should be alarmed by russia's actions. a spokesman for vladimir putin says russia will consider its own retaliation as well. the homeland security adviser to president obama is going to join me live in just a minute. also, the response from donald trump. we are all waiting for this. so far from mar-a-lago we've got silence from trump, silence from his transition team. we did hear from him yesterday, though. he was asked about the prospect of sanctions. this is what he had to say. >> i think we ought to get on with our lives. i think the computers have complicated lives as it is. >> this is a big part of our story. 22 days from now, donald trump becomes president. will he keep these sanctions or will he lose them? that is one of the major questions hovering over all of this. also rounding out our agenda, those close to the trump transition saying the president-elect may be upsety what he sees are efforts by obama to undermine his incoming administration. how this latest action against russia could further complicate this relationship of two presidents in transition. we begin right now with our top story. president obama striking back at russia this afternoon, announcing actions against those that our intelligence agencies believe were involved in cyber attacks during the 2016 election. in total, this response by the u.s. is the strongest ever taken against state-sponsored cyber attack aimed at our country. it includes here naming individuals specifically for their roles, going so far as expelling russian intelligence officers from the united states. dozens of them. now, russia has denied any role in trying to disrupt the presidential election in this country. a spokesman for russian president vladimir putin says moscow regrets the new sanctions by the united states and will consider retaliatory measures. we have all of the angles covered. obviously a major story unfolding just in the last few minutes, including reaction from moscow we'll have for you in a second. let's start, though, with nbc news pentagon correspondent hans. in determining exactly what the united states is doing here, we have reaction on two different tracks. one is dispelling intelligence officers from this country, and another is taking them from russia. explain what is going on here. >> that is the offensive part and the third is the defense. that is releasing this report giving u.s. cyber security firms sort of the keys to the kingdom and some defensive measures they can adopt against future russian potential cyber attacks. so we have the four vitindividu on the offensive side, four individuals all associated with the russian intelligence agency. then you have the five institutions as well. then you have these 35 individuals. they're described as russian officials working in the embassy in activities and matters that are not consistent with diplomatic or consular activity. steve, that is shorthand for calling them spies, expelling them. it's a given in spacecraft and spycraft that you have certain individuals working inside embassies that actually work for their country's intelligence. it's in open diplomatic circles. steve, you hinted at this. what is donald trump's response, and one bit of information we don't know, did president barack obama give donald trump a heads up, giving them some sort of lead time that these actions were coming, and have they all calibrated whattrump's response is going to be? we know trump and obama have been talking repeatedly. that's the question i have at this hour. >> and hans, what do we know about individuals being named here? what specifically do we know about those names we're seeing, basically a lot of us for the first time ever? >> some of them have been known to intelligence officials. one individual had already been charged for something in the state of nebraska for his code name lucky 1,2345. the unknown ones are part of the gru. that gives an indication that it was centralized, it was local e localized and the obama administration thinks this was by russian intelligence, leaving no shadow of a doubt on that matter. >> hans from the pentagon, thank you for that. she is traveling with president obama, they are out in hawaii. tami, hans raised the million dollar question. these are sanctions raised by the obama administration who will be out of power basically three weeks from now. was there communication between the current president and the incoming president about this, and do we know why the obama administration was so determined to do this on its watch with new administration coming in in three weeks. >> hi, steve. i can tell you the obama administration is committed to showing russia they are responsible for these actions, which is why they've taken these sanctions today, which is why they'll be submitting intelligence reports to congress in the incoming days. this is some of the most aggressive action we've seen, but keep in mind, this is not just for the hacking into our elections, this is also for the harassment of our diplomats who have been in russia. we recently learned that over the last year, our u.s. diplomats have been harassed, and they describe these threats, the hacking threats and the harassment, as very disturbing and that all americans should be alarmed. the reason they are doing this now and putting these sanctions out before obama leaves office, part of it is because they want to send a message. they want to send a message not only to russia, but china, north korea and anyone else who could engage in cyber warfare with us, they are expected to meet here. we are supposed to get a little more information so we'll keep you updated on that. >> tami traveling with the president. thank you for that. we mentioned the state department is declaring 35,000 russians living in the united states, persona non grata, kicked out of the country, released from the department saying the expulsion of these individuals part of a comprehensive response to russia's interference in the u.s. election. also, and you just heard tami mentioning this, a