east coast has gabriel elizondo in our washington news and its peculiar language there isn't it all as well and so far so good. yeah it is peculiar language but i think what you're seeing there from president donald trump is he's trying to downplay the situation a little bit it's important to note to come out that tweet came out just about 9 50 pm local time here in the u.s. used before 10 pm about 2 hours ago so that tweet came out after the president had been briefed by his war cabinet which was his secretary of defense secretary of state as well as joint chiefs of staff chairman who all rushed to the white house as this as the 2 bases in iraq were being attacked and briefed the president and it's unclear what exactly they briefed him about the details of the attack but of the attacks i should say but clearly trump got the message or the message he wanted to give out to the world really into the american people where is it from his perspective everything is under control now white might why might he be saying this you know there were talks that the president could it could be address

troops in iraq let's talk to gabriel elizondo who joins us live from washington d.c. gave it all to believe that a letter of such importance was leaked mistakenly and officials have not been scrambling ever not to limit the fallout and there's been a pretty bad week for the pentagon. it really has a pentagon was in damage control on multiple levels on monday to really understand and really get the full impact of this letter and why it was so damaging is that to remember over the weekend it was the iraqi parliament that decided to voted for this non-binding. voted this non-binding to remove u.s. troops from iraq and then president trump tweeted afterwards saying american troops are going nowhere we're going to stay in iraq so that's when we come to monday and this letter was leaked it was a letter that's on department of defense letterhead it signed or it wasn't signed but it was written by a general based in iraq an american general and it was a letter purportedly to his iraqi colleagues or is iraqi counterparts the military in iraq and listen to the 1st sentence of t

now we have a team of correspondents across the story so beautiful teen is in iraq's capital gabriel elizondo we'll have more on president trump's reaction and dorsetshire bari will have all the latest from the iranian capital but it's right matheson begins our coverage with this report. this is iran's promised response to the us assassination of top iranian general on their money ballistic missiles soaring into the night sky their targets to iraqi military bases housing thousands of u.s. soldiers iranians are taking the crowd there to hit back directly they wouldn't even leave their proxies to deliver the message that their american. kind of saving faith order for them because killing so they money. is an insult from the americans to iranian establishment to iranian estate all and therefore i think you're ronnie and has to retaliate on twitter this was us president donald trump's response all is well he's added casualties and damage are being assessed and said so far so good he's also said the u.s. has the most powerful and well equipped military anywhere in the world by far the question is

team of correspondents monitoring all the developments some wonderful tina's in iraq's capital gabriel elizondo we'll have more on president trump's reaction and dosage of bahrain will have all the latest from the iranian capital but 1st rob matheson begins our coverage. this is iran's promised response to the u.s. assassination of top iranian general high seems on the money ballistic missiles soaring into the night sky their targets to iraqi military bases housing thousands of u.s. soldiers iranians are taking the core of the to hit back directly they wouldn't even leave their proxies to deliver the message that their american. kind of saving faith or for them because killing so they money. is an insult from the americans to iranian establishment to iranian state as all and therefore i think you're ronnie and has to retaliate on twitter this was u.s. president donald trump's response all is well he's out of casualties and down. mage are being assessed and said so far so good he's also said the u.s. has the most powerful and well equipped military anywhere in the world by far the question is wh

take on this evolving story thank you let's go back to washington and our correspondent there gabriel elizondo gapes so it's moving pretty fast now what else do we know. still radio silence out of the pentagon from the white house and state department absolutely no communications from any official channels out of any of those 3 areas. there are unconfirmed reports that the pentagon is waiting until there is d.n.a. confirmation that they get on the ground before making any sort of announcements again that's unconfirmed no official channels or are doing this we've reached out to the pentagon on multiple levels multiple times but it is absolutely silent read into that what you want but clearly this if it turns out to be true would probably reckon it would mean an announcement from the president of the united states donald trump he's still at his mar-a lago resort in florida again nothing out of the white house and i should mention there was no hint that anything such as this was in the works either in any official washington channels at least that leaked anywhere publicly this is coming as as big

