to you. >> david piper live from bangkok. now we'll take to you a live news conference. heather has more on that >> we have the malaysian transport minister here right now to talk about the malaysian flight and mh-17. let's listen in to what he has to say. this is live, coming in. to the families of those who lost their lives, our hearts go out to those who have been

affect affected. in recent hours, officials in the u.s. and ukraine have indicated that malaysia airlines flight mh-17 was shot down. it will be contro tra conveniented with international law and malaysia condemns any such action in the strongest possible terms and calls for those responsible to be swiftly brought to justice. the ukraine government will institute investigation into the acti

action. >> all right, well that was the malaysian transport minister basically offering his condolences. little difficult to hear right there. we'll break that down and determine more of what they have to say about this. >> some strong words, though. he did say if, in fact, this was a missile that shot this plane down sbintentionally it is a clr violation of international law and they condemn it in the strongest manner. >> in the wake of the disaster, the faa is now banning all u.s. flights from entering ukrainian air space until further notice saying "the potential for continued hazardous activities" basically could take place in the america. the faa barred american air carriers flying over part of russia and ukraine for safety concerns but mh-17 the area was not included in this restricted air space. the time now 14 after the top of the hour. passenger plane attacked in mid flight, exploding in the sky, and where is the leader of the

free world? he's fund-raising and getting a lot of criticism for that this morning and we'll tell you what the administration had to say about it, many saying it's simply a lack of response. that's coming up next.

back at 6:16 on the east coast and the takedown of a malaysian flight. our president has time for fund-raising even stopping for a hamburger in delaware last night. >> marianne rafferty is here now in the studio with us. what are people saying about the white house's lack of response to this tragedy? >> good morning, heather. 298 people are dead and malaysia arlsz plane shot out of the sky but the president moving forward with his planned schedule twul fu two fund-raisers in delaware last night. he stopped at a burger joint, only a brief mention of the downed passenger jet. >> looks like it may be a terrible tragedy.

right now we're working to determine whether there were american citizens on board. that is our first priority. >> the president heard about the crash from russian president vladimir putin, who passed along air traffic control reports during a phone call to discuss u.s. sanctions. later the white house releasing a photo to show the president has things under control on the phone with the ukrainian prime minister aboard air force one. not everybody is convinced. >> how does the white house react to the notion that the president is a bystander to all these crises? >> there have been a number of situations in which you've seen the administration intervene in a meaningful way that has substantially furthered american interests and substantially improved the, you know, the tranquility of the global community. >> some are arguing the president has a pattern of zoning out during times of crisis. >> this last week he was in texas and went to a fund-raiser instead of the border and he's got a pattern of doing this, the

day after the benghazi attack he was in las vegas for a fund-raiser. the day after putin took over crimea, he went to a fund-raiser and said it's happy hour for the democratic party. >> so what is on the president's schedule today? he has a trip to camp dived scheduled. >> it really makes you scratch your head and wonder. thank you marianne rafferty. he is not mincing words when it comes to president obama's response to the plane attack. he says "enough is enough and this president needs to step up and actually lead." >> he's had no reaction to anything that i can tell in the last six months. look, it isn't as if we're going to go to war with russia but we have denied ukraine lethal weaponry on the grounds we don't want to escalate the conflict. the rebels and russians are killing ukrainians in large numbers by shooting them out of the sky. the least the president can do is make a damned decision for once in his life. we are now going to supply

lethal weapons to assist the ukrainians in defending themselves and complete the offensive going on in eastern ukraine to destroy the rebel insurgency. >> it is now 19 minutes after the hour and we have another huge story we're covering this morning. the israeli military launching a ground offensive in gaza. its goal to target hamas leaders. >> what does this mean now for the middle east? we'll talk about that, up next.