response quote to a pattern of harassment to our diplomats overseas that has increased over the last four years. the department detailing the harassment has involved arbitrary police stops, physical assault and the broadcast on state television of details about our personnel that put them at risk. again, that from the state department. joining me now is david phillip. he's the moscow bureau chief for the "washington post." david, thank you for taking a few minutes. it is around midnight where you are right now, so obviously late in the night as they receive this news. what is the initial reaction in moscow right now to these sanctions? >> reporter: well, they saw this coming, obviously, because the obama administration had said this was coming. people are basically casting it as obama administration's last desperate efforts to undermine the relationship with russia. they know that the relationship soured with the obama administration a while back, and so basically the way this is being shown is, on their way out, they wanted to do whatever they could to, you know, salvage our relations and also maybe undermine relations with trump. >> david, in the run-up to the announcement of these sanctions, this was telegraphed in a way. there has been a lot of talk about the potential for a retaliatory talk by russia in regard to these sanctions. is russia to retaliate the fact that there is a new president coming in in three weeks who has talked about having a v different relationship with russia? >> reporter: right, and that's the trick with this move here. putin says they want to have a good relationship with trump. they've been cautiously optimistic. if they did try to swing it so he became president, they've been hiding that hand. they keep saying we can't be certain what our relationship with trump will be like. so to do something nasty in response knowing trump will be the one to reap that, that's probably not the best move. they're probably wondering what they can do to the obama administration without totally undermining relationships going forward. >> thank you for taking a few minutes. appreciate that. economic sanctions from the department of treasury, from the state department also removing individuals from the united states. also, there is a third component to the sanctions and to the actions president obama is imposing today. the first declassified report from the department of homeland security and the fbi, this details russian malicious cyber activity. this is an action the united states are calling the russian action here, grizzly steppe. joining us from the obama administration, lisa monaco, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism. lisa, thank you for taking a few minutes. let me ask you the question raised by hansichols a few minutes ago. president obama imposing these sanctions, president-elect trump sworn in, president obama leaving office. is there any kind of timing with the outgoing president with the incoming president? >> what there was was notification today to the senior member of the president-elect's team. but no, no consultation in advance. this is, as you pointed out, a set of sanctions, disclosure of malicious cyber activity, and the expulsion of 35 russian intelligence officers and their families and the closure of compounds being used in the united states for intelligence collection purposes. all of these are a set of steps designed to respond to the aggressive behavior by the russian government against our personnel in moscow and the cyber activities that we disclosed and called out earlier this fall in october and attributed to coming from the highest levels of the russian government seeking to interfere in our election process. what you've seen today in the announcements we've made and the set of steps that we are disclosing today is a determination to make clear that there will be consequences for aggressive activities from the russian government against our personnel and in efforts to interfere with our election process. >> you made an affirmative decision here not to simply collect this information, present it to the new president and say, you deal with this, you're the one who is going to have to live with whatever sanctions you decide to impose, whatever actions you decide to take or not to take. there was an affirmative decision by the obama administration to do this now and to make the next president deal with the fallout and deal with the consequences. is that because you do not believe that donald trump has president would take severe actions against russia for this? >> i think what you're seeing is we're doing both. one is the russian government should not be surprised at all by this. these actions follow, one, the unprecedented disclosure and attribution of efforts to interfere in our election this fall. these actions today also follow repeated private and public warnings, including at the highest level of the u.s. and russian governments, warnings to the russian government about their aggressive behavior and that it won't be tolerated. these actions today follow efforts to both reach out to and brief and provide assistance to the state and local governments who own our electoral infrastructure and members of congress to alert them to this threat. so all of that is a set of activities that have been ongoing. the actions today were designed to make very clear, and we've been clear all along, there will be consequences, we will respond at a time and place of our choosing, and that's what you're seeing done today. in addition, president obama directed the intelligence community to provide a full report about not only cyber efforts to interfere in our election this year, but going back to prior election cycles. that work is ongoing and that will be delivered prior to president obama leaving office. >> and that is a key question here, because you know as well as i do that the reporting and the run-up to today's actions and leaks coming out of some of our intelligence agencies in this country are saying not just that