military confrontation than just a moment we'll be speaking to dorset a body who's in tech run and gabriel elizondo in washington d.c. but 1st this report from our white house correspondent kimberly hauck it. with the u.s. and iran edging dangerously close to war president donald trump proclaimed that tehran appears to be standing down truck gave no indication that the united states intends to strike back hours after running in missile attacks on 2 bases used by the u.s. military in iraq we suffered no casualties all of our soldiers are safe and orderly minimal damage was sustained and our military bases it was a stark contrast to the president's threats of retaliation without hesitation that have dominated his twitter feed in recent days instead flanked by top advisers and generals trump laid a surprising suggestion that members of nato to become much more involved in the middle east process it was an astonishing claim from a president who once called nato obsolete he also encouraged u.s. partners and allies to abandon the j c p a way an agreement put in place in 2050 and by world powers to live i

indicating the withdrawal but a top general said it was circulated by mistake will be speaking to gabriel elizondo about u.s. troops in iraq in just a moment but 1st let's go live now to us a bag who is in tehran i said let's talk about the funeral 1st thousands of iranians have turned out and sent him on his hometown to pay their final respects tell us what's been happening and the feeling across the country right now. well it's what we've been witnessing over the last 3 days since the assassination of a cousin so the money now there are $3.00 days of mourning yesterday was a funeral it was a national holiday few repair was led by the supreme leader ayatollah khomeini today he's being buried in his home city of kut monetarist seeing thousands and thousands of people but the calls from the streets of course are the same cause that we've heard here in the harare and all over the country and that is in the calm that's the farsi word for revenge people in the streets are calling for revenge and assassination of them so the money has reignited this country just back in november we saw widespread antig

the president's defense team says it will argue he's on solid legal and constitutional grounds gabriel elizondo has more from washington d.c. . they are going to argue they say the fundamentals of the 2 articles of impeachment against the president the abuse of power and obstruction of congress they're going to say from a constitutional and legal standpoint that nothing the president is being accused of is necessarily a crime and they will say it does not rise to the levels high crimes and misdemeanors something that a president shouldn't be impeached for the 1st migrants from a caravan moving north through guatemala have been allowed into mexico there were scuffles at the crossing earlier central american countries are under pressure from the u.s. to stop the breaching us border most of the violence worthing poverty and violence in honduras east africa is seeing a rise in locust swarms it's adding to fears over food security in the region still reeling from floods and drought kenya is one of the worst affected countries the insects have destroyed hundreds of thousands of hectares of crops in s

security council that it reserves the right to self-defense about his killing gabriel elizondo has been. their i remember ambassador to the united nations sent this one and a half page letter friday evening to u.n. secretary general andrew good 10 days and the security council and in it he says that iran reserves the right to respond based under international law and he also had some very strong comments in it as well saying that the assassination is solely a money quote by any measure is an obvious example of state terrorism and a criminal act that constitutes a gross violation of the fundamental principles of international law and the principles of the u.n. charter so that's the statement that's going out to the u.n. from the iranian mission so far the americans at the u.n. have not responded but earlier in the day u.n. secretary general antonio gutierrez did say that he is deeply troubled by events going on in iraq right now the republican strategist rich joins us now on skype from briston in virginia good to have you with us. the assassination is being justified on the grounds that.

