QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, thank you so much for making time for us today. We appreciate it.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Always good to be with you, Andrea.
QUESTION: We're told that there is potentially some very good news: that there is a breakthrough; that we've been close before but that this time there could be a deal, a ceasefire deal, with the hostages starting to come out within 48 hours of the announcement of a deal, and it could come this week; that this is always conditioned on the fact that Hamas, Mohammed Sinwar could back out of it, but that everyone else is on board. Correct?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Andrea, we are closer than we've ever been. The ball is in Hamas's court, but it's very close, and we are very hopeful that we get it over the finish line finally after all this time. We've had Lucy and the football moments before —
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: — where the ball gets pulled away at the last minute. You can never exclude that. But as I said, we are closer than we've ever been.
QUESTION: And that the priority would be the same as the President announced in May and that you've been announcing —
SECRETARY BLINKEN: This is based on - this is based on the framework the President put out in May that we got the whole world to endorse - country after country, the United Nations Security Council —
QUESTION: And —
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Everyone got behind it. And then finally, back then, Hamas was isolated; it accepted the framework that the President put forward. Ever since then, we've been working on negotiating the final details, everything that has to go into implementation. And time and again, it's been delayed or derailed by some event. But now we're at a point, as I said, where we are closer than we've ever been, and we'll have to see if Hamas can finally say yes.
QUESTION: And I've been told by several sources very close to this that, as we have expected, the injured - the women, the injured, the elderly would come out first, and then of course the Americans, alive and dead. That is the general sense.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: I can't - look, I can't - I can't get into the details of - the President, when he put out the framework, made clear that during the first six weeks of this agreement - because it's basically a two-step process of a phased deal - the first six weeks, the conflict stops, Israel pulls back its forces, a lot of hostages come out, some prisoners are released by Israel, we surge humanitarian assistance, and we also use that time to try to finalize an agreement on an enduring ceasefire. We've done a lot of work on that. We haven't waited to get to the ceasefire itself. We've done a lot of work with Arab partners, with Israel, with others to try to get an understanding on what would follow, basically a post-conflict plan, so that the vacuum that's there - when Hamas is effectively not in charge and Israel pulls out - is filled by something that can run Gaza effectively.
QUESTION: And a very important part of this, by your initiative, is that simultaneously Steve Witkoff, the envoy from President-elect Trump, has been there for the last three days —
SECRETARY BLINKEN: That's right.
QUESTION: — along with Brett McGurk, the White House envoy, that they have been full partners in this. I am told by U.S. officials very close to it that he has been very helpful on a couple of key issues, and the Israelis are on board, and it's now up to Hamas.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Yeah, I think Steve Witkoff has been a terrific partner in this, and also President-elect Trump in making clear that he wants to see this deal go forward, and go forward before January 20th. And of course, everyone wants to know - and it's very useful as well to have Steve a part of this - they want to make sure that the deal that the President's put on the table and that we've negotiated, the Trump administration will continue to back. So getting - creating that confidence by having Steve Witkoff's participation, I think, has been critical. But this has been a very good partnership, and we hope that together we get this over the goal line.
QUESTION: Now, with Hizballah all but destroyed, with Hamas and the war potentially over in Gaza, with Syria, the regime now gone, isn't Iran appreciably weakened without its proxies? And what is your expectation about what Israel might do next?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Yeah, this is a dramatically transformed Middle East for all the reasons you've said, and it has put Iran on its back feet in ways that we haven't seen before. It's lost its best proxies in Hamas and Hizballah, it no longer has Syria and Assad, and as a result I think there's an opportunity to transform what's happened, and also to have something that deals with the fact that it's - what's happened in the last couple of years has come at a terrible human cost - to actually get to a broader transformation in the Middle East.
