Medal of arts, the first lady is also going to attend. Thats it for way too early and t. J. Is back. Morning joe starts right now. Despite talk of a new temporary ceasefire in gaza today, both sides in that war launched new attacks. Hamas rocket launches roar to life. In israeli, fired back. We have accepted five ceasefires acted upon hamas has rejected every single one of them. They have even violated their own ceasefire. You want to recognize israeli as a jewish state . No. More fighting in ukraine is preventing outsiders from reaching Malaysia Airlines flight 17. The fighting, some of the
worse of the fighting seems to center around the crash site itself. So much of what people do is psychologically annual lies so you tell us what is he like . You met him many times. He is very tough. If he wants to stare intently at you with his very bright blue eyes he can turn on the charm. The fighting in elaborate rages on tonight. So the u. S. Embassy in triply is guarded. Will you consider impeaching the president . You know, this might be the First White House in history that is trying to start the narrative of impeaching their own president. Good morning. Its monday, july 28th. Welcome to morning joe. With us on set, youre not going to believe this, joe. Pulitzer prize winning jon
meacham. Mark halpern, thank god youre back. We have some politics to talk to you about this morning. Host of way too early, thomas roberts. Hello. In washington, National Security correspondent for the New York Times david singer with new reporting this morning out of Eastern Ukraine. T. J. Is back. Youre not going to look good, nor am i this morning. None of us are but that is okay. There is t. J. Looking good, t. J. , nice and rested. I wish we could all take vacations. Im going to go on from there. How was your weekend, mika . Did you have an uneventful or exciting weekend . No. What happened . I had a weekend that had to do with the trials and tribulations of raising teens. Thats all im going to say. It happens to all of us. Im not sure. You should take a vacation some time. Im not sure ill make it through this period of time. Is all im going to say. Its not that much different
from coming to work . Love my girls. They are so much different. We want to get to some of the political stories going on. Over the weekend, israeli agreed to a brief ceasefire proposed by hamas but, sunday, more rocket attacks and more israeli raids this morning. Secretary of state john kerry has reportedly turned his hope to rolling ceasefires now with a permanent diplomatic solution proving to be elusive. The white house is increasingly concerned with the death toll and president obama called Prime Minister netanyahu knowing him it is time for an unconditional ceasefire. One of the shells landed near a u. N. School last week, but says it fell outside the school denying it was responsible for the deaths of 16 people, including children. Lets get the latest now and joining us from gaza, nbc news Foreign Correspondent, ayman
mohyeldin. Today is the period marking the end of ramadan. Families get together and have meals and children receives toys and gives and very much like christmas in the United States but here today a somber feeling among many families and some not even leaving their home and assessing the damage. Over the weekend a lot of damage was visible for us and others as we traveled across various parts of gaza to see the results of the fighting has crippled gaza the past several weeks. The death toll stands 1,039. A lot of people still digging through the rubble and believed hundred dollars more are buried where in the gaza strip. On the political front, there is this kind of de facto ceasefire that has emerged. Neither side officially calling
it a ceasefire but both sides clearly restraining themselves a little bit. We have heard the sounds of rockets being launched and sounds of israeli fire into gaza but, for the most part, both sides want to get through the threeday period with a lot more less fighting but there is concern by thursday, hamas has told us if there is no comprehensive agreement in place the fighting could continue in full force. Ive been following you closely what youve been doing during these terrible three weeks. The pictures are absolutely tragic. Could you just in human terms describe to our viewers what youve seen day in and day out over the past 21 days . Reporter yeah. I mean, it has been a very difficult few weeks on the ground. I think one of the ways i would tell you that every single palestinian that i have met, every single one that i have met has been affected by this war. And what i mean by that is they have either had families displaced now living with them,
they have either lost relatives or have been affected themselves even injured. Even our own crews, shrapnel hit one of their cars. When we talk about the scope of this operation there is no inch of gaza that has been spared. When you speak to palestinians who did what the israeli told them to do, leave the front lines and come into the city, stay away from areas that are told to be dangerous, they have also been affected. One person losing all of his entire family. I think a humanitarian toll to this that is difficult at times to capture and the most difficult part of this assignment trying to capture all of the stories we hear from the grief. We have seen Palestinian Militants fire rockets consistently every day and raises questions about the scope of this operation and whether or not its achieving its objectives that israeli says it is achieving. Even today, palestinians were