says it's concerned about the virus spreading to nations with weak health systems gabriel elizondo has more from washington d.c. we've heard from a spokesperson from the chinese foreign ministry who came out and said that they will continue to work closely with the world health organization but said that china has the confidence and capabilities to beat this we have also heard from the chinese ambassador to the united nations who while admitting that this is in a very critical stage with coronavirus saying we urge the world not to overreact so what you're hearing from china is very much message that we do have this under control. the u.s. special envoy for syria says at least $200.00 as drawings of him the last rebel held province in the last 3 days and estimated 700000 people in italy have been the lean towards the turkish border. doldrums trial defense team has told u.s. senators that the president should not be impeached for doing anything to boost his reelection prospects democrats say they're trying to normalize lawlessness and police and protesters have clashed in india's capital

says it could further complicate the situation in life now to washington and our correspondent gabriel elizondo gape hi there was mr trump in saying. trump spoke to aired on just a couple hours after that vote in turkey that could potentially send troops to libya and we got a very brief readout or summary of that call from the white house and between the 2 leaders and the message was very clear message was that the trump told aired on any foreign intervention in libya is just going to complicate the situation there in that country sort of warning or giving an admonition to err to want to be careful about anything he does there and that's insinuating that the u.s. would not support that but the u.s. policy towards libya is quite complicated and quite frankly it's been all over the map on one side you have countries such as the u.a.e. united arab emirates russia and egypt that support the war lord half they are speaking to trump out of one side of his ear the other side you have countries like turkey that support the u.n. recognized prime minister in tripoli speaking to trump out of the other sid

all say there is intelligence to suggest the plane was struck down by an iranian missile over gabriel elizondo in washington he says despite the earlier concerns the investigation into the crash is likely to be an international effort everyone wants to basically get to the bottom of this quickly because the sooner they can get on the ground and all of these teams can start gathering all of the the information that's necessary the sooner we'll reach a conclusion of what actually did happen in conclusion though it should be pointed out that their ratings are the lead investigators on this right now and they say that they will do a full and transparent investigation and keep everybody involved particularly ukraine of course where this plane was from. if the headlines the u.s. house of representatives has passed a not chose to support it democrats actually opposed the measure of house speaker nancy pelosi said the assassination of general concepts of the money was provocative and disproportionate russia and turkey have announced a ceasefire in syria's last rebel held strongholds hundreds of people

ok let's take you to washington and our correspondent gabriel elizondo surrogate we know the u.s. secretary of state mike pompei oh he's been checking in with his regional allies here in the middle east do we know what's come out of that conversation. not fully but we are getting a better sense of who he spoke to and perhaps why secretary of state mike pompei o made a round of phone calls to regional allies to prime minister benjamin netanyahu of israel he thanked netanyahu for israel's continued support he also called the prime minister of iraq dumas the on wednesday as well and he stressed to the prime minister of iraq that it's the government of iraq's obligation to protect u.s. diplomatic facilities in iraq and also geisha and to see that these sort of attacks on the u.s. embassy do not happen again according to the readout from the state department secretary of state pompei also had a phone call with the qatari amir tomine bin hamad al funny this was an important call because qatar is a very important ally to the united states according the state department the to the amir qa

indicating that was drool but a top general said it was circulated by the state will be speaking to gabriel elizondo about u.s. troops in iraq in a moment but 1st let's cross live to us a big in the iranian capital asset let's talk 1st about the funeral thousands of iranians have turned out. to pay their final respects tell us what's been happening and the feeling across the country right now. well this is the 3rd day of mourning got some of the money is set to be buried in his hometown of mon now we've seen similar crowds across the country his body arrived 3 days ago yesterday was a funeral and brought in with the supreme leader to look how many led those prayers we saw in the streets packed with mourners lot of emotion a lot of people are still very angry angry and asking for revenge and similar scenes. at the moment in fact people there were shouting the farsi word for revenge was the thumb and this is what the head of this time of revolutionary guard had to say in response to that. and. our revenge will be harsh in tough be certain because we are telling the enemy we will avenge him if you resp

state department is advising americans against traveling to china gabriel elizondo has the latest from washington d.c. . the advisory is very clear it's a level 4 advisory which is the highest and most severe level advisory that the state department would issue to american citizens and it is very simple it says do not travel to china not only do not travel to the epicenter of where this outbreak is happening but it's very clear saying do not travel anywhere in china period full stop 2 days of questioning has just wrapped up in donald trump's impeachment trial senators will now decide whether to allow witnesses democrats have been pushing to hear from trump's former national security adviser john bolton meanwhile trump has been rallying supporters in iowa accusing the democrats of trying to overturn the result of the 2016 election event comes ahead of the state caucuses on monday when democrats begin the months long process to choose their candidate for november's presidential vote. the u.s. special envoy for syria says at least 200 air strikes have hit the last rebel held province in t