we turn to another fox news alert and another major story we're following today the israeli military launching an all-out assault on the gaza strip. at least 14 hamas militants have been taken out so far that we know of, and one israeli soldier

has been killed in action. so what does this mean for the entire middle east? here to weigh in on this, fox news contributor and middle east expert lisa destari. thanks so much for coming in this morning. we know there are boots on the ground, israeli boots on the ground going through gaza. what can we expect to happen today? >> this is something that the s israeli and benjamin netanyahu left on the table, if we need to go in with boots we will go in with boots. they're talking about a focused target attack, going after the tunnels, very specifically after the tunnels. >> the tunnels that bring in a lot of supplies and equipment into hamas. >> right, because they can attack with the missiles and target specific leaders of hamas in gaza. the tunnels are underground access into israel and what happens to offset this nod benjamin netanyahu gave on the ground was the hamas rejection to the cease-fire.

we have this ping-pong match, but again we see that israel allowed for the, a smaller cease-fire yesterday, let humanitarian aid in. >> and hamas started firing rockets again, doing away with the cease-fire. >> right, so we have this bad pattern but what really offset the ground operation, 13 terrorists actually using the tunnel to try to get into israel yesterday and that's what we went in for the ground operation at that point. >> we do have some video of israel going after those 13 hamas members that you mentioned, basically emerging from that tunnel and being taken out by some sort of an israeli air strike. so let's talk about what's happening now in gaza. will this do the trick? will this put on end to hamas' mission against israel? >> what israeli sources and the idf are saying this is an open-ended operation. they're calling it the second fails of the operation, but what they want to say is that this is actually going after with

tweezer tweeze ers rather than an axe. >> this sounds like a big deal, they called up 66,000 reservists, israel has. >> they're not just going in there and bombardinge trying to civilians, given ample warning, gotten texts and leaflets to evacuate. >> have the civilians heeded that warning? >> many have not. >> hamas said it's all propaganda, don't believe it. >> hamas is telling people to say home whether it's to become martyrs or stay home and protect themselves or send the children to the roof to act as human shields this is something we've seen a lot on the side of the palestinians and the hamas leadership there. if hamas was there to protect the palestinians we'd see them protecting them like the israelis. >> and helping them get out. >> instead using them as human shields. >> we don't know how successful israel will be in this mission but lisa daftari we'll check in with you again. when we come back we have live team coverage of the other

huge story we are covering today, the malaysian jet that was shot down by a missile. we'll be back in just a minute with more on that.

good morning to you. you are watching an early edition of "fox and friends" first because there is so much huge news breaking throughout the world. i'm heather nauert. >> and i'm heather childers. malaysian jet shot down by a missile in war-torn ukraine. 298 people are dead. >> ukraine and russia are blaming one another for the shooting down of that plane. >> let's get started with that. doug is live in our d.c. bureau. doug, what do we know? >> heather, we know that the black boxes have reportedly at least been recovered and that will tell us the altitude for instance of the aircraft in the moments before it was apparently taken down by a missile, but the real evidence may be on the ground there. all of that debris, some of

which made their heat signatures of a missile that struck the aircraft. that's why they'd be looking for big pieces of fuselage, for instance, that may have distinctive markings on them. beyond that, when you look at the video of the crash site itself, this is strewn over a considerable area. that in and of itself may be an indication of what happened to the aircraft. there seems to be little doubt it was taken down by a surface-to-air missile. earlier this morning, malaysian officials talked about the mounting evidence. >> should there be concern t will be contravened international law. >> there is already considerable fingerpointing here. russian-backed ukrainian rebels blame the government there, the ukrainian government blames both russia and the rebels, which have recently shot down a number of ukrainian aircraft in the same region, and of course, this would implicate russia. >> we must, we must react in a

stringent fashion, because vladimir putin has clearly been fomenting this situation in eastern ukraine, even recently sending in additional troops and additional equipment for the "separatists." >> now, among all of the pieces of evidence that we'll have to consider here would be u.s. satellite data. because of the growing conflict there in the region, the u.s. has positioned a number of satellite around there, some of which can detect the heat of missile launches, which may give us an indication what type of missile was launched and which side it was launched from, ukraine for russia. >> dug luzader live for us, thank you. who shot down mh flight 17 moments after the crash? russian rebels claiming responsibility for shooting down