there had been russian interference in this election, not that there had been russian attempts to hack into, to get access from all sorts of information, from government, all sorts of places, but there had been reporting from intelligence agencies in this country saying this was an operation directed by the russian government to weigh in on behalf of donald trump and against hillary clinton. is there any evidence that you're presenting, is there any statement you're making to that effect here? >> i'm not going to get ahead of what the intelligence community produces. what you're seeing today is a set of actions that are put forward to respond to the aggressive activity of the russian government against our personnel and in their efforts through cyber means to interfere in our election process. these are a set of actions to impose costs and to make very clear not only to the russian government, but to other actors, that there will be consequences for violating, frankly, what our international norms of behavior. >> lisa monaco over at the white house. lisa, thank you for taking a f minutes. i'm going to bring in now republican congressman ted yo from florida, dan meeks from new york. thank you both for joining us. congressman yoho, starting with you. the incoming president trump said people should get on with their lives. donald trump is going to have to make a decision here on january 20 when he takes the oath of office. does he uphold these sanctions or does he do away with them? what do you think he should do? >> first off, i want to say merry christmas and happy new year to you, my good friend and colleague darrell meeks. he'll understand this and decide which way to go. i think this is a misstep by the obama administration. what i've seen in the reports i've read is they're pivoting in a way to justify any reason hillary clinton lost this election. and it comes down to the failed policies of this president, and they're looking at anything they can to put blame on why they lost this. if you look at the information that got leaked through anonymous or wikileaks, if you look at that information, is any of it not true? >> congressman, let me ask you the question this way. let me ask you the question this way. for the purposes of our discussion here right now, let's stipulate that this the information that came out in wikileaks and the information that apparently was produced for public consumptionyhis did not have an impact on the election, that donald trump was going to win, anyway. if the intelligence, though, that's being presented here nonetheless shows that russia was behind an attempt to do this, that russia was behind hacking these e-mails, putting the information out there, attempting to disrupt the election, are these sanctions appropriate? regardless of whether they affected the outcome of the election. >> well, i think the first thing is the integrity of our election process is something that we have to safeguard against regardless of who is behind it. and if it's true that russia did do this, then yes, i think there is some diplomatic efforts that we need to make to go down this line. but we've known -- and this is what i want to bring up as a question -- is we've known that people have been hacking into our intelligence through cyber security over the last 8, 10, 15 years. i want to know why we have not bolstered this up to this is not an issue. it's going to get tougher in the future, and i would think the united states government at the direction of the president would have a stronger cyber security procedures in there so there is not an issue. this is going to continue, and this is something we need to have a response for and we need to have a clear definition, and president obama has had eight years to do this and he's not done this. i find it a lack of leadership, failure of leadership. >> congressman meeks, leet t mek you about this. your colleague, congressman yoho, says these groups have historically targeted government organizations, think tanks, universities, corporations. in other words, this sort of thing was going on, they're saying, even before the attempt to get into the democratic national committee's e-mails, the attempt to get into pode podesta's e-mails. is there an element of president obama and politics to this? >> absolutely not. president obama made sure that politics was not involved in his decision. that's why he did not do anything sooner or during the election, because had he brought it up at that time, then others would be saying, oh, he's playing politics. he's trying to tilt this thing in regards to hillary clinton. >> but why not take all this information, take all these assessments, and we just heard from lisa monaco over at the white house that there's more. there is something in progress right now. there will be more information produced. why not take all that information, you have a new president coming in in 22 days. here's the new president, here's all the information we collected, make a decision on this loss. >> president obama told you a few weeks ago he was going to do something overtly and covertly. this is not a surprise. he has always -- when he said he was going to do something in this regard, just like he did with osama bin laden and others, he lived up to that. so he was very clear just a few weeks ago tt he, as president, because he is still the president of the united states -- >> does that reflect the judge that he thinks the action he would like to see taken here, the action he wants to take and is taking himself, is not an action that donald trump would take, in his judgment? >> i think it's clear that he sees that our democratic process was intruded upon and that he, as commander in chief, has the responsibility to make sure, since this happened under his watch, that he, in fact, did something about it. he warned president putin, as he said he has several times before, so this is not something that should be a surprise to anyone. it is not something that he has played politics with. it shows how serious