It's the Brian Laris Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. And today, of course, is October 7,

24, exactly one year since the world changed in so many ways with the Hamas

attack on Israel. You've been hearing all the coverage just now on the BBC, earlier on NPR,

if you've been listening this morning. For this show's contribution and observance,

we're going to focus on U.S. policy toward Israel and Gaza and the region in the last year

with Franklin IV, staff writer for the Atlantic, who has a very in-depth timeline and analysis of the Biden administration response.

The article displays it around 50 pages. It's called The War That Would Not End.

Of course, a major question for the presidential candidates is whether Kamala Harris or Donald Trump would change course in any way

or how they would try to end the war if they would. And spoiler alert about this article, Franklin

Four writes near the top that it's the story of an over-extended superpower, his words, story of an overextended superpower and its aging president, unable to exert themselves decisively in a moment of crisis. Franklin, thanks for coming on with us again. Welcome back to WNYC. Thank you. I was just remembering that I was on with you, I think, about a year or two after September 11th on its anniversary.

So I guess I'm your go-to guy for commemorating atrocity in their painful aftermath.

Well, one of them and one of many, unfortunately, in the world in which we live.

And you were here in April to talk about another major Atlantic piece that you had written about American Jews. I should say that

despite your frame of failure, the article begins, and we're going to talk about this a lot

in part one here, with how close they were to an epic success on October 6th last year,

literally the day before,

when a Biden official was meeting with a group of Saudi diplomats

drawing up a normalization of relations deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel

that also included a Palestinian state.

So can you talk first about how developed that plan was and how close to yes they were

on October 6th last year between the various parties?

So that plan was of a piece with a much broader deal that the administration was hatching with the Saudis,

...