a russian plane. >> leland, tell us what this group is capable of? >> heather, they are a scary bunch for sure. it is believed pro-russian separatists are commanded by the russian special forces and intelligence communities who provide not only strategic guidance but weapons from moscow. the separatists have become highly proficient shooting down ukrainian planes. at the same time the malaysian plane went down, a separatist leader igor strokopf posted this, we'll translate the russian, "we shot down on an-26" a military transport plane used by the ukrainians "near the city of torez, donetsk people's republic" the area they control. "we warned you" he continues, "don't fly in our sky." that post has been removed.

there was a post on twitter bragging taking over an anti-aircraft system from a base in eastern ukraine, the same type of missile u.s. intelligence suggested could have taken down the aircraft. the ukrainian intelligence services put out a tape of an intercepted phone call between rebel leaders first bragging about shooting down a plane and while we have no way of confirming the authenticity of the tape, during a second phone call released by the ukrainians, the commander goes from ex-sided to bewildered when he's informed it was a commercial airliner they shot down. the question remains who are the rebels and more importantly their leaders, including stralkopf, is he a ukrainian who loves mother russia or intelligence officer leading the rebels. the key question is who actually controlled that surface-to-air missile battery, russian special forces or pro-russian

separatists. it is an awfully blurry line between the two groups. back to you. >> leland, since you were on the ground there, it will be very significant gaining access to the crash site itself. what can you tell us about this area where the plane went down? >> imagine the farmland, you'd probably think about it as almost nebraska-like if you were to equate the geography to the united states in terms of what the terrain is like, but remember that when we were there, we were going through an awful lot of checkpoints. they do not like americans. they do not like westerners, and they are all armed, so the idea of actually getting folks in there, these rebels do not want you do is going to be an awfully difficult proposition and especially given the amount of area that you would have to cover. this is not like the ntsb go team can just show up, and you can imagine that during this time, if the russians want to have people on the ground doing whatever it is they want, cleaning up, gathering things, that kind of thing, these

pro-russian separatists will be a lot more friendly towards them than they are going to be anybody to the west. >> leland, since you've been there, let me ask you about our human intelligence on the ground. does the united states have any assets on the ground that can further tell us who exactly night might be responsible and whether or not the rebel commanders are communicating with russia on this? >> you have the human intelligence s aspects, spies, t more important is the signals intelligence that intercepts phone calls, those kinds of things that the u.s. is going through. we already saw the ukrainians put out this tape of these alleged phone calls and that's where you're going to get more of your real time information. it was in the past week or so that u.s. intelligence realized that they had an operational surface-to-air missile system that was as sophisticated at the fa-11. back in april in may when i was there, they had shoulder launch

kind of things that work against helicopters, low-flying aircraft. it was this past week or so that the united states and western intelligence figured out that they had this more sophisticated system on the ground in ukraine and conceivably figured out how to use it. >> making this a whole different ball game. >> thank you, leland. ambassador john bolden not holding back to president obama's response to the crisis in ukraine. he says the u.s. sampnctions ha not gone far enough. >> these are pure pin pricks. we have to get off the idea that imposing economic sanctions on a country that are not xleely xre hen completely comprehensive. they don't care if their standard of living falls 5% or at least their government doesn't. you go back to ramping up american missile defense. if you want sanctions let's have real sanctions. i'll give you an example.

