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THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER

Some Leaders' Presence at Unity March Raised Questions; Prevention of Terror Attack in U.S.; Terrorists Kill Up to 2,000 People in Nigeria; Demonstrations of Resilience in France

Aired January 12, 2015 - 16:30   ET

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


JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: So, theoretically, Jake, a trip could have been made. But we should also point out the White House said earlier today this was not a decision made by the president. This was made by other staffers. They just won't say who. Jake?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Interesting. Jim Acosta reporting live from the White House, thank you so much, Jim. Appreciate it.

So President Obama's absence from the unity march and the absence of other U.S. officials, it's making headlines. But it's the presence of leaders and dignitaries from other nations, their actual being here, that has come as a surprise to some groups that consider the fight for free speech a full-time job. It must be an even bigger surprise to the journalists and activists who are behind bars in their countries for saying something that the regimes didn't like. The nonprofit group Reporters without Borders put out a statement today saying it was outraged by the presence of officials from countries that restrict freedom of information. They were at the rally anyway. And Reporters without Borders called out nations like Egypt, ranked 158th out of 179 nations on the press freedom index. Egypt sentenced three al-Jazeera journalists to between seven and ten years in jail on what many to be believe to be trumped-up terrorism charges for supporting in their view the banned Muslim Brotherhood. It's now been more than a year since the arrest of journalists and they were just granted a retrial.

Turkey was there, the prime minister represented at the rally. They rank 154TH on the press freedom index and according to the committee to protect journalists, Turkey won back-to-back titles for jailing the most journalists in 2012 and 2013. "Je suis Charlie," indeed. And then of course, the ambassador from Saudi Arabia, proud participant in that rally. Saudi Arabia, which condemned the slaughterhood at Charlie Hebdo just a few days after had it flogged a blogger for the same crime, blasphemy. Then, of course, there's Vladimir Putin's Russia which has sent their foreign minister Sergey Lavrov to that rally. Very exciting to see him. They've also sent several journalists on to long assignments in Siberia. They sentenced the blogger who launched a website exposing the corruption in the Sochi winter Olympics and sent the band Pussy Riot to prison for performing a negative song about Vladimir Putin. Russia incidentally ranking 148TH out of 180 on the world press freedom index. "Je suis Charlie," indeed.

In other national news, all three dead terrorists were known not only by French intelligence officials, but they were on the U.S. terror watch list. And they had been on it for quite a while. Now our sources are filling in the blanks on what the U.S. knew and when the U.S. knew it and the potential for any possible attacks on American soil. That's coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to "THE LEAD." I'm Jake Tapper, and I'm live in Paris today as we try to find out more details about last week's terrorist attack that paralyzed much of this nation. We are now learning that the man who took hostages and killed four of them at a kosher supermarket was on a U.S. terrorist watch list and investigators are trying to find out whether the terrorist linked to the Paris attack have crossed paths with any American citizens. CNN justice correspondent Pamela Brown has that part of the story for us tonight.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, in the wake of the Paris attacks and new efforts by ISIS to capitalize on the momentum the Department of Homeland security has tightened security at federal buildings in more U.S. cities and law enforcement is being asked to stay on heightened alert. The big concern among law enforcement here is that there were Americans training alongside the suspects in Yemen and that there could be others like the Kouachi brothers and Amedy Coulibaly living here.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: With an ISIS flag behind him and a rifle at his side, the alleged killer in the kosher market siege seen here in video that emerged over the weekend pledges allegiance to ISIS. A senior U.S. law enforcement official tells CNN Amedy Coulibaly was in the U.S. government's terrorist database known as Tide for a while, though it's not certain if he was on the no-fly list. The Coulibaly video surfaced just as ISIS tweeted out a video encouraging Jihadis go out and attack government officials and civilians in Canada, the U.S., Australia and France. Law enforcement officials say the terrorist group is trying to galvanize supporters in the wake of the Paris attacks.

ERIC HOLDER, ATTORNEY GENERAL: This is the nature of the new threat that we must confront.

BROWN: In response, the FBI and DHS sent out a warning urging law enforcement officials across the country to stay on a heightened state of alert and the NYPD sent out a city-wide warning.

JOHN MILLER, NYPD DEPUTY COMM. OF INTELLIGENCE AND COUNTERTERRORISM: What you also see with this renewed threat is a call for a wider audience through their Twitter capabilities, through their Internet reach, through their videos, to say we want more people to engage in low tech, low cost, high yield attacks with whatever they can put together.

BROWN: Law enforcement officials say it's not yet clear if the Paris suspects were directed or just influenced by ISIS or al Qaeda to carry out these low tech, low cost attacks. Whether or not there could be similar type attacks in the U.S., U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein raised alarm bells when she said this on CNN Sunday.

SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, (D) INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRWOMAN: I think there are sleeper cells not only in France, but certainly in other countries and yes, even in our own.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And a senior U.S. law enforcement source I spoke with said there's no evidence of sleeper cells in the U.S., also said it's possible there are other people that they are just not aware of who are plotting attacks and that is, of course, the big concern, Jake. What officials don't know?

