[Unidentified Female:] We were, like, seeing people.
[Jonathan Mann, Cnn International Anchor:] Inside the horror of the Istanbul terror attack. A firsthand account from a woman who survived the shooting. Plus the latest on the manhunt for the suspect. Next we're live in Istanbul. Also, showdown on Capitol Hill. President Obama and Vice President-elect Pence are readying their parties for the looming battle over Obamacare. Can the Democrats defend the president's signature policy or will Republicans deliver on their promise and repeal the law? Coming up, we're live in Washington. And
[Unidentified Female:] It was cruelty. This was cruelty against my son. What honor?
[Mann:] A new law in Pakistan aimed at stopping so-called honor murders and making sure the victims get justice. Later in the program a report from Lahore. Hello, and welcome to CONNECT THE WORLD. I'm Jonathan Mann at CNN center in Atlanta. Thanks for joining us. Turkey has identified the gunman who killed 39 people in a shooting rampage at an Istanbul nightclub on New Year's Day. They're still not naming him, though, or revealing his nationality. Police also detained 20 suspected members of ISIS in connection with the attack. Our Sara Sidner reports the once glitzy Reina nightclub is now scarred by bullet holes and stained with blood.
[Sara Sidner, Cnn Correspondent:] In order to get to the Reina nightclub from the Bosphorus, you of course have to take a boat. We're now entering where this massacre happened. It's truly in a beautiful spot. From the beautiful terrace, which is on the Bosphorus, you really can't really see any damage, but the moment you walk in, you can see the very first bullet hole that we've been able to see from this attack, that is definitely a high caliber weapon. Huge hole. That's blood from a victim on the wall right, beneath the large bullet hole. To get some idea of just how frightened people were, look at what they left behind. Shoes, coats, there are purses, there are glasses and scarves. We also see a hat and that is stained with blood. This is the bar and the dance club area where people would eat and drink, dance and enjoy themselves. This area is where people sort of trying to hide behind anything they could but in the end this place where we're standing was strewn with bodies. From what we can see this is the area that seems to have the most bullet holes and the holes are huge. But surprisingly, there aren't that many considering all the shooting that happened that night and that is because the terrorist was targeting them one by one by one. This is the view from the Reina across the Bosphorus and you're looking at the Asia side with its rolling hills and beautiful mosques. This is why people came here, it is incredibly picturesque. But now so many people will remember that a slaughter happened here. And the owner is really struggling with figuring out whether or not he will open up this club again. He says he'll leave it up to his employees who both saved people and died here.
[Mann:] And Sara Sidner joins us now live from Istanbul. Sara, that nightclub has been turned into a killing field. It speaks volumes about what happened there, but you actually spoke to some of the survivors. What are they telling you?
[Sidner:] Their story absolutely harrowing. We talked to a young woman who was married with a child. She's from Jordan. Her husband is from Saudi Arabia. The two of them inside the club looking to have a great time. They were away from home for the first time in a very long time and then the shooting began. The sound of rapid gunfire captured from afar, the moment of terror, as a gunman began massacring people inside Istanbul's Reina nightclub. Naef Zakaria Al Wazan and his wife were inside the Reina nightclub having dinner. Their video shows the excitement before the New Year arrived. It was supposed to be the honeymoon they never had. Instead, they both ended up pierced with bullets. Naef too exhausted to recount the story. His wife too shy to show her swollen face, speaks for the both of them.
[Unidentified Female:] When the sound says, OK, let's go, after OK, let's go, after this statement, I hear, like shooting.
[Sidner:] She says her husband begged her to crawl toward an exit. But it was difficult. A young woman had grabbed onto her shoe.
[Unidentified Female:] She was dying, and she was like asking me, cover me, don't go, cover me.
[Sidner:] Naef knew they couldn't stop. He was watching the gunman's every move.
[Unidentified Female:] He said to me, don't say anything. He is going to every table and shoot the people.