says $11.00 soldiers have been treated for concussion in kuwait and germany gabriel elizondo is in washington d.c. he says the troops are expected to return to iraq after their treatment. it does not appear to be serious injuries nevertheless this is what the pentagon is telling us they say that after the missile attacks on the base many of the service members were screened for concussions which they say is very common the blast from missiles can cause buildings to shake and rattle and and can cause potentially concussions in people that are even outside of the immediate impact zone once these tests were done on multiple service members that were at that base that needed further screening they showed signs of some sort of concussions that were they suffered after the blasts from those missile rocket launches the service members have been transported to a u.s. air base in germany to a u.s. air base in kuwait and they say they're doing further testing the military says this is all part of standard procedure no one is in any sort of life threatening injuries or anything like that in fact the mil

ok let's go live now to washington and my colleague gabriel elizondo he's there were donald trump has been tweeting about the unrest as of tuesday cable gets there in just a 2nd of these reports talking about the u.s. considering sending more forces into iraq how do we read that. yeah there are reports in us media here on tuesday evening that the u.s. could be sending as many as 4000 troops to the middle east very soon in the wake of these protests in baghdad outside of the u.s. embassy reports are that the entire 82nd airborne of the u.s. army is big division has already been given deployment orders and that 500 paratroopers are already in route to kuwait it's important to note that this is not yet confirmed we have reached out to the pentagon the pentagon will not confirm this with us however we are potentially expecting the pentagon to issue a statement about this potential new troop deployment in the coming hours if this is true it would mean a dramatic escalation in the number of forces that are being sent to the middle east so far only about 100 u.s. marines that were based in k

and bring in gabriel elizondo gave a rather curious tweet from president trump saying all is well so what can we read into this some are we now seeing perhaps a pause of a possible off ramp for the americans to cool down this temperature. well there's certainly a pause and there's certainly a potential off ramp for this to lead to some diplomacy the big question now is will president donald trump take that off ramp or not we overly only have heard since these strikes from one tweet from the president as you mentioned said all is well and then he ended his tweet by saying i will be making a statement tomorrow morning that would be wednesday morning here in the united states trump just said that there the u.s. is still assessing the situation but it was sort of for lack of a better word a kind of an upbeat tweet almost like nothing to see here look you know keep going along there what to make of that i think that is essentially basically trump was meeting with his war cabinet in and after that he basically got got the word that there were no american troops that were killed and so i th

tehran doors or is there no we seem to have lost dorsey will go to the united states where gabrielle elizondo is standing by can you tell us more about what the u.s. has confirmed deal with the pentagon has confirmed here with this strike. yeah it was a pretty remarkable department of defense statement about this it's good too and a half paragraphs long i won't read the entire thing again but the key points that stand out here is obviously the united states department of defense confirming that the strike that killed solomon he was at the direction of the president united states that should not necessarily be a surprise given the high profile of solo money but also in the statement of by the department of defense they really pointed out how solo money in their view was actively planning more attacks on americans and american diplomats in the region there was a real sense in this statement that solo money in his cause forests were. an immediate threat to american lives in the region all read part of it general so the money was actively developing plans to attack american diplomats and service

the strongest of a series of earthquakes to hit the island in the past 2 weeks under serious gabriel elizondo is in washington and says the island is bracing for further aftershocks. the epicenter at least where the hardest hit area that we're seeing where most of the damage is it's along the southern coast of puerto rico we've seen pictures on social media and a little bit of video that people have been posting on social media showing that in one town the main churches collapsed in other towns along the southern coast we've seen some roads that have collapsed and washed out as well as some buildings and homes that have collapsed as well in the city of poland's a city of about 150000 people on the southern coast we've seen some damage there as well the main hospital there while not collapsed has been completely evacuated because there's fear that the hospital infrastructure or the foundation could be compromised soon after these earthquakes hit there was a tsunami warning that was issued but it does not appear that there is a tsunami threat at this time the people were very nervous in puerto

trump was one to run will quote pay a big price for any damage or loss of life at the embassy gabriel elizondo has more from washington secretary of state mike palm pale gave an interview tuesday evening to c.b.s. news new united states he basically called the protests outside the embassy a very serious sit.

