JEFFREY GOLDBERG: We're a month away from an extremely important and extremely close presidential election, which means, among other things, that we're all poised for an October surprise.
There's a good chance that the surprise, if it happens at all, will come out of the Middle East.
We'll discuss, next.
(BREAK) JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Good evening and welcome to Washington Week.
Headline writers keep stating that Iran and Israel are edging closer to war, but we're pretty much there already.
Israel has partially dismantled Iran's Lebanese proxy army, Hezbollah, which first fired rockets at Israel on October 8th, the day after the massacre of Israelis by Hamas.
Since the start of the war, Hezbollah has fired thousands of rockets into Israel, and Iran's other proxies, and Iran itself, have joined in.
Israel has launched a series of devastating counterattacks, and while President Biden supports Israel's right to defend itself, he's also warning the Israeli Prime Minister against further expansion.
Implicit in his message is a worry about what a wider war means for the presidential election here.
Joining me to discuss the Middle East war is, in America's role, Peter Baker, the Chief White House Correspondent for The New York Times.
Francesca Chambers is a White House correspondent for USA Today.
Franklin Foer is my colleague and a staff writer at The Atlantic, and David Ignatius is a Foreign Affairs Columnist at The Washington Post.
Thank you all for joining me.
David, I'm going to assign you to get us up to -- up to speed.
I want to read something that you wrote this week.
Israel has recovered the military primacy it lost when Hamas fighters surged across the Gaza border on October 7th and ravaged Israeli civilians.
Hamas has been tamed militarily.
Hezbollah is reeling from the targeted killing of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and most of its top military commanders.
And Iran's retaliatory barrage appears to have been absorbed by Israel without major losses.
So, right now, what are the chances we're looking at a major Israeli retaliatory strike to pay back for the previous retaliatory strike?
DAVID IGNATIUS, Foreign Affairs Columnist, The Washington Post: My guess is that we'll see a significant strike, but not an overwhelming one.
Not -- certainly not on nuclear facilities.
I think the Israelis have made that clear to President Biden.
Probably not on oil facilities, but I'm not sure.
When I've asked, I've been told, expect a demonstration by Israel that we can hit anything we want in Iran, like what they did after April 14, but not something that would ratchet this conflict up to an entirely different level, that really would be all-out war.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Donald Trump said this week that he thinks it's crazy to advise Israel not to hit the nuclear facilities in Iran.
And obviously, we know Netanyahu's -- Prime Minister Netanyahu's predisposition on that question.
So why wouldn't they use this opportunity right now to go do some lasting damage to a couple of the key nuclear facilities?
Only because Joe Biden is asking them not to?
DAVID IGNATIUS: No, I mean, I do think there is a temptation.
When you're on a roll, as Israel has been now for some months, it's hard to stop.
I mean, you know, there just seems to be no Iranian capacity to prevent them from knocking down one proxy after another and to, you know, from acting at will against Iran itself.
So there is a temptation to keep going.
When you say strike at their nuclear facilities, I always have to remind myself that that's not an easy thing to do.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
DAVID IGNATIUS: You know, these facilities are centrifuges.
They're buried deep underground.
The Iranian expertise is really in the minds of the scientists.
So the idea that with a bombing campaign you could take out the Iranian nuclear program, I think most experts would say is unrealistic.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: And attacking oil facilities, that could certainly cause problems for President Biden and Vice President Harris in the next four weeks.
Is that why they're advising against it?
PETER BAKER, Chief White House Correspondent, The New York Times: Yeah, I mean, look, that is an easier target, to David's point, than the nuclear facilities.
Oil facilities are there and easily hit.
But the question is, what does world markets, you're already seeing the price of crude go up, could they hit just the refineries, for instance, that mainly handle internal domestic consumption and wouldn't necessarily hurt the global markets, possibly?
But that's something that Biden doesn't want to see.
Because the election may be also, because he doesn't want to see the spiral that he's been trying to avoid for 12 months.
He has been - - that's been the number one goal, aside from supporting Israel's right to defend itself, has been supporting its right to defend itself up to a point, right?
Up to the point that we don't engulf the region.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
Francesca, you were just with the president yesterday.
Give us the sense from the White House this week about the calibration that's going on in terms of the advice or requests being made by the White House to Israel right now?
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS, White House Correspondent, USA Today: Well, and it's not just the White House.