no russian financial institution has any role in the american financial system. that's a sanction. >> he made some good points with that whole conversation. we have some new information that is emerging this morning about the victims. 298 people killed, 23 believed to be americans. >> david piper is covering this angle for this, is he live from bangkok, thailand, with how the world is reacting. what is so bizarre normally you know at this point whether or not americans were on this plane and we can't say that for certain and no word yet from the state department on that. david, what can you tell us about this angle? >> reporter: well, at the moment we've got a figure around 40 that haven't been classified by nationality and there's a suggestion that that could be those 23 americans, but of course no confirmation at this time. here in asia, there is growing anger over what has happened and also shock that the malaysian airlines plane has been involved

again in one of these major crises. families of loved ones who were on the plane have been gathering in malaysia's main airport where the aircraft was due to arrive earlier local time. the death toll updated to 298, three infants were on board but not allocated seats and now been included in those that were lost. malaysia airlines says it's contacting relatives but will release the full manifest of who was on board. the manifest will be closely looked at to see if any known terrorist suspects were on board. reports suggest as many as 08 children were on the plane. many nationalities were on there, including 150 from the netherlands, 43 from malaysia, 27 australians and as i said, being reported at least 23 americans, they may be as i said also that some of those 47 people whose nationalities haven't been identified yet, and this woman didn't actually board the plane.

>> like i'm shaking. i don't even know what to do. i feel like physically sick. i was like from the hague coming from the airport and in the taxi, just crying. i feel like i've been given a second chance. >> reporter: a number of the passengers on their way to an international aids conference in melbourne, australia. their names have not been confirmed but it's believed they were leading hiv/aids resev researchers. >> receiving news colleagues and friends on route to attend the international aids conference taking place in melbourne, australia were on board the flight that has crashed over ukraine. >> reporter: australian prime minister tony abbott says the world should be filled with revulsion over what has

happened, because it stands, it looks less like an accident and more like a crime. he said it was a grim, grim time for the families of those on board, and a grim day for the world, adding "it was confirmed the plane had been shot down" becomes not an accident but a crime. he also called in the russian ambassador to his office to try to get some response to the incident and he told reporters that he was actually the ambassador said it was ukraine's fault, and he said that wasn't satisfactory. back to you. >> a lot of fingerpointing. 298 people, by some accounts 80 children. >> interesting that russia is blaming ukraine. it is now 41 minutes after the hour. ukraine and russia playing the blame game as we said in this missile attack. >> while president obama is back here at home busy with photo-ops and also fund-raising. we'll tell you about the administration being increasingly under fire this morning. that's coming up next.

>> stay with us. @pp@paúq÷wx

15 minutes before the hour now. malaysia airlines flight shot out of the sky yesterday, 298 people are dead but for the president of the united states, it seems to be business as usual. the white house is under fire this morning for a lack of response to the tragedy. >> marianne rafferty is live in the studio and joins us with what is on the president's agenda today. he's getting a lot of pushback for attending those fund-raisers and i'm looking behind you right now. he talked about not liking photo-ops, but he had one yesterday. >> actually he is under a little bit of fire for this. according to his official schedule he'll be meeting with advisers before a planned trip to camp david after a long night of fund-raising in new york city. earlier he pushed for more

highway funding in delaware. during his speech there only a brief mention of the downed passenger jet. >> looks like it may be a terrible tragedy. right now we're working to determine whether there were american citizens on board. that is our first priority. >> the president heard about the crash from russian president vladimir putin, who passed along air traffic control reports during a phone call to discuss u.s. sanctions. later the white house releasing a photo to show the president has things under control, on the phone with the ukrainian prime minister aboard air force one. but not everyone is convinced. >> how does the white house react to the notion that the president is a bystander to all these crises? >> i think that there have been a number of situations in which you've seen this administration intervene in a meaningful way, that has substantially furthered american interests and substantially improved the, you know, the tranquility of the global community. >> some are comparing the

president's reaction to president bush on 9/11. >> if you read the accounts of that day, president bush desperately, he was insistent over the objections of everybody in the security detail "i'm going to be back in the white house tonight. i want the americans to see the commander in chief in the white house leading the country unafraid." americans are not seeing that from this president. we need the commander in chief, republican or democrat, when americans might be killed you want the commander in chief in charge. you want him back at the white house doing his job and not raising money for the democratic party. >> the white house did issue a statement late thursday demanding a full and credible investigation. heather? >> marianne rafferty, thank you so much. president obama's response to the crisis erupting into two parts of the world is already drawing comparisons to a 1983 incident. >> back then soviet fighter jets attacked a korean airliner killing everyone on board that plane. president ronald reagan did not mince words when it came to that