[Sidner:] Then a gaping wound appeared on her knee. She had been shot and Naef knew then survival meant running. They tried, but the gunman responded. Just as he had done outside the club, he aimed to kill. Naef was hit, a bullet entering his shoulder and exiting his back. He couldn't run anymore.
[Unidentified Female:] He said to me, sorry, I can't. And he was like, saying, if I die, just be with my son until he gets older and after that, live your life. I love you, you know how much I love you, and he just give me his ring and and his ring were like filled with blood. And he just gave it for me. He said to me, keep it with you and remember me. If I hurt you someday, don't it's not me.
[Sidner:] Her husband had surprised here with a trip to Turkey. They left Saudi Arabia with excitement. It was their first trip away from their young son. But their New Year's Eve was interrupted just one terrible thought inside that club, they may never see their son again.
[Unidentified Female:] We were like seeing people, bodies and thank God, thank God, that's where like a dream, dream, that I was like saying to him, can you just catch my hand and told me if we are in a dream and we were going to open our eyes again, are we alive?
[Sidner:] She began dragging her blood-soaked husband. They made it just outside the club. Finally relief. A taxi driver arrived and helped hoist them to safety.
[Unidentified Female:] If he hear me now, that taxi guy, if he hear me, I say to you, thank you so much. I really appreciated everything you do you did for us. You saved my my life, me and my husband.
[Mann:] It's horrifying and the killer is still on the loose. Sara, what are Turkish authorities saying about the investigation?
[Sidner:] The number of arrests have doubled. There are now 20 people authorities say that have been arrested in Izmir. That is coastal town. And including in those 20 people, they're now saying and this just came in to us 11 of those were women. There were children that had to be detained or taken by authorities because there were so many women that were detained and there is so much more information coming out that perhaps this attacker was from the central city of Konya. It's also a very conservative place. But we really just still don't know the name of this attacker. Authorities say they think they have identified him but they certainly haven't given out any new information about him and his name and where he might be so the manhunt is still underway, Jonathan.
[Mann:] Sara Sidner, live in Istanbul. Thanks very much. It's a battle royal on the U.S. Capitol Hill over the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare. President Barack Obama's signature legislation and a big part of his legacy. He's visiting Democratic lawmakers right now to sketch out a defense plan for Obamacare. Their strategy convinced Republicans a full repeal would hurt them politically. Meanwhile Republicans will get their own marching orders from Vice President-elect Mike Pence also visiting Capitol Hill. Donald Trump has vowed to repeal and replace Obamacare when he takes office. Phil Mattingly joins us now from Washington with a look at what we can expect today and in the months to come. Phil, we are talking about on one-sixth of the U.S. economy. The health of millions of Americans. It touches the country. It touches every family, every home. What are the two sides doing?
[Phil Mattingly, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, I think that's a really important point as we go into this new Congress. Look, Republicans control the House, they control the Senate, in 16 days they control the White House. That doesn't mean this process is going to be easy, even though Senate Republicans have already started the process of repealing the Affordable Care Act. The repeal part might not be difficult, the replace part will be extraordinarily difficult. And that's where it comes to how these two sides are operating right now. Republicans know they want to repeal. They don't know an agreement on what a replace would actually look like and you kind of nailed it in terms of what Democrats are doing right now behind closed doors, making very clear that strategy, messaging, how they defend this law is incredibly important as we go forward, and one of their key kind of points that they want to make over and over again is what Republicans are going to do by repealing before they replace, send the market into chaos, send coverage into chaos, perhaps take coverage away from the 19 million to 20 million Americans who have gotten coverage because of Obamacare. They believe they have throw Republicans on the defensive and perhaps repeat what Republicans did to them in making Obamacare so unpopular in the first place Jon.