TAPPER: Pamela Brown with that report from Washington, thank you so much. Pamela, joining me now to talk more about the threat to the U.S., potential threat to the U.S., is former State Department coordinator for counterterrorism, Ambassador Daniel Benjamin, he was a chief advisor to Hillary Clinton while at the State Department. He is now a director of the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College. Ambassador Benjamin, good to see you, as always. Yesterday on CNN's "State of the Union" Senator Feinstein, member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said that the Visa waiver program, this is the program that allows citizens from some countries to enter the U.S. for up to 90 days without a visa, she called that the Achilles heel of America. Do you agree and what more do you think needs to be done to prevent an attack on the homeland?

DANIEL BENJAMIN, FORMER STATE DEPT. COUNTERTERRORISM OFFICIAL: Jake, it's good to be with you. I don't agree. In fact, the visa waiver system is complemented by an extensive array of information sharing agreements that we have with our European partners, who are the principal participants in visa waiver and with other countries that tell us an enormous amount about who is getting on every plane coming to the United States. And because of that, our intelligence community is able to check every possible database and look into any derogatory information about travelers here. We are much, much safer than we were 10 or 15 years ago in that regard, and while we can't predict perfect success in this regard, we are much better off and I think it's a pretty good system.

TAPPER: We have seen these attacks on Western countries in the last few months, the attack in Ottawa, the attack in Australia, now these horrific attacks in Paris. What do you think the likelihood is that we will start to see this as the new normal in Western countries, including the United States?

BENJAMIN: Well, Jake, in some sense, we have already seen it because since the late Yemeni clerk Anwar al Awlaki put out his call for individual acts of jihad by people wherever they may be, we have seen a number of such acts and, of course, one of them, the most notorious, was carried out by Nidal Hassan at Fort Hood. And I think all of this belong in that same category. So, it could happen here but having said, I think we have really dedicated domestic law enforcement and intelligence personnel working these issues around the clock. So, it could happen, you can't prevent every attack, but I think we are much more aware of the threat than anyone on earth and really doing our best to prevent it from happening again.

TAPPER: Just a few months ago, President Obama touted the anti- terrorist operations in Yemen as a clear success. It's still vague, it's still murky how connected the Kouachi brothers were to al Qaeda in Yemen, AQAP, but what does this attack say and the fact that Anwar al Awlaki still really wields clout when it comes to Jihadis and home- grown terrorists, even though he was killed in 2011. What do all these attacks say about how successful the U.S. has been in anti- terror operations in Yemen?

BENJAMIN: Well, we have been pretty successful. We have thwarted quite a number of attacks from the Christmas Day, so-called underwear bomber on. But it's important to remember that Yemen is a very difficult case. It's -- much of its territory is ungoverned. We have been working with that government in Sanaa and trying to increase our ability to strike at terrorists, but this was a problem that was growing for more than a decade, and some people did get to Yemen, they did get training and they did go home and they still have that knowledge and that wherewithal to attack. So again, I think we are making progress, but we really need to keep track of all those people who have been in Yemen and who may have been radicalized and gone home. None of these capacity building cases, none of these cases where we are working with other countries are easy, are clean or fool- proof.

TAPPER: Ambassador Daniel Benjamin, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

Coming up, attackers on motorcycles, hunting down people as they tried to flee. The ones who hid in their homes were burned alive. Horrific details of the latest Boko Haram attack and now word that the terrorist group is using young girls as suicide bombers.

Plus, Charlie Hebdo employees, they are working on their latest issue set to be released one week after the terror attack, in just two days. That's coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper coming to you live from Paris, France.

We'll get back to coverage of the lives lost here in France, and this city and country on edge. But, first, calls to stop a string of deadly attacks in Nigeria. In one case, explosives were strapped to a young girl and then detonated in a crowded marketplace. In another incident, hundreds of bodies left scattered in the town of Baga. That area, too dangerous right now to recover the bodies for a proper burial.

Authorities believe that the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram is responsible for it all. That, of course is the same group that kidnapped the 200 school girls last spring.

CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson is following it all in Nigeria.

And, Nic, these are horrific incidents. What if anything is being done to stop the attacks?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, eyewitnesses describe hundreds of Boko Haram arriving in the early morning hours of Saturday, 3rd of January, in the town of Baga, opening up with machine gunfire, heavy rocket-propelled grenade fire. The army they say was on the run. That's the crux of it there, if you will. The only army outpost overrun, they were forced out.

This witness hid out in the bushes by his house for three days before Boko Haram moved on and he was able to escape. He thinks that as he left, he saw as many as 3,000 bodies.

The army, however, are saying that they believe there were only about 150 people killed. They say they have had covert surveillance, aerial reconnaissance, and this is the basis for their figure of 150 dead, they say including soldiers as well. But they are not offering up these aerial photographs to kind of back up what they're saying here.

So, it runs in the face of the witnesses, what witnesses are saying, and we've also talked to soldiers here who have been involved, have been sent in to recover some of their colleagues who were killed in the fighting. One soldier talks about prying out of a burnt-out vehicle, prying out the charred bodies of colleagues and being so traumatized by it, not being able to eat for days. That's some of the first-hand accounting, even from the soldiers we are getting here.