seen firing rockets. It is a complex situation on the ground but a humanitarian challenge for us trying to cover it nonetheless. Ayman, thank you. Israeli Prime Minister benefiting anyone netanyahu discussed two of the biggest issues surrounding the middle east crisis. Hopes for a ceasefire and the heavy toll being paid by civilians. We have accepted five ceasefires acted upon them. Hamas has rejected every single one of them, violated them, including two humanitarian ceasefires which we accepted and implemented in the past 24 hours. Now hamas is suggesting the ceasefire and, believe it or not, david, they have even violated their own ceasefire so they continue to fire at us and we will take the necessary action to protect ourselves. First of all, hamas is responsible for the deaths of civilians. We are not targeting a single civilian. We are responding to hamas action and we are telling the civilians to leave. Hamas is telling them to stay. Why are they telling them to stay in they want to pile up
their own dead bodies. They not only want to kill our people, they want to sacrifice their own people. Charlie rose sat down with the leader of hamas and asked whether the militant group would recognize israeli as a jewish state. [ speaking in Foreign Language ] translator we are not fanatics and do not fight the jews because they are jews. We defy the occupier. Contrary we actually respect the religious people. Its one thing to say you want another thing you want to coexist with the state of israel. Do you want to coexist with the state of israeli . Do you want to represent do you want to recognize israeli as a jewish state . No. Translator no. Okay. Joe, obviously, youre a long time supporter of israeli. Right. Do you think israeli at this
particular time has the right to continue the attacks in defense of their own country, despite all of the calls for a ceasefire . Mika, israeli has the right to defend their country and protect their people. The Prime Minister is correct in saying, as he did again yesterday on meet the press, that the United States or any other country would protect themselves from these similar types of attacks that they are enduring from hamas. I mean, just imagine. Ive said this before. Imagine if missiles were fired from the Mexican Border to the United States. By nightfall our troops would be in mexico city. Yes, they have that right. The wall street journal editorial this morning also correctly points out the International Assistance that countries give to gaza that they think is helping to help the plight of the Palestinian People and build schools is actually being funneled by hamas into creating this terror economy and that is because hamas is a terrorist organization as
netanyahu said yesterday uses its people to protect its missiles instead of using its missiles to protect its people. Israeli has pointed out hamas uses women and children as human shields. They are correct there too. There are literally thousands of justifications with israeli is trying to do going after hamas. That said, make no mistake of it, mika, with up to thousands of civilians being killed over the past several weeks, israeli is, obviously, losing this war in the eyes of the world and i think more tragic for all of those seeking peace in the middle east before these attacks began. Before these attacks began, hamas was isolated. They were bankrupt. And they were on the edge of political oblivion. So, yes, israeli has a right to move aggressively in gaza but it doesnt mean its the right strategic move for israeli to
make. David, i think those seeking peace so much in a long time in this region the great tragedy is hamas was on the ropes before this fighting began. Now they are only empowered in the eyes of the Palestinian People or at least a large segment of the Palestinian People as protectors against israeli. Joe, i think thats right. Hamas has certainly played the media element of this quite well. But i think Something Else has also played into it, which is that both sides were dug in, i think, in this case. The israelis and hamas in ways that i think surprised each other. So israeli discovered that this Tunnel Network was much more extensive than they had believed and, as a result, when you had the president saying a week ago, president obama saying a week ago that israeli had inflicted significant damage, the israeli assessment was quite different. Hamas, i think, realized along
the way that the longer they could keep up these barrages the more they could demonstrate that they actually had emerged as a much more powerful force than i think many palestinians had believed. By virtue of the fact that the rocket attacks continue even now even after this pretty comprehensive pounding and i think thats why both sides are basically rejected this fascinating plan that my colleague Michael Gordon got a hold of that john kerry was passing around that would have put in a sevenday halt and then immediately gotten discussions going in egypt. Instead they are left with these rolling daybyday humanitarian pauses which i think no one has any confidence it will continue. All right. We are going to come back to this. There are new implications in Eastern Ukraine in the investigation into the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight 17. A team of international