a president he is. as much as he wanted hillary clinton to win, he would not play politics in this because this goes to the very fabric of our democracy, and this is why i think both democrats and republicans have to stand up and make sure that these sanctions and others against the russian administration and mr. putin stands in a unified way. >> congressman yoho, we heard that one of the goals here, apparently, from the obama administration's standpoint is to get this as a matter of public record, to get this as a matter of accepted fact that russia tried to hack into the presidential election. let's say trump wins either way. taking the effect of it aside, are you convinced that russia was trying to do this? >> is that for me? >> yes. >> i think russia could have had a hand in this, but again, the information that they let out was just information that was factual. and so is it wrong to send out information as fabt wal regardless of where it comes from? i want to know how giving out the truth swayed the election. and i agree with gregory, and i agree that we have to protect the democratic process, but if president obama wanted to work smoothly, as he said, way transition, i think he would have corroborated with donald trump and come up with a plan that they both could be in agreement instead of acting unilaterally like he did on this or like he did with the u.n. sanctions against israel. these are things he should have weighed in with the administration. his term is over. he's got 22 days left, and being a veterinarian, one of the our professors said, above all, do no harm in your diagnosis and your treatment, and this is something i think he should work with the trump team to do a transition so that it could be carried on and be more effe effective. if you read the executive order, he said any person convicted or found guilty of doing these things are going to have sanctions on them. it doesn't talk about a nation state. so i think this is a very weak executive order, but i do agree we need to protect the democratic process, by all means, and at any cost. >> congressman ted yoho, congressman ed meeks, thank you. all the actions it is now ready to take and taking. that's coming up, including two people wanted by the fbi for their involvement. plus, what this could mean for the incoming trump administration. we've been talking about this. any hoeppes for a new relationsp with the kremlin? i'll discuss it with my panel. that's ahead. the obama administration announcing sanctions on several individuals and intelligence agencies, kicking several dozen intelligence officers out of the united states, this over allegations in the belief that the intelligence committee was trying to disrupt the election. with more details, i want to bring in investigative reporter tom winter. tom, you've got more information here. we have this hacker wanted by the fbi. tell us what's going on here. >> two of the hackers that were involved here, and i'll just quickly take us back to earlier this fall. nbc news reported this hacking was going on, that it was believed to have a russian government element to it, and we said that individuals in hacking groups were doing the actual hacking, but then it was directed by the russian intelligence and the gru, and we've seen all of that come to bear today. so when we got the names just a while ago, we started running them through the various databases and talked to who he started to talk to, and alexsey belan has been wanted for his role in a january 12 and april 2013 hacking, he has two other arrests connected to that, as well as identity theft. his last known location was athens, greece. he is considered a flight risk but is wanted by the fbi. and last hour, evgeniy bogachev has been wanted by the fbi. he was once on the top 10 fbi fugitive lists. he's now on the regular wanted list for the fbi. they say today he has stolen over $100 million from the u.s. government or private companies over serious hacks going back to 2013. he faces a indictment in pennsylvania, 14 counts there, and he was stealing money for electronic fund transfers and taking them from numerous victims' bank accounts. these are two individuals that are well known to federal law enforcement. they've been on the fbi's most wanted list and they're two people named for their role in the election hacks. bogachev is believed to be in russia. we have no extradition agreement with russia, so it would be tough to get him back in the best of circumstances let alone the circumstances we're now in with our relationship with russia. so this is going to be difficult for either of these two individuals to be brought back to the u.s. to face charges that they've already been charged or indicted with, and obviously now they're implicated in a major hack involvement in the u.s. election. >> i think you're right. good luck getting them back if they are in russia. time now for a quick check of the headlines at the half hour. recapping our top story, the obama administration imposing sanctions on russian officials and that country's intelligence services over its alleged interference in the u.s. election. the u.s. also moving to kick out 35 russian intelligence officers from this country, also shutting down two russian compounds, one in new york, one in maryland. russian president vladimir putin spokesman saying a short time ago moscow regrets the new sanctions and will consider retaliatory measures against the united states. president-elect donald trump saying he will consider two rules of a higher american. he also is creating 8,000 new jobs in the united states. the sear fis cease fire in expected to take effect one half hour from now. it does not include terrorist groups like isis. they hope the cease fire will be fully implemented. new york officials talking about their plans to protect new year's eve revelers in times square. about 7,000 officials will be on duty to protect the estimated 2 million people who are expected there to ring in 2017. a federal judge in south carolina ordering