QUESTION: But let me interrupt you to ask, since you yourself have said that Iran is a week away from having enough fissile material to theoretically build a weapon - they don't have weaponization yet, but they're reaching a red line, an Israeli red line. The Israelis see this as an existential threat to their existence. What would stop Israel now from going in and taking out the nuclear program? They've already taken out critical air defenses.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: So yes, Iran is at a point where, in terms of the fissile material necessary for a nuclear weapon, it could upgrade that material to bomb-grade quality in a matter of a week or two. But as you said, it still also has to develop the weapon itself, and that would take a lot longer. Look, Iran is going to be faced with decisions of its own of how it wants to move forward, but I think the incoming administration would have an opportunity precisely because Iran's on its back feet - the - it's suffering economically in a terrible way. Its people, I think, are disputing so much of what the regime has done, particularly in meddling in the affairs of other countries throughout the region. This is a moment of opportunity, and maybe a moment of opportunity to resolve in an enduring way the nuclear challenge posed by Iran, but also the actions that Iran takes throughout the region.
It's also a moment of opportunity if we can get an enduring ceasefire in Gaza, and if there can be some greater agreement on a pathway forward for Palestinians to realize their political rights; a moment of genuine integration in the region where Israel normalizes its relations with everyone, including Saudi Arabia, it's integrated into a regional security architecture that further marginalizes and isolates Iran and betters the lives of people throughout the region. There is a huge opportunity here, and everything that we've been able to set in motion or support in the last couple of years has moved us to this point.
QUESTION: Why shouldn't Israel take out the nuclear program once and for all?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: You have to look at what would be enduring and what would make sure that the program doesn't come back. So one of the things you have to assess is: If that were to happen, would Iran simply rebuild and rebuild even deeper underground in a place that would be even harder to get to? You want to make sure that whatever you do - and everyone is determined that Iran not have a nuclear weapon, starting with President Biden - but you want to do that in a way that's enduring.
QUESTION: Let me ask you about Syria, because Syria has now had an attack from ISIS in Damascus over the weekend. Türkiye has attacked the U.S. allies, the Syrian Defense Force, in northeast Syria. This is such a fragile peace. Is it important to keep some U.S. troops there to make sure that those ISIS prisoners are kept imprisoned by the Syrian Defense Force, to make sure that the whole thing doesn't collapse and ISIS regain a foothold?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Look, one thing we've learned over the years is that what happens inside of Syria doesn't stay inside of Syria. You see all sorts of consequences that flow out of the country, whether it's the potential for terrorism that goes well beyond Syria, whether it's mass human displacement. So we have a stake in trying to make sure that this extraordinary opportunity that is now before the Syrian people to actually control their own lives and their own destinies - not have a dictator do it, which is the case for the last five decades; not have some outside power do it; not have a terrorist group do it - that's the possibility.
But you're exactly right; it's incredibly fragile. And I think the U.S. role in trying to help guide this and shape this, along with Arab partners, along with other European partners and others - Türkiye - is essential. That means, I believe, keeping some presence, but it also means being very engaged in all of the efforts to help support a Syrian-owned, Syrian-led transition to get the country to a better place.
QUESTION: ISIS has had this incredible propaganda machine, and it's gained strength in the last four years frankly, Mr. Secretary - on your watch and on this administration's watch, more specifically. But they are inspiring lone wolves all over the world, most recently in New Orleans. What can the U.S. do to try to combat the propaganda machine of this terror group - potentially getting a foothold in Syria, but even if they don't, they're inspiring terrorists.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: So Andrea, I think there are two things we have to focus on. First is making sure that ISIS doesn't emerge from the box that we put it in. When I say "we," I'm talking about what the Obama administration did to take away the so-called caliphate that had developed. It had - it had actually had for the first time a terrorist group control —
QUESTION: In the Trump - in the first Trump administration.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: And yes - and that's what I wanted to come to. This was a success of the Obama administration completed by the Trump administration. That caliphate was destroyed. All the territory that they had taken - mile upon mile in Iraq and in Syria - was taken back. It was completed by President Trump when Raqqa, the last piece that held, fell. ISIS was in a box. It's been in a box ever since, but we have to keep it there.