It is the defense secretary who's talking to his counterpart in Israel, Yoav Gallant, on a near daily basis, I am told.
And what we aren't seeing is the president of the United States who's speaking directly to Bibi Netanyahu at this point.
And he has suggested repeatedly that a call could be coming soon.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: When was the last time?
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: The last time that they had spoken was in August.
And notably, when the United Nations was taking place, Netanyahu came to New York after Biden was already back in Washington.
He was meeting with President Zelenskyy at the White House at the time.
So they did not cross paths when they were in New York.
As far as a phone call that could take place, the calculation on that has been that Biden doesn't feel the need to speak to him until something is actually going to happen.
When I spoke to President Biden about this last night, he said that he hadn't spoke to him because nothing was taking place right now.
So that tells you a lot about the movements in the next couple days, maybe to a week, that he has not felt the need to have a conversation at that level yet because the White House only believes he needs to weigh in when a decision seems to be imminent.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Frank, what is the thing that the White House is looking for?
FRANKLIN FOER, THE ATLANTIC NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I was just thinking back to that conversation in August, which took place in a totally different world, where Biden was trying to bring Bibi along to a place where he would come to an agreement over the terms for the peace deal with Hamas that would be acceptable to Hamas.
And it was a very -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: That was to get the hostages out, Israeli hostages out.
FRANKLIN FOER: Like, yeah, it was a very uncomfortable call and it happened in a totally different era.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Uncomfortable is a euphemism for they yelled at each other a lot?
What was it?
FRANKLIN FOER: Yeah, yeah, more or less.
I mean I don't think it was in -- it was not a 10 on the scale of those conversations, but -- it wasn't a totally friendly call either.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Is it Biden who doesn't want to talk to Netanyahu or is it Netanyahu who also doesn't want to talk to Biden?
FRANKLIN FOER: I think it's mutual at this point.
I think that there's a lot of kabuki that happens in these calls where Biden gets performatively angry at Netanyahu because he has a lot of pent-up feelings towards him and Netanyahu knows what's coming and he knows what he needs to tell Biden in order to get things back on course.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
So what does Joe Biden want right now?
Does he want a comprehensive ceasefire on the northern front and on the southern front?
And I ask this because there are -- there are people who are more hardline in the administration -- than others and some people say, well, going to David's point, you know, maybe the Israelis are doing a pretty good job of destroying Iran's terrorist proxies.
Why would we stop that from happening?
Kind of the point that President Trump made this week.
So, I mean, what does Joe Biden, now I'm asking you to do like a soup saying, what does Joe Biden want?
FRANKLIN FOER: Well, as it relates to what's happened over the course of the last couple of weeks in Lebanon where the administration's position has markedly changed from pushing for a ceasefire to giving Israel more room to operate.
That's based on, I think, increased faith in Israel's military capabilities that they didn't expect that they would perform as well against Hezbollah.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Going to David's point in this column that there's nothing that beats winning here.
FRANKLIN FOER: Yeah.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Yeah, yeah.
FRANKLIN FOER: Yeah, but there's also been this muddled thinking ever since October 7th within the administration where Biden, I think, is overwhelmingly agreed with the objectives that Israel wants to achieve but he has this fear of escalation, the same fear of escalation that dominates his thinking about Ukraine.
And he believes that the Israelis may be well-intentioned about certain things but they're also not necessarily thinking straight, that their strategic thinking is marred by trauma and anger.
And he worries where that would go.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Yeah.
Peter -- both of you, Francesca and Peter, I'm very curious about what Vice President Harris thinks about all of this.
We're going to come in a minute.
I want to play you something from Donald Trump.
But I do want to play you something from Kamala Harris right now.
This is from just this week.
I want you to listen to this for a second.
KAMALA HARRIS, (D) U.S. Vice President & Democratic Presidential Nominee: My commitment to the security of Israel is unwavering.
And let us be clear, Iran is not only a threat to Israel, Iran is also a threat to American personnel in the region, American interests, and innocent civilians across the region who suffer at the hands of Iran-based and back-terrorist proxies.
We will never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to defend U.S. forces and interests against Iran and Iran-backed terrorists.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: So, Francesca, she's saying the things that mainstream Democratic national leaders say.
No reason to disbelieve her, obviously.