As for those young girls with bombs strapped to them, not just in one market, but on Saturday, but two girls Boko Haram apparently strapped bombs to and sent them into another market nearby on Sunday.

So, it's now three girls have been used as essentially unwitting and unwilling human bombs. A dastardly tactic by Boko Haram here, Jake.

TAPPER: Nic Robertson reporting to for us in Nigeria -- Nic, thank you. Stay safe.

The tension between France and its Muslim population started way before this attack on "Charlie Hebdo". Could yesterday's historic call for unity be the start of something more meaningful? We'll talk about that next, live from Paris.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper in Paris, France.

Demonstrations of resilience and solidarity here in Paris have been overwhelming. People in France vowing to stand together against last week's act of terrorism.

Let's bring in Bernard-Henri Levy. He's a philosopher and author here in Paris. He contributed to "Charlie Hebdo".

Monsieur Levy, I want to ask you, "Liberacion" is reporting, and we have not authenticated this yet, but they are reporting what the next issue of "Charlie Hebdo" will be. And it's a picture of -- a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad, and it says on top, "all is forgiven" in French and he is holding a sign saying "Je Suis Charlie".

It sounds like the paper is not backing down, it will continue to provoke, continue to be outrageous in the name of satire.

BERNARD-HENRI LEVY, FRENCH PHILOSOPHER & AUTHOR: I never contributed to "Charlie Hebdo" but I was their friend.

TAPPER: Oh, you didn't? You were their friend. OK, I apologize.

LEVY: But this is so brave. They are so great. To continue in the state where they are, state of despair, state of sorrow, state of mourning, to continue to joke and to laugh and to do this sort of cartoon, this is really bravery. They are courageous.

You had Daniel pearl in America. We have Cabut, Charb, Wolinski and Tignous. This is, as we say in France, the politeness of despair. Politeness of despair is humor. You laugh -- to laugh is a way to hide the politeness of despair.

TAPPER: What a lovely way to put it.

I want to ask, you are also a member of the Jewish community. We went out to a Jewish school today. We talked to a Jewish mom at the kosher supermarket where those four innocent Jewish men were killed. There's a lot of security, a lot of people with guns, police, soldiers, standing outside Jewish schools where kids play and learn. It must be awful.

LEVY: This is awful. This is awful.

This country which has been built partly by Jews, Jews belong to this country. They made the culture of France.

This situation of being guarded by brave policemen and soldiers is so sad. But, unfortunately, for the moment, it is necessary. It began by crowds in the streets shouting "death to Jews" in the time of the war in Gaza.

Then, you had attacks on synagogues by some jihadists but they were just trying and now Jews have been targeted as Jews, not because they made cartoons, not because they mocked Muhammad, just because they were born Jews and four of them were killed, shot dead.

So, there is a threat today which is serious, which is clear. We have to keep our cold blood, I keep mine, but this is the situation and I understand that for moms, may be afraid for their kids when they go to school.

TAPPER: Yes, no, it's very sad. And yet at the same time, we also saw yesterday with this unprecedented rally in which there were not only Jews and Christians and secularists but Muslims holding up signs saying "Je Suis Charlie." Or "Je Suis Juif", I saw a young Muslim girl, young Muslim woman, Frenchwoman, holding a sign saying, "Je Suis Juif".

It seems as though there is the potential for moderate Muslims and Christians and Jews to stand together and really fight this scourge, this Islamic jihadism.

LEVY: It is the same sort of reaction as you had in America after September 11th -- pride, solidarity, brotherhood, and not accepting the victory of the terrorists. They ask us to lie down, we stand up. They want to divide us, we unite. They want to set Muslims against Jews, then Muslims come in the street with Christian, with atheists (ph) and with Jews.

And you have another board, which was taken by some French Muslims, which was, not in our name.

TAPPER: Right.

LEVY: Your Islam is not my Islam. Your reading of the holy text is the wrong reading.

At last, we were waiting for this moment in France since so long. Muslims taking the speech, taking the voice to say, not in my name. It came yesterday in this huge prodigious gathering in the streets of Paris.

We did not see that, so many people in the streets, since the funeral of Victor Hugo in 1882.

TAPPER: Well said. Thank you very much.

LEVY: Thank you.

TAPPER: Monsieur Bernard-Henri Levy, thank you so much.

That's it for THE LEAD in Paris, France. I am Jake Tapper.

I want to give you just a couple of final thoughts about covering the demonstrations yesterday, I have never seen, I've never participated in a rally or covered a rally where more than 1.5 million come together for something so positive, especially something so negative happened. It really reminded me a lot of what we saw after bin Laden was killed, and the outpouring of love and unity that we saw in the United States. I remember going to the White House that night and covering it, and the cheering -- the organic, spontaneous appearance of this crowds, and the cheering was quite something to behold and I beheld it again in much larger numbers in Paris, France, on Sunday.

I now turn you over to Wolf Blitzer. He's in "THE SITUATION ROOM."