[Mann:] Now, Phil, while you're talking to us, we are also looking at pictures of a room where we expect to hear from Vice President-elect Pence and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan when they finish their meeting, so we are expecting to hear more about this. But just to drill down a little bit more on the point you're making and the one they're going to have to address when they start speaking to the cameras, we have a majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives, majority in the Senate, and a president-elect who is a Republican, and there is no broad consensus on what they're going to do after making all these promises for all these years?
[Mattingly:] It's a difficult issue. And I think you made the point. It's one-sixth of the economy, it's an incredibly complex system to begin with. Repeal is easy, and I think when you talk to Republican senior Republican aides, even lawmakers on Capitol Hill, they'd say look, that's the easy part. We can knock that out quickly. And there are top line agreements on some of the aspects of whatever the Republican alternative health care plan is going to be. But if you look over the last six, seven years, basically, Jonathan, there has been no central agreement, really no central plan for Republicans because it's a lot easier to oppose something that go on the record and support it. And whether exchanges to Medicare or Medicaid, or timelines for implementation of whatever a replace would actually entail, there are real disagreements, not just among kind of a few senators or a few House members, but real kind of core groups in both chambers right now, and as long as that exists, it is going to be problematic going forward. Because look, repeal, because of the mechanism that's being used on Capitol Hill, they can do that with just a simple majority. With just 51 senators. And Republicans currently control 52 seats. Not a problem. Replace, legislatively, they're going to need Democrats to move that forward. That changes the dynamic quite a bit and that kind of lays out why this is such a complex process.
[Mann:] Once again to drill down on the details, because the headline is clear, it's get rid of it.
[Mattingly:] Right.
[Mann:] But in the absence of a plan, what are they telling the kinds of institutions that have to do long-term planning, insurance companies, hospitals, or doctors, and above all, patients, millions of Americans waiting to find out what's going to happen in the gap between repeal and replace?
[Mattingly:] The final group is I think the one that they need to address quickly and forthrightly, if you. I think when you talk to insurance company lobbyists here on Capitol Hill, when you talk to hospitals here on Capitol Hill, there's a lot of I have no idea. When you listen to some of their earnings calls a couple of months ago as they started to try and map all this out, they don't exactly have a clear path forward and that's also the case with the individuals who have coverage through Obamacare. Now one source who's in the room at the Mike Pence meeting right now said one of the pledges that Mike Pence made to the lawmakers that are sitting there was there cannot be major disruptions in coverage. There cannot be chaos. Now that seems to imply that they're going to working on some type of timeline, that they will keep Obamacare in place even after its repeal until a full replacement plan is in place. But again, this goes back to the original problem, John. If they don't have a kind of central agreement on what a replaced plan will actually be, how are they going to repeal this and not cause chaos?
[Mann:] Phil Mattingly in Washington, thanks very much. And once again, we are waiting for that news conference, the vice president-elect and the speaker of the House of Representatives talking about millions of Americans and a big chunk of the U.S. economy and what they're planning to do about it. We'll bring that to you live when it gets underway. Now to a case that's divided Israel between those who think they witnessed an execution and others who saw self-defense. Well, now a military court has made up its mind and found an Israeli soldier named Elor Azaria guilty of manslaughter for shooting and killing a wounded Palestinian suspect. Let's take it back to what happened. Have a look at Azaria at a settlement in Hebron in the West Bank back in March. You're seeing the scene just minutes after what the Israeli military says was an attack by two knife- wielding Palestinians on some Israeli soldiers there. They shot one alleged attacker, killed him on the spot. But only shot and wounded the other. He's in black on the left there. Still alive until Azaria cocks his gun and shoots him once in the forehead. The soldier's state of mind has been the main focus of the case but it's a lot bigger than that. Our Oren Liebermann has been following the trial for us from Tel Aviv and joins us. Oren, tell us about this. This has been a long, painful, careful case and it touched a lot of Israelis and obviously a lot of Palestinians in a very, very basic way. Walk us through what the courts decided.