another competency exam for church shooter dylan roof. roof could face the death penalty of this after being convicted of hate crimes and other charges in the deaths of nine parisioners at a black church last year. northern new england under a winter storm warning as the first nor'easter of the season moves through the region. some places could see more than a foot of snow. turning back now to our top story. again, president obama i am pmp sanctions amid a slew of other actions today meant to hit back on russia for what is their interference in the u.s. presidential elecon. they tweeted out this. presiden obama expels 35 russian diplomats in cold war de javu. everybody, including the american people, will be glad to see the last of this hapless administration. putin also tweeting a lame duck, as you see there. the chief correspondent for politico, and ed rendell, the former governor of pennsylvania as well as the former chair of the democratic national committee. hugh hewitt, let me start with you. we've talked about this. the first major decision president donald trump will have to face when he is sworn in on january 20, either abide by these sanctions put in by president obama or remove them. what should he do? >> i approve of this measure myself. in june of last year or june of this year, the harassment of our diplomats, it's been well known and president obama at that point decided not to take action against russia. a lot of the intelligence professionals that i follow and respect, like john schindler, says this is a very solid move. i agree with speaker ryan, it's long overdue. what donald trump does, though, is not really the frame i'm looking at, steve. we have a russian reset button which has collapsed. we have president obama who was mocking mt romney four years ago and about their agencies calling and mtd their foreign policy back. we have to judge this on our own merits, and let president-elect trump, when he gets all his advisers around him, decide to respond to whatever the situation is there. >> ed rendell, how about from your standpoi? we talked about this in the last block. 22 days from now, the president-elect becomes president. apparently all information will be presented to donald trump and say, hey, you make the decision, you're becoming president. instead they chose to do it now. do you think that shows a lack of faith on president obama's part that donald trump would take this seriously? >> not necessarily, steve. look, you're elected to serve a four-year term. there's one president before another president takes over the oval office and the president prior to this election respected that. secondly, you serve up until the day yr predecessor takes the oval office. at 8:30 on this that monday morning as i was leaving for mayor of philadelphia, i signed off on the economic deal even though my successor was going to be signed in at 10:00 the next morning. i was paid for 365 days that year, and i was absolutely intent on being governor and mayor up until the last minute that i was in office. i actlly thinkhat president obama did donald um a favor. if he had passed this on to donarump all the information and said, you me the decision, then trump's first decision vis-a-vis russia would have to be imposed sanctions. for some of the reasons you just said and for the fact that the intelligence community, cia, fbi, oem home ts land security was convinced she was trying to disrupt her dad's election. >> let's look ahead and let's build a new relationship. >> isaac, let me bring you in because you wrote an interesting piece about why donald trump has felt perturbed, i guess you could say, about saying here's the headline. what's really bugging trump about obama, barack obama saying maybe he had won the election if he ran against trump, what he's been doing with the administration is what he's doing with israel. >> this is certainly essentially a dare to donald trump to back off the sanctions, to let these who have now been booted out of the kurnlt. it is being done at a moment. >> not even a week ago -- brandishing this lerlt that talked about a new start to the relationship, and they were involved hacking the elections or hacking into e-mail accounts involved in the election and putting it public in a way that had effect on what was going on during the campaign. it does not seem like this is something that donald trump would want, and when you were speaking with lisa monaco earlier in the program, she said that even though we know that obama and trump spoke yesterday that that was not -- from the cav yacht she just gave you, when the president-elect or his team were told about these sanctions that were told the. with an eye, of course, toward hids successor is and how. those moves are being done without full sign-off on him and perhaps to try to get in the way of his agenda. >> i want to ask you something about something. >> you think there's positively tingat work here. democrats don't want to face the fact that they lost. stlan aspect of that the democrats are overplaying what happened here, because it says, hey, hillary clinton didn't really lose, the russians beat her. >> let's focus on something. i go back to what you said it's important that we officially protect our election system. this is serious business. and the president had to do what he did, and what he did sounds to me to be very appropriate. we'll know more as things roll out. but it's a decision that had to be made. if barack obama wanted to play politics the day after he had his first declaration, he would have said the cia believes russia tried to hack the election, wanting donald trump to favor in victory. he didn't do that because he thought he would influence the election. had director comey stuck to the same standard, we may have had a different result. >> i think from his public comments, at least to date, we'll see if he says anything different now, donald trump has made it pretty clear he thinks this is politics, he thinks this is democrats who don't want to admit they just lost