And keeping it there will also take away from the potency of its propaganda. You're right; of course, that propaganda continues. We see lone wolves who are inspired. But without the success of having a caliphate, of having - controlling all this territory, being able to say for the first time we have a terrorist group, ISIS, that controls territory, that really undermines the potency of its message.
If that were to change, if we were to allow ISIS out of the box again - there are 10,000 foreign terrorist fighters, ISIS fighters, who are being controlled in detention centers in Syria. We also would want to see them get repatriated to their countries of origin, but meanwhile, they need to stay locked down.
Our Kurdish friends and the Syrian Defense Forces, they're critical to doing that. That's why, even as we're working with Türkiye to deal with its very legitimate concerns about the PKK, the terrorist group that's attacked Türkiye for years, we have to do it in a way that avoids a conflict between the Syrian-supported forces in the northeast and the Syrian Defense Forces with the Kurds, and to over time integrate those Kurdish forces into a Syria national force, to have any of their foreign fighters leave Syria. All of that can happen, but we need to give it a little bit of time.
QUESTION: Chris Wray just told 60 Minutes, and Homeland Security Secretary - the Homeland Security Secretary told me that the greatest threat we are now facing is from China hacking us, from hacking our infrastructure, our telecom companies, our water companies. And this has just increased exponentially. How come we cannot stop this hacking? In terms of Storm Typhoon, we don't know how they got in, how long they've been there, and we don't know how to get them out.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Yeah. So this is an enduring challenge. There's no finish line. This is the nature of the world we live in. It's the nature of competition right now. And what we've done over these past years is to shore up our defenses everywhere, including right here at this department, to do everything possible to detect and uncover these efforts as necessary, to go out to sanction Chinese entities that are involved in it and others who do it.
QUESTION: Shouldn't there be more consequences?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: There –
QUESTION: This is a serious threat.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: This is going to be something that's going to be with us for a long time, and we have to make sure - as we're doing - that we continue to try to stay ahead of it, both in terms of our defenses, both in terms of taking action as necessary against China - making sure that others are doing the same thing, other countries working from the same page. But there's no finish line. We have to just keep making sure that we're as strongly defended as possible and that there are consequences that flow from these actions.
QUESTION: Climate change is a major threat and is a national security threat. We're seeing it in Los Angeles most horrifically now. It's catastrophic.
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Yeah.
QUESTION: President Trump last time got out of the Paris Climate Accords. What advice would you have for him about re-evaluating climate as a national security threat?
SECRETARY BLINKEN: Yeah, Andrea, I think it's exactly as you say. What we've seen is climate change is a driver of so many other things. It's a driver of conflict. It's a driver of mass human displacement. It's obviously a driver of suffering, as we've seen horrifically in Los Angeles. And so it's exactly as you say: It is a national security concern. And I hope that as the administration looks at this it will take action accordingly. One of the first things President Biden did was to get back into the Paris Accord, but beyond that we've taken so many steps over the last four years to try to make sure that we were doing our part.
But here's the challenge. Even if the United States does everything right - from my perspective - in terms of emissions, we're maybe 15 percent of global emissions. You've still got to account for the other 85 percent and you've got to bring other countries along. If we're out of the game, it's a lot less likely we'll be able to bring them along. When we're in the game, we've had real success in doing that. So I hope the next administration stays in the game.
There's another aspect to this too, and it goes to the competition with China. So much of the investment that President Biden has made in climate technology, including through the IRA, has been all about winning the competition for the 21st century economy. Because all of these technologies that we're investing in now, China is investing in, and they want to capture markets around the world. And countries around the world want this technology, like electric vehicles. And if we're not in that game, if we're not making these investments, someone else is going to be doing it, and it's China. So I think we have a profound interest in making sure that we're continuing something that really is a win-win. It's a win-win in terms of the dealing with the climate challenge. It's a win-win in making sure that we continue to have by far the leading economy in the world that everyone else looks to.
QUESTION: And our thanks to Secretary Blinken for sitting down with us on a very busy day.