But there is this perception among Republicans, certainly, and some more right-leaning supporters of Israel, that she's going to be, quote, "softer" on the issue, that she doesn't have an emotional attachment to Israel in the same way that maybe Joe Biden has.
Any sense from the Harris team about where her relationship with Netanyahu could go or what she actually thinks should happen in the Middle East?
And, Peter, I'll let you jump in after, too.
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: So, as a presidential candidate, she's said relatively little about foreign policy, not just when it comes to Israel.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: And also domestic policy, actually, by the way.
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: Not just when it comes to Israel and Iran.
She has focused a lot on the economy and on other issues.
We've heard her talk in the debate a little bit about this, as well as in her Democratic National Committee speech, and then, of course, the clip that you just played.
As far as what we could expect from her, I mean, largely what we're hearing would be a continuation of the Biden administration policy when it comes to all of these issues on foreign policy.
But as far as what the campaign itself is saying, you mentioned those Republicans.
They've been trying to go on the offense against Donald Trump more recently when it comes to foreign policy.
They just released a new digital ad today in which they're playing some of those Republicans who have broken with Trump on national security, trying to get under his skin that way.
Liz Cheney is in that video.
They've already turned the Liz Cheney speech into an ad now.
They've really been trying to drive more of a philosophical argument against Donald Trump, and we have seen this with other things that she's done, too.
So it's less about any specific policy and more about the argument that under Kamala Harris there would be stability in the world.
Under Donald Trump, you would see more chaos.
At least that is how the Harris campaign is explaining it.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Peter, jump in and add to what Francesca is saying.
PETER BAKER: Yeah, I mean, look, first of all, in fairness, Donald Trump isn't exactly talking about policy either.
I will settle the war before I take office is not a policy.
That's a brag, a boast.
It's just and also -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: All right, I want to play that for you in a minute.
PETER BAKER: Oh, and a silly one, by the way, obviously, not realistic.
He's given no indication of what he would do in the Middle East, much less in Ukraine, to actually make these wars go away.
In fact, if anything, he's been more cryptic and opaque about the Middle East than anybody would have expected, right?
He spent four years in office seemingly as Bibi Netanyahu's wingman, but they had a falling out at the end, actually before the end, really, and he's been kind of all over the map.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Netanyahu is a difficult date.
PETER BAKER: It's a difficult date.
In a bipartisan fashion.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
But go to this question about Harris.
I mean, it seems like, and talking in the context of the next four weeks, it seems fairly obvious that when you -- one of the things you do, first rule a fight club, don't get into a fight over the Middle East four weeks before a national election.
Is she going to -- I mean, is she going to make that?
PETER BAKER: Well, I mean, what is her reaction?
Are you kidding me?
That's her reaction.
Like, now is what you want to do?
The whole goal for the administration was to get this ceasefire that Frank was just talking about, done, so they could get this off the table by the fall.
Not that people wouldn't still be talking about it, but that it wouldn't be the main focus of our TV pictures that people are seeing at night.
It wouldn't be the main focus of conversation.
The left, which has been mad at the Biden administration for being too supportive of Israel, might have other things to think about instead of that.
The right, which likes to take after Biden for being not supportive enough of Israel, won't have a cudgel to go after them, and now instead this is the conversation four weeks out, not what she wants.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
Frank, come back to the question Francesca raised, the whole year that's gone by.
You wrote a very interesting piece in "The Atlantic" recently where you reconstructed the efforts by Joe Biden, in particular Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, Tony Blinken, the Secretary of State, to, I guess, containment is the issue.
Talk a little bit about the frustrations of the past year and where there's been discord.
It seems like muddle, which is the word you used, is an accurate word to describe the way they're sort of grappling with all this.
Give us a little framing for that.
FRANKLIN FOER: Right.
I mean, to begin with, just after October 7th, Israel actually didn't - - sorry, Biden actually didn't want Israel to invade Gaza in the manner that they invaded Gaza.
Their initial war plans were even more robust than the war plans that they ended up implementing, but his preference was that they would conduct counterterrorism raids.
And then as the -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Can I -- by the way -- sorry to interrupt, but can I just read something that struck me?
This is sort of like a time capsule.
Barack Obama, on October 9th, wrote, "We stand squarely alongside our ally Israel as it dismantles Hamas."
FRANKLIN FOER: Yeah.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Barack Obama used the word dismantle.