an election. just yesterday he talked about the prospects of sanctions. he said, people have got to get on wh their lives. you said you like the idea of taking action against russia and imposing these sanctions. do you think donald trump is taking this seriously enough? >> i do. governor rendell has a very appropriate take on this. the national security element ought to stay off on one lane where people can judge it and the policy of another. he said on a personal level, the transition is going very smoothly. there are profound policy differences, for exame, on resolution 2234 which president trump denounced as well as most democrats that ed worked with for many years as being an erratic brace with israel. >> the headline you read at the beginning of this segment, russia and turkey are negotiating a cease fire in syria. we've been thrown out of the middle east by russia. donald trump faces a huge challenge. it's got nothing to do with barack obama's failures, though they are many and we could talk about them forever. i think the reset that's coming on the 20th will be complete, i just don't know how it's going to impact russia. >> and from the respect of the obama white house, how it views the transition. donald trump was upset in the morning, he spoke with the president, everything seemed to be resolved by the end of the day. how is the white house looking at this? >> look, there is an agreement between the trump team and the obama team that actually a lot of the transition stuff is going very well. the chief of staff for the white house currently, dennis mcdonough, is in contact with reince priebus who will be in contact with mr. trump. other white house officials feel that. there is some gripe be of the trump team with some problems, unspecified with some of the agencies, different departments. but oh all, they're pretty happy about it, there is frustration among a lot of people close to president obama, to see donald trump picking at trouble, using twitter and some of his other public comments to flare up problems with oma whom they think has done a very good job here. of course, trump's team would respond to that and say, well, president obama is the one who told david axelrod how he would have beat donald trump, so it not like this is done without both sides having something to complain about. >> 22 days from now, we'll have a trfer piece of poip. . secretary of state john kerry's speech with that vote on israel last week. up next, key democrat slamming this speech, accusing it of being too critical. that is next. my business was built with passion... but i keep it growing by making every dollar count. that's why i have the spark cash card from capital one. with it, i earn unlimited 2% cash back on all of my purchasing. and that unlimited 2% cash back from spark means thousands of dollars each year going back into my business... which adds fuel to my bottom line. what's in your wallet? nosy neighbor with a glad bag, full of trash. what happens next? nothing. only glad has febreze to neutralize odors for 5 days. guaranteed. even the most perceptive noses won't notice the trash. be happy. it's glad. more fallout today from secretary of state john kerry's speech on the middle east peace process and the u.n. resolution declaring the palestinian territories to be illegal. chuck schumer among those criticizing kerry for being overcritical of israel. schumer issuing a statement saying, while he may not have intended it, i fear secretary kerry in his speech a actn at the u.n. has em boldened extremists on both sides. a state department official responding to schumer today saying, stating uncomfortable facts doesn't embolden extremists, dangerous steps on the ground by both sides do that. the jewish have had hundreds of settlements built since israel claimed palestinian territories after the cold war. kelly is there. kelly? >> reporter: we spoke to settlements on the west bank and we talked to palestinians ling alongside them. the settlers were extremely critical, the ones we spoke to, of the obama administration. they were very critical of that u.n. abscension last week when the u.n. decided to abstain on the vote of the resolution, asking it to condemn on these settlements. and the kerry speech critical of the obama administration over the past eight years. they sort of feel like they've been forgotten by the obama administration. one settler in particular who we spoke to lives very close to rumala. this is a palestinian city in the west bank where the palestinian authority is based. he's lived there for 32 years. he's on an israeli settlement, he's raised his seven children there, and he says, look, i see this as israeli land, as jewish land, and he points back to a text in the old testament as proof. here's a little bit more of what he had to say to us earlier toy. we're in the israeli settlement of bait, it's one of the oldest settlements. it started in 1977 with just six families. 6500 israelis live here now and these are some of these homes, these red-roofed homes you can see just behind me. if you look across this road, on the other side of the road are palestinian homes. that's the edge of rumala where the palestinian authority is based. what separates em? a fence,uard gates, the israeli military which has a small base at the entrance of this settlement. we talked tie mo a man who has v here for 32 years. he's raised his seven children here, and wesked him why he came and why he stays. >> we believe that we have the rights and the historic, the moral, the legal rights to live here, and we seek peace. we are not looking to expel them, we're not looking to opress them. we want to live here in our h e homeland as peaceful citizens, and we are happy to have them live here also. >> and the views are just as entrenched on the other side of that fence. families, palestinian families, who say they've lived on ts land for generations and they have no intention of leaving. and interestingly, both the palestinians we spoke to and the settlers we spoke to, some of them, anyway, were sort of confused about what a trump administration, a few trump administration, might mean for them despite the sort of indications that this incoming administration will be very pro settler. one settler told us, i just don't trust him. i don't know what's going to happen. and another thing that they have in common, steve, is that both sides really are digging in right now. steve? >> kelly over there in tel aviv. kelly, thank you f at. still ahead, we were talking about it like it was only a question of when. the dow hitting 20,000, but now a big plunge. 