investigators was forced to turn back from the crash site because of deadly clashes between pro russian rebels and ukraine troops. More than a dozen officials killed and officials said they did not feel safe in the area. It comes as the United States is preparing to make a push for new sanctions against moscow. Now we have this. Ukraines president pending an oped over the weekend calling for tougher International Response and he writes, in part as always the United States should take the lead. Working together with the European Union, washington can shape a Worldwide Coalition of nations in support of ukraine to ensure that these terrorists are not able to strike again. Russia needs to know the International Community is serious and long past time for it to act. The state Department Released new photos that it says proves russia is not only helping the rebels but shots are being fired from russia into ukraine. This photo shows artillery strikes last week in ukraine
involving rounds that Officials Say are only used by Russian Military units. U. S. Officials also say russia is preparing to give more missiles to the rebels which moscow denies. Meanwhile, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton says despite the Obama Administrations must published she always had doubts with vladimir putin. I was the most skeptical of putin during the time i was there in part because i thought he had never given up on his vision of bringing mother russia back to the forefront, not by looking at what russia could do to be a modern nation but by looking to the past. I think that what may have happened is that both the United States and europe were really hoping for the best from putin as a returned president and i
think we have been quickly, unfortunately, abused of those hopes. Hillary clinton still on her book tour. Your thoughts on her sort of looking back at that reset, jon meacham . She is right about mother russia. True. And we have had now ten years, i guess, or more of american leaders who have been trying to play chess with putin and have not been doing particularly well. Beginning with president bush and now president obama. A hundred years ago today the First World War began and we are back to the great game where empires fell apart and nation states created and the countries we have been talking about this morning grew out of that cat cl its faeting fascinating Hillary Clinton talk about that. What i really find fascinating are the numbers. You look at the numbers. Hillary clintons numbers Approval Ratings as secretary of state, she has gone from the most popular leader in the Obama Administration to, now in retirement, having people looking back at her time at the state department as a failure. Are Hillary Clintons ups and downs as a political candidate going to be tied to what is happening across the world . Because it seems like americans are judging her for a lot of these International Crises that are now exploding. I think in the end she has been saying on her tour that the economy and vision for the future on job creation is going to be a bigger deal if she runs. I think she is suffering in these episodic comments from the same thing i think the president obama is suffering from. Its all tactics and episodic. There doesnt seem to be a big Strategic Vision how to deal with the world jon meacham is talking about. We are still dealing with the fallout of the cold war and still dealing with the fallout of a post9 11 world and a lot of people are able to question her role and the president s record on the question of where is the grand strategy and where is the vision taking america into a situation we are not dealing episodically with lots of crises how to bring things together. David sanger youre reporting that pentagon is drawing up plans to give ukraine the exact locations of surfacetomissile locations. How quickly could Something Like that be fast tracked . It could be fast tracked very quickly, thomas, but its a fascinating and very vexing choice for the president. Think about his options here. The United States is already giving some intelligence to the
ukrainians. They are giving them satellite photographs similar so what you showed before showing the russian heavy equipment moving across the board but its not realtime so not something the ukrainians could use to target. If president obama decides to give them realtime information, he will be entering the United States much more directly into the conflict with russia and seem this is less than ukraine than it is about putin. There is some risks. Its not clear that the ukrainians know what to do with the data. Its not clear that they wouldnt make a mistake and strike inside the russian border and you can imagine what a problem that would be. The other thing that people were sort of whispering to me and eric schmidt, my colleague when we were working on this story last week and over the weekend, is that the Ukrainian Military is so compromised at this point, so full of russian intelligence agents that you might take this targeting data and just mail it to moscow. So its a very hard choice and,
of course, the president decides not to do it his critics will say he walked up to provide aid and backed away. David sanger, thanks very much. An extremely western pattern is moving across the country including severely thunderstorms and tornadoes and hail storms. Nbcs meteorologist bill karins joins us with more on that. What a sunday it was. You expect sundays like this in may and early june. The activity Severe Weather tornado months but not late july. This is supposed to be the quiet season and talk about heat waives and droughts but not this year. The extreme weather pattern continues around the country. Tornadoes in tennessee and claiborne, ten homes destroyed yesterday and strong storms in kentucky. There is a picture of that tennessee tornado. Just a rope tornado but you can
see how violent it was. It wasnt big. It was pretty narrow twister but it moved through with fierce winds up to about 120mileperhour they estimated. That hits a home and that just takes it and tears it apart. L