Winning Propaganda War with ISIS; Saudi Arabia Postponed Blogger's Flogging
CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: It's 29 minutes past the hour. The U.S., Japan, Jordan and Britain are all condemning what appears to be the beheading of a second Japanese hostage by ISIS. Marchers filled the streets of Tokyo in a silent grieving tribute to Kenji Goto. You see it there.</s>VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, he had he gone to Syria to try to save his friend who was also taken by hostage and met the same fate. Japan's prime minister held a cabinet meeting and a show of defiance to the terrorists, he said Japan will continue aiding countries opposing ISIS.</s>SHINZO ABE, JAPANESE PRIME MINISTER (through translator): I feel the strongest anger against this atrocious despicable act. I will never forgive the terrorists. Japan will expand further humanitarian support, such as food and medical support, to the region.</s>PAUL: Jordan says it's still trying to free a military pilot who was taken hostage by ISIS last year. But it's not clear now whether he is even alive. ISIS released a video that purportedly shows Kenji Goto right before he was killed and then shows his decapitated body. Now, we are not going to show those images. Just this one from that video of Kenji Goto still alive in the captor's hands. But I do want to bring CNN senior media correspondent and "RELIABLE SOURCES" host Brian Stelter also joining us again is CNN military analyst General Mark Hertling. So, I want to ask both of you, should the media stay away from ISIS propaganda images? Brian, to you first.</s>BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: For the most part major news outlets like CNN do stay away from the most gruesome images and they are actually pretty hard to find online unless you know what you're looking for. And that's why in some cases, I think, social network and websites like Twitter and Facebook and YouTube have a harder time with this issue than mainstream news outlets like CNN. You know, for us if we decide as we do not to show the images post- execution, well, then that is that. But on Twitter or Facebook, YouTube or sites like it, anyone can post that video, anyone that sympathizes with ISIS can post those images and it's harder to get them taken down and track them.</s>PAUL: General Hertling, we know that this propaganda video that they post is their way to try to reel other people into, you know, their life, their cause. Do you think that the U.S. is losing that propaganda war specifically?</s>LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: I do not, Christi, and in fact, when you take a look at the strategic campaign against ISIS, they are what we call in the military seven different lines of effort. Only two of those are really military lines where it's kinetic operations. And one of the lines is information operations to counter this kind of propaganda that you talk about. It's critically important, to go back to your last question, that the media represents this for what it is. The media in a free country helps inform people and part of the countering of propaganda is informing people what a dastardly organization this is, so I think it's appropriate to continue to tell these stories, but in a correct way.</s>PAUL: Yeah, Brian, you know, some people say none of the images should be shown of ISIS, and that is just encourages them, possibly inspiring more people to join their cause. What do you say to that?</s>STELTER: I understand it, but I think a version of being blindfolded or wearing ear muffs does little to actually understand the complex world we live in and actually can do damage to the general's point, can do damage because people don't understand the reality of what is going on. Where we deal with and where it gets complex is in this gray area between, for example, if you see comments on Twitter online or elsewhere, sympathizing with ISIS, well, are those - should those be banned or should there only be messages that advocate for violence or show graphic images that should be banned? Those are the sorts of tough decisions I think that have to be made, but the idea of ignoring the reality altogether that feels much more risky to me.</s>PAUL: Yeah. So, General Hertling, at the end of the day, how cannot just the U.S. now, but, you know, we heard Japan, Jordan, Britain, how can we collectively win the propaganda war? Because we know that that is fueling and bringing more people into ISIS?</s>HERTLING: Well, there is that balance Christi. You just brought it up. There will certainly be some recruits that will see these kind of videos as something that belonged to an organization that they might want to join. First of all, you have to prevent that. So we have to counter that piece of it. But the other pieces, there's millions more people now who have seen what has happened to Mr. Goto who are going to say -- who are going to be better informed about how ugly and horrific this organization is. So it is that balancing act between gaining support for the fight versus what ISIS might gain support for jihadi and then you have to stop that with one of the other lines of effort and that is stopping the recruiting campaign. Yes, I think we can counter that.</s>PAUL: OK, good to know. Gentleman, Mark Hertling, we appreciate it, and Brian, real quickly, what do you have coming up on your show today?</s>STELTER: Well, we are talking about this topic and about the language of terror. Some news outlets are choosing not to use the word "terrorist" or the words "extremists". So, we are going to talk about those decisions that are made on "Reliable Sources" there this morning.</s>PAUL: All ready, good to know. Brian Stelter and General Mark Hertling, always appreciate it. Thank you.</s>STELTER: Thanks.</s>BLACKWELL: Authorities in Saudi Arabia have once again postponed the flogging of a blogger. Raif Badawi is being punished for insulting Islam on his website. Now, he was injured after the initial set of lashes and the second set of 50 lashes has been postponed several times. CNN's Fareed Zakaria set down with President Obama during his trip to India, and he asked him why the U.S. is so closely allied with such a regime.</s>BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It is important for us to take into account existing relationships, the existing alignments within a very complicated Middle East, to recognize that we have strategic interests in common with Saudi Arabia, and that even as we work on those common interests, for example, countering terrorist organizations, that we are also encouraging them to move in new directions. Not just for our sake, but, more importantly, for their sake.</s>BLACKWELL: And to watch the full interview with President Obama, watch Fareed Zakaria, GPS, this morning at 10:00 a.m. Eastern right here on</s>CNN. PAUL: We have gone the latest round of talks between representatives of Ukraine, Russia and rebel envoys have -- had failed, essentially, yielded no results thus far. The talks were aimed at ending months of deadly violence and fighting. A previous ceasefire agreement negotiated in Minsk last year, crumbled long ago. And in the meantime, there has been heavy fighting between separatist forces and Ukrainian troops near Donetsk. Officials say at least 12 civilians and 15 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed just this weekend.</s>BLACKWELL: Still ahead, with daughter of singer Whitney Houston in a medically induced coma this morning, we want to talk about her potential state of mind and especially considering the disturbing similarities to her mother's death. We will talk after the break.