20,000 suddenly seems a far way away. that's next. and great service. over seventy-five years. wait. seventy-five years? that is great. speaking of great, check out these hot riffs. you like smash mouth? uh, yeah i have an early day tomorrow so... wait. almost there. goodnight, bruce. gotta tune the "a." 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(vo) what'scorn? dog food's first ingredient? wheat? in purina one true instinct grain free, real chicken is always #1. no corn, wheat or soy. support your active dog's whole body health with purina one. again, our top story of the hour. president obama issuing economic sanctions against russia today, ordering the expulsion of 35 russian officials from u.s. soil, also releasing a joint report from the department of homeland security and the fbi that details the first evidence of what the u.s. says was the russian government interfering with the presidential election here. president obama noting that these actions are not, quote, the sum of a response to aggression of russia's activities. hans in the pentagon, kasie hunt here in new york. hans, let me start with you. you itemized what the sanctions are. you've got intelligence officials being tossed out of the country, you've got some agencies over there. from a practical standpoint, what is this going to do to russia? does this have any bite in terms of what russia is or isn't able to do? >> in terms of the four individuals that have been named and put sanctions on, these are high-ranking officials, the head of the gru. this is russia's intelligence agency. it's unlikely that will actually have any effect. that's mostly symbolic. unless you think high-ranking gru officials are day trading at td america trade in the states, this probably isn't going to affect them much. symbolically, it's very important. it gives an indication that the white house and the full intelligence agencies who are pinning this on russian intelligence at the very top of the gru. now you get to the 35 diplomats that were basically working as spies. they didn't call them spies, but the state department came very close to that, saying they weren't carrying on in a manner that was consistent with diplomatic or consular work. those 35 intelligence officers, let's call them that, they will be expelled. that's going to be something very difficult for donald trump to undo. the interesting thing about that, though, is you can usually expect a tit for tat on expulsion. that means those attempting to work in a diplomatic community, they might be expelled. that's one possible response from the russian side, and what that does is put u.s. intelligence gathering -- it resets it, right? if you check out the top spies in the country, it's going to take a while for the new guys to get up and running. the third and final point, this is a defensive manual. this is an indication that the u.s. thinks more cyber attacks could be coming, and they're giving this manual trying to help out cyber security firms on how they can have simply more defenses. steve? >> kacie, in terms of the political action we're waiting to hear from donald trump. apparently that's coming in the next few hours. >> that's exactly what you're going to want to watch over the course of the next weeks and months, frankly. today we just in have a new statement from mitch mcconnell, the senate majority leader, and this is really a critical one because he's the one that's going to set the tone for are republican leaders in washington going to end up disagreeing with trump who has this deep skepticism about intelligence that has led to this event and whether it's cast out on our election, and said just yesterday, we all just need to move on with our lives? mcconnell, i would say, based on reading this statement here, he says at the very end of it, while he does criticize the obama administration overall for their foreign policy, he says sanctions against the russian intelligence services are a good initial step, however late in coming. as the next congress reviews actions associated with the u.s. election, we must also work to ensure that any attack against the united states is met with overwhelming response. so he, like other top republicans, speaker ryan, the house intelligence committee chairman, are not criticizing the actions that president obama took today. they are taking the opportunity to say, hey, the president has weakened the united states on an international stage. he didn't do enough soon enough, but at this point, it is an emerging potential fissure with trump and his political rt kasie hunt, hans at the pentagon, thanks to both of you. we'll have a lot of coverage the rest of the night on the sanctions the u.s. is imposing, and we are expecting to get a response from donald trump, likely a written statement, likely not him coming out and talking to the cameras, but nevertheless a response from donald trump in terms of what president obama has done in the final days of the obama presidency. obviously we are waiting intently to hear what donald trp has to say. that's going to do it for this hour. i'm steve kornackin new york. mtp daily, in for trump starts now. >> we're waiting for donald trump's word on president obama's retaliation on russia. >> i think we need to get on with our lives. i think computers have messed with our lives. >> and the battle in the west as the president works to secure his environmental legacy. this is "mtp daily" and it starts right now.