So there were so many different messages going on within the Democratic tent even back then, and it seems like they never got kind of clarity on that.
FRANKLIN FOER: Right, and so many different strategies that they were trying to pursue and so many different goals that they were trying to pursue.
At the same time, they were trying to get to a ceasefire and hostage deal in Gaza.
They were trying to negotiate deals for the reconstruction of post-war Gaza and trying to negotiate normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel.
And it's hard to say that they have achieved any of those goals, especially since the one goal that they were proudly touting was that they were able to contain the war to Gaza and prevent it from spilling over in the north and with Iran.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
You mentioned the Saudi deal.
David, this has obviously been a dream.
Obviously, it was a dream of the Trump administration, even before the Trump administration.
It's still a vision that if you can get the most important Muslim country, the custodian of the two mosques, the holiest site in Islam, to engage Israel above board.
I mean, obviously, they cooperate on military and intelligence issues already.
And obviously, Iran does not want that.
Is that something that could ever happen so long as the current Iranian government remains in power?
DAVID IGNATIUS: Could Saudi normalization with Israel happen?
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Within the framework of the current Middle East.
DAVID IGNATIUS: So the truth is, Mohammed bin Salman wants that as much now -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: He's the crown prince.
DAVID IGNATIUS: -- as he did a year ago.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Why does he want it?
DAVID IGNATIUS: He wants it because he thinks a strong Israel, and he has a much stronger Israel in prospect, can be helpful to Saudi Arabia.
He thinks Iran is a threat.
He thinks Israel is, with the United States, that really does want to pull back from the Middle East.
Israel is the strongest friend to have, and he wants that - - wants that friendship.
So I'm told that he has been signaling over the past several weeks that he's as interested in normalization once the Gaza War, whatever happens, Lebanon, is passed, as he ever was.
So I think that's still in prospect.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Does he need a Palestinian state to be created before he does that?
DAVID IGNATIUS: So he needs -- no, I don't think so.
He needs something he can claim is being responsive to Palestinian needs.
He needs a path of phrases, a pathway toward a Palestinian state.
And I think the Saudis and others in the Middle East have bought off on that formulation.
I think the question still is whether there are enough Israelis, especially after this very robust moment, clobbering Hamas and Hezbollah, enough Israelis who really want to make an opening for Palestinians or a pathway.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
DAVID IGNATIUS: And we'll have to see.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Let me stay with you for one more minute, and I'll ask Peter and everyone else to jump in.
What does Hezbollah want?
DAVID IGNATIUS: To survive.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Now to survive.
DAVID IGNATIUS: So what does -- so Hezbollah has prided itself, It's -- it's raison d'etre (ph), is that it's the resistance to Israel.
If this war goes away, Hezbollah's ability to function, I think, begins to disappear.
I think the most interesting thing that lies ahead for the United States is the possibility of helping Lebanon regain its sovereignty.
Hezbollah is, it's not out, but it's really down.
It's clobbered.
Their leadership has been decimated.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: What do you mean regain its sovereignty?
DAVID IGNATIUS: So, you know, one big problem for Israel is that they don't have plans in Lebanon as they don't in Gaza for the next day.
So what is the next day?
And the only plausible next day is that after Hezbollah really is clobbered, that the Lebanese armed forces move in and take that territory all the way to the Israeli border and regain sovereignty and control of Lebanon.
CENTCOM, our military command in the Middle East, has been working on this for 15 years, and I just have been talking to people today.
All those plans are ready to go.
The White House is keen to do it, and that would be, you know, for the United States, a way to come back into the Middle East game, I think, in a very positive way.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Peter, I come back to this question of whether anything that America might want in the Middle East is dependent on having a different Iranian government.
And the question I have is, if it's Donald Trump as our next president, do you think that the Trump administration would move toward regime change?
It seems like the Democrats are very, very hesitant to talk about bold plans, as Frank points out, ceasefire, ceasefire, ceasefire.
Do you think the Republicans, even a quasi-isolationist Republican like Trump, would be more interested in changing the dynamic?
PETER BAKER: I think he would find it appealing.
He will no doubt be surrounded by people who might advocate that toward him, right?
There will be some hardliners who will push in that direction.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Like the Tom Cottons, Mike Pompeos.
PETER BAKER: Yeah, exactly.
But the truth is, like, you know, as you say, Trump talks a big game sometimes on things like that, but he is hesitant to use force and, I think, to be too aggressive.