[Oren Liebermann, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, it played out very publicly because every witness, every statement, and there were dozens of witnesses on both sides here, all of that was carried in the media. And it wasn't just media commentary. Politicians regularly weighted over the course of a month's long trial here. You've described exactly what happened and what led up to this trial, the question was, what did Elor Azaria do? What was he thinking, right? The question was never, did he pull the trigger? We knew that from the very beginning. We saw the video and the Israeli military said there's no question there. It was, what was he thinking? Was he acting in self- defense or was he acting out of vengeance? The court, we know what they decided. A unanimous decision from the military court saying that he acted they said when he shot, he shot needlessly and they found him guilty of both manslaughter and of course that was the bigger charge, and improper behavior. But for much of this trial, it seemed like it wasn't Elor Azaria on trial, it was the values of the Israeli military. This happened back in March at a time when the Israeli military was facing increased criticism. Human rights groups saying Israeli soldiers were too quick to pull the trigger, using too much force against a wave of Palestinian stabbings and ramming attacks. Bigger picture, that was very much at the heart of this trial and that engendered stronger emotions on both sides. The Israeli military is supposed to be a unifier in society, transcending cultural differences, religious differences, differences in opinion. And this trial became the military versus one soldier. The Israeli leadership on one side saying that no soldiers accepted a lot of the break to Israeli military code of ethics. Some politicians on the other side standing by the soldier and saying no soldier should ever be on military trial. Jonathan, the consequences, the arguments about this trial will end long after will go on long after the latest appeal.
[Mann:] What's going to happen to him now? Some politicians are already talking about trying to get a pardon for him.
[Liebermann:] And we saw those statements come out very quickly. Some say he never should have been on trial. Now that he has been convicted, they're saying that he should be pardoned or at the very least his sentence commuted to a shorter sentence. His lawyers have promised to appeal. They say the military court and the judges there were biased from the very beginning. Now it's in the hands of the president. If there is a call for a pardon, that has to come officially from the minister of Defense and go to the president. And that's up to the president. We have seen no indication there. Speaking of the minister of Defense, he said we have to respect the military judge's decision even if there are those like me who like it less, so he coming out I wouldn't say in favor of the military court's decision but standing by and saying the Israeli society, the Israeli military has to respect the decision of a military court.
[Mann:] I wonder if you could parse this for me because what seems to be emerging is that with a soldier on trial, you would expect that the Israeli military might feel targeted but in fact it sounds like most or much of the brass was harder on this young sergeant than civilian politicians were.
[Liebermann:] Well, I would say some civilian politicians there. The Israeli military leadership from the IDF chief of staff to the Defense minister came out and said this was a breach of the code of ethics, this was a soldier who was not following orders. The Palestinian attacker was wounded. He was on the ground. He no longer posed a threat. In fact the IDF shortly after this happened, their first one of their first statements explaining this said 11 minutes passed between the stabbing attack and Elor Azaria cocking his gun and pulling the trigger and killing the wounded Palestinian suspect on the ground. That, the Israeli military said is simply what soldiers don't do. If there's no threat anymore, there's no for further action. Therefore they say was a breach of the Israeli military code of ethics. And that is what's so important to them and that is what every soldier needs to follow, that's especially important in a country where almost every Jewish youth serves in the military. So they see this as much bigger than one soldier on trial. The consequences of this affect every soldier who will serve from now on. It's a clear statement then. The Israeli military, the leadership that is very much standing by its code of ethics and saying there is no soldier who's not allowed to follow this. It's incumbent upon every soldier. As you pointed out some politicians have immediately jumped to the soldier's defense and said we can never put an Israeli soldier on trial, especially not when he shot a Palestinian attacker. That is the debate we'll continue to see. We may have a guilty verdict here and that verdict may be upheld or not upon appeal, that debate will continue to play out I suspect for a long time here.
[Mann:] Oren Liebermann, live in Tel Aviv, thanks very much. You're watching CONNECT THE WORLD. We'll be back right after this.