attack, three decades ago, remember this. >> i'm coming before you tonight about the korean airline massacre, the attack by the soviet union against 269 innocent men, women and children aboard an unarmed korean passenger plane. this crime against humanity must never be forgotten, here or throughout the world. let me state as plainly as i can, there was absolutely no justification either legal or moral for what the soviets did. one newspaper in india said "if every passenger plane is fair game for home air forces, it will be the end to civil aviation as we know it." >> interesting that that was not even american flight, but the president, our president took to the air waves to discuss that issue. >> good comparison. as you remember ronald reagan went on to lay out the groundwork for the dismantling of the soviet union. happening in tel aviv right now, a live update from israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu, giving an update on the situation in the gaza strip,

the israeli military launching an all-out is aa salt to target hamas. we'll bring you the latest live at 5:00 a.m. from jerusalem. >> that is one of israel's military leaders. the blame game is in full swing this morning for the rocket attack that brought down mh-1. ukrainian separatists are the suspect number one. >> so are the separatists suspected of launching this attack? we'll take a look.

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this is a crime against humanity. all red lines have been already crossed. this is the deadline. >> that is the prime minister of

ukraine just moments ago condemning the actions behind the malaysian flight disaster, also saying that his country is launching its own investigation into what happened and who exactly is responsible for this. this as we get in some brand new video coming in to fox news. this is the site where the malaysian airline went down after it was hit by a surface-to-air missile over eastern ukraine killing 298 people. no one has taken responsibility for the mh-17 crash, but suspicion falls on pro-russian separatists in eastern ukraine. so what do we know about this group? michael ruben is from the american enterprise institute, joins us now some additional information. what can you tell us about these rebels or these pro-russian separatists? >> well, good morning, heather. the rebels or the separatists, it's really a distirnnction we shouldn't make with regard to the rebels versus the russians. they are former russian special forces, the head igor gherkin,

sometimes called igor strelkov is a former fsb agent, fsb is a successor to the kgb. i've studied a lot of rogue regimes a common pattern is to try to establish these proxies in order to have plausible deniability. shame on us if we allow these russians to get away with it. >> so what do we need to do? how do we keep them from getting away with it? >> well ultimately we need to realize that the buck stops with the kremlin. these weapons appear to be coming in from the kremlin, either the kremlin doesn't have control over its weaponry, which is a major concern, or they're simply with not even a wink trying to transfer to these guys to avoid accountability. either way i agree with ambassador john bolton, we have to make sure russia understands it will be held accountable for any proxy it creates whether or not it wants deniability. >> we know that russia has at least one of the black boxes. overnight a second one was

discovered. we don't know who has that. in terms of access to the crash site itself, what about the separatists and these rebels? what do you believe that they will allow or will not allow when it comes to investigating the actual site itself? >> you know, the circumstantial evidence points overwhelmingly to these russian-backed separatists in the ukraine. the fact of the matter is, they're not going to want to provide definitive proof that they were responsible for this. we shouldn't demand definitive proof if they're not going to allow access, that's a confirmation of guilt. >> okay, michael ruben, sorry we have to wrap you up. thank you for joining us. >> thank you. when we come back, our live team coverage of the malaysian jet shot down by a missile, that continues. stay with us.

0

. welcome good morning. welcome to "fox and friends first." i'm heather childers. >> i'm heather i am heal an m missile in the ukraine.al an m 23 americans dead. russia and ukraine blaming each other. a second black box was discovered from the wreckage. >> the second story we mentioned israel's military says they are now expanding the ground offensive that is underway in gaza. the goal to target the leaders of the terror group hamas. >> the latest on the investigation as to what brought down that plane. >> doug luzader is live for us in the washington, d.c. bureau just coming in. what can you tell us? >> where are the black