Remember the time that they shot down an American drone and he launched a retaliatory strike and 10 minutes before it was about to hit said, well, I changed my mind, I'm pulling back.
And I think -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: But he also did assassinate Qasem Soleimani -- PETER BAKER: Yeah.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: -- the Iranian terror chief.
PETER BAKER: Exactly.
And because he's on both -- because he did both of those things, he is therefore unpredictable.
That's the old madman theory that Nixon used to propose.
In this case, people think it might actually be true.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
David, before you two jump in, I just want to play what Donald Trump recently said about the Middle East, and we can talk about that.
DONALD TRUMP (R), Former U.S. President, 2024 Presidential Nominee: I will settle the war in Ukraine before I even take office, I'll settle it as president-elect.
I met with President Zelenskyy the other day.
I know President Putin very well.
I'll get it settled.
I will end the chaos in the Middle East and I will prevent World War III, something nobody else can say.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Something nobody else can say?
Something nobody else would say, I think.
DAVID IGNATIUS: Sly little line.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Jump in.
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: Well, I would say the Harris officials, one of their biggest frustrations with Donald Trump on foreign policy is this argument that none of these things would ever have happened if I was, you know, president.
It's hard to prove a counterfactual that none of those things would ever happen.
But their argument has been that America's allies and relationships have been stronger.
They've made this argument that Harris would stand up to dictators like Putin and that she'd crack down on Xi Jinping and all these other folks.
When you talk about Democrats and unwilling to be bold on these sorts of issues, the difficulty that Harris is running into is that she is the sitting vice president of the United States and she cannot get in front of the president, her boss of the United States, on these issues right now.
And so in some ways for her, it is better to say nothing and not show daylight with President Joe Biden, even in areas where she may -- where she may have -- she may have daylight with him.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: That's an excellent point, because we don't know really what her instincts are on this because she has to toe the line.
FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: And there are other areas where she -- where she, you know, she might be suggesting she might be potentially softer, she's seen in that way, she's been more sympathetic, some people have seen towards the Palestinian cause, but the uncommitted movement has not endorsed her in this election because the things that she has said have been so close to what Joe Biden has said.
And so that is how this could affect her electorally.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: David, any insight on Kamala Harris and her foreign policy vis-a-vis the Middle East?
DAVID IGNATIUS: So I interviewed a lot of people who sat with her in the Situation Room around the table, and I just wanted to hear, what does she say?
And for the most part, the answer was what you'd expect.
She asks great questions, she's very lawyerly, she asks, you know, about Russian troop formations, well, how many units are there?
How quickly can they move?
I was also told that they make decisions there to kill people, to conduct operations.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
The fight against ISIS, for instance, continues.
DAVID IGNATIUS: Yeah.
And somebody said to me, I've watched her, and she's ready to take the shot.
So I thought that was a pretty good description of, you know, the moment where you actually have to come down, it's like, you know, deciding to kill bin Laden.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
DAVID IGNATIUS: And she's ready to take the shot.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.
Frank, making assumptions here is probably a dangerous game about what she might actually be like in power.
FRANKLIN FOER: Right.
Well, interesting that the Israelis both have big question marks about her and about Donald Trump.
I think Joe Biden was a very comfortable figure for Israel because they knew that whatever hesitations he had about what they were doing, there was this underlying Zionism that was really deeply felt, and that when he came to Israel after October 7th, that was an incredible sign.
But I asked the same questions that David asked of people, were there ever moments of daylight between Biden and Harris as these decisions were being debated, and they just didn't exist?
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: That's interesting.
One final question for you, because you've studied Joe Biden and his policies and his personality for so long, just 15, 20 seconds, sorry.
The -- what do you think he wants -- as he leaves office, what do you think he wants out of the Middle East?
Hostages free?
Would that be enough?
FRANKLIN FOER: I think he wants it, but I think that there's no expectation that they're going to be able to get that between now and then.
JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Well, that's sobering.
And unfortunately, we have to leave it there for right now, but I want to thank our panelists for sharing their reporting, and to our viewers at home, thank you for joining us.
You can read more of Frank's investigation of America's diplomatic efforts in the Middle East at TheAtlantic.com, and of course, read all of these smart people.
I'm Jeffrey Goldberg.
Good night from Washington.