security council it reserves the right to self-defense the killing of so the money gabriel elizondo joins us live from washington gabriel we've had this communication from the iranian ambassador what else do we know about its contents it was a long letter about one and a half pages it was sent late friday to u.n. secretary general internal good jihadists as well as to the security council and as you mentioned it was a iran mission there basically told the u.n. that it reserves the right to respond in self-defense based under international law the letter went on in part to say that. the killing of solo money by quote by any measure is an obvious example of state terrorism and as a criminal act constitutes a gross violation of the fundamental principles of international law including in particular those stipulated in the charter of the united nations so what you hear now is basically iran laying out its case if you will on why they think that they they clearly think that this was an illegal assassination of sort of money and also laying out to the u.n. its reserving its right to respond acc

trump is one tehran will quote pay a big price for any damage or loss of life at the embassy gabriel elizondo has more from washington. secretary of state mike pompei o. gave an interview tuesday evening to c.b.s. news new united states he basically called the protests outside the embassy a very serious situation but said at no time was the u.s. ever considering evacuating the embassy in his words he said that iran was directly responsible he said again in his words this is all for stems from iran's state sponsored terrorism that according to the secretary of state and if that's not enough tuesday evening as well the president of the united states donald trump sent out a tweet where he again pointed the finger directly at iran i want to read you exactly what the president said in a tweet tweet he said iran will be held fully responsible for lives lost or damage incurred at any of our facilities they will pay a very big price this is not a warning this is a threat before finishing the tweet with happy new year so what you're hearing here is basically pompei on one side saying our embassy is no

is taking this and how potentially it could escalate again gave thanks very much gabriel elizondo our correspondent in washington hillary mann leverett is formally a white house national security official she's currently c.e.o. of strategy a political risk consultancy she joins us from washington as well hilary great to talk to you again what's your reading of how the trumpet ministration has handled this. well i think you know what what we see is in india an enduring symbol of the storming of the u.s. embassy by thousands of of iraqis it's an enduring symbol that nearly 17 years after the u.s. invasion of iraq one trillion dollars spent $5000.00 u.s. lives lost that the u.s. position in iraq is is worse today than it ever was and i think the trump and ministration president trump in particular but also secretary of state pompei o are very concerned that what is happening in iraq could at least you know on television look like a nother benghazi moment that's what they're talking about here the concern that back in 2013 when the u.s. u.s. diplomatic compound was stormed in magazine lib

secretary of defense then denied it let's get more from gabriel elizondo he joins us now live from washington d.c. again but we had lots of used sirens here is hard to believe that less of such importance was leitz mistakenly and yet officials have been scrambling to limit the damage this has been a bad week for the pentagon has it not. it has and it was not only that this letter was leaked that's bad enough but that the contents of the letter are apparently incorrect according to the secretary of defense as well so to understand this just look back to this weekend 1st when the iraqi parliament voted on a non-binding measure to the victim u.s. troops out of iraq that was the 1st thing that donald trump afterward said tweeted out no u.s. troops will not be leaving iraq so that's the context we have here and that's when this letter came out in the letter was on department of defense letterhead and it was written apparently by a brigadier general that it's from the u.s. military in iraq it was written apparently to give to his iraqi military counterparts informing them that the u.s. was pulling

security council that it reserves the right to self-defense after the killing of some in money gabriel elizondo joins us live now from washington so let's discuss this letter from the iranian ambassador what do we know as to what he's saying and what reaction is he expected to get. yeah there i remember ambassador to the united nations sent this one and a half page letter friday evening to u.n. secretary general andrew good to it is and the security council and as you mentioned in it he says that iran reserves the right to respond based under international law and he also had some very strong comments in it as well saying that the assassination is solely a money quote by any measure is an obvious example of state terrorism and a criminal act that constitutes a gross violation of the fundamental principles of international law and the principles of the u.n. charter so that's the statement that's going out to the u.n. from the iranian mission so far the americans at the u.n. have not responded but earlier in the day u.n. secretary general antonio guterres did say that he is deeply troubled by eve

ok let's bring in our washington correspondent gabriel elizondo we understand the u.s. secretary of state might pompei oh he's been talking to regional friends regional allies do we know what's come out of those conversations. yeah he's been working the phones pretty vigorously on wednesday's been speaking to 3 very key allies in the region number one benjamin netanyahu the prime minister of israel spoke to pompei on the phone not much was released about what they talked about but the state department say that pompei of thanks netanyahu for his support over the last couple days particularly also spoke pompei oh by the a phone to iraqi prime minister. in that phone call pompei o stressed to the prime minister that the iraqi government is under an obligation to provide security and protect u.s. diplomatic facilities inside iraq and stressed that the u.s. is expecting that iraq will continue to do that over the coming days weeks and months but then pump ale also spoke with the qatari amir tomine bin hamad funny this is an interesting call they according to the state depart

apollo knee and trump's personal attorney jay sekulow for more we're going to cross live to gabriel elizondo in washington d.c. game it looks as though this is a pretty high powered defense what are we reading into this. yeah i think you can read into it that trump is taking this very very seriously i mean these 2 lawyers that he brought in to be part of this team are celebrity lawyers that are very very well known in washington and have a long history in this city and really in the nation 1st looking at alan dershowitz a long time a law professor at harvard he's considered one of the preeminent constitutional lawyers in the u.s. dershowitz is actually a democrat and voted for hillary clinton however he has come out very strongly over the last 3 to 4 months or so even if before that saying that he believes that this impeachment trial is something that should not be pursued constitutionally and that there are no high crimes and so-called misdemeanors and so that's really caught trump's attention and i think that's probably why he brought dershowitz on his team also dershowitz as appears on te

you very much live now to washington correspondent following that end of this developing story gabriel elizondo gave a sketchy picture at the top line seems to be that the u.s. has been involved it would appear according to these multiple reports in taking out 2 high value targets. yes peter and in times like this it's important to reveal to our viewers who is talking and what we know but it's just as important to be honest about what we don't know yet let's just be clear that we've reached out to the pentagon we've reached out to as many sources as we can at the pentagon and as of now nobody from the pentagon is confirming with us absolutely anything absolute radio silence out of the pentagon right now read into that whatever you want if we get something from the pentagon the minute we get it we're going to share it here also nothing from the white house or from the secretary of state mike pompei oh washington in the last hour or so all the official channels anyway are absolutely silent so again read into that what you wish now reuters as you briefly mentioned is reporting that this according

depends on the witnesses and we simply don't know if they'll be allowed yet think that that's gabrielle elizondo there and what isn't in d.c. . still ahead so on al jazeera t.v. interview. today i am being seriously threatened in my physical integrity and that of my family the venezuelan government is accused of offering bribes to the opposition of these. and that rugby union to european champions to form overspending or players' salaries i think relegated to the 1st 2nd division. head of the big snowstorm across northern sections of the united states snow ice blizzard conditions and a cool some rain further to the south but it has been meeting fairly swiftly this storm system look at this this is in utah salt lake city 13 centimeters of snow has been recorded and then as a say the storm is moving reading its way eastward so this is day morning across in iowa again a case of digging out of all that snow but just look at this because by sunday it really is pretty clear out across much of the west the central regions and even by then across much of the northeast still some snow flurries really lak