Open Book with Anthony Scaramucci - The Decisions That Changed the Middle East Forever - Akbar Shahid Ahmed

Episode Date: September 29, 2026

My guest today is Akbar Shahid Ahmed, an award-winning foreign affairs journalist whose new book Crossing the Red Line takes us inside the Biden administration’s handling of Israel and the war in Gaza. We get into what Washington knew before October 7th, the warnings that were missed, and how the decisions that followed reshaped America’s relationship with Israel and the Middle East. These are the conversations we have to have in the world today. Akbar Shahid Ahmed is the Senior Diplomatic Correspondent for HuffPost, based in Washington, D.C. A native Pakistani, Akbar has reported from around the globe. Akbar won the 2025 Writers Guild Award for Outstanding Writing and a 2025 New York Press Club Award. Read his wonderful new book, Crossing the Red Line: Biden, His Advisors, and Israel's War in Gaza Anthony Scaramucci is the founder and managing partner of SkyBridge, a global alternative investment firm, and founder and chairman of SALT, a global thought leadership forum and venture studio. Order my next book, All the Wrong Moves: How Three Catastrophic Decisions Led to the Rise of Trump, out now: ⁠https://www.scaramucci.net/allthewrongmoves Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

By October 6, there was a real awareness that Palestinians as a whole, and specifically Hamas, felt really left out of that process of bringing Israel more into the region and building ties between Israel and other Arab states, specifically the Saudis. And so there were warnings coming in to Washington, to the White House, saying they feel that the deal you're trying to get by the administration officials just before this. You had Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisors say, the region is calmer than it's been for two decades. They were presenting themselves as bringing in a period of instability, all the while their own

professionals, their own international are saying, hey, this is leaving out this group, they might make a choice to react. Now, we also know from other reporting that the Israelis had intelligence, that Hamas had battle plans. And that's part of the fact that too is there was a willful blindness from both the Netanyahu and Biden administrations on October 6th. Welcome to Open Book. I am your host, Anthony Scaramucci. Joining me today is Akbar Shahid Ahmed.

Hopefully I pronounce that right, Akbar. He's an award-winning foreign affairs journalist. He's out with a new book called Crossing the Red Line. Biden, his advisors, and Israel's war in Gaza. You know, I hear the Red Line Act, I think of Barack Obama and Syria. But you're using the red line here as it relates to Joe Biden.

And tell me what the red line is there. And what do you believe the administration did? to allow Israel to cross that red line. Thanks for having me, Anthony. In the Biden era, that red line was what he set over the town Ruffa, which was me 2024, by that time six months post-October 7th. You had 1.4 million Palestinians clustered into this one town, right? We'd seen months of warfare by Israel in response to Hamas's attack and taking of hostages,

violations of international law on their own. But what I argue in this book, drawing on nearly 175-infuse with officials across the State Department, diplomacy, White House, intelligence, humanitarian, the whole range. What I argue in the book, Anthony, is the Biden administration enabled Israel to have an excessive response. The kind of response that we've now seen obviously provoke a huge backlash in the US, have a huge human and moral cost among Palestinians. And that red line concept to me is so important because it shows two things. The president himself said, I don't want the Israelis to behave towards Rafa in this way. And then when they did impose no consequences, so it was a message of total impunity.

And building on what you point out with Obama, look, I come at this as someone who's reported on U.S. foreign policy for about 14 years, grew up on the receiving end of it in Pakistan, wanted to reflect its highest ideals, right? but so often American presidents will make these claims about red lines, human rights, international law, and it becomes empty hollow talk, which has a real effect for human lives, but also for American power and influence. It's a fascinating book. I appreciate you writing it because I've learned a lot in the book, but there, a lot went wrong on October 7th. So let's start, let's start on October 6th. Because, again, and I could be wrong about all this, but I got to, from the book and from my outside reading, Israel knows it has a problem with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

They're shooting Kaysam rockets into Starrot, other places. They're intercepting these rockets. They're trying to contain the violence. But they also tell the Gatoris it's okay to fund Hamas, right, because they're trying to figure out if there's a political solution here. Right. So it's a very complicated story. and then it crosses over into violence.

And so the Americans think rightly or wrongly, what I mean about Americans is meaning the foreign policy gurus, they think that this had to do with the Abraham Accords. They think that there was a potential opportunity for the Saudis and others to recognize Israel. And since Hamas is sponsored by the Iranians, it triggered the October 7th attack. So I want you to tell me fact from fiction, and I want you to tell me the precursor story before we get into the red line activity. Yeah.

So let's go to October 6, right? By the point of October 6th, you've had Hamas be in control of Gaza now for about 16 years. As you rightly point out, as U.S. officials themselves told me, one said to me, Netanyahu himself, his Israeli prime minister, encouraged this policy. of sustaining the rule of Hamas, in part U.S. officials assessed because he wanted to keep the Palestinian leadership severed, right? There's the Gaza Strip where Hamas was in control from 2007. There's the occupied West Bank, where the Palestinian authority backed by the U.S. is also in control. From Netanyahu's perspective, as you say, allowing the Qataris, Iran to a degree, others to support Hamas's rule, which was oppressive for Palestinians and, of course, violent towards Israelis, that was a policy choice.

that put off this question of Palestinian peace for many, many years. And Netanyahu kind of made the gamble that we can kind of sustain ourselves like this. There won't be a moment of immense violence like what we saw on October 7th. It was the wrong bet. American officials through the Trump and Biden and prior to that Obama administrations allowed that policy to continue, right, and enabled it even while they had deep concerns. Then you bring into the picture of the Abraham Accords and this kind of American approach of can we get the Arab states to recognize Israel?

Can we have a region that's more about moneymaking, economic progress, stability, not about these longstanding political differences. However, what a lot of my sources told me, Anthony, was by October 6th, there was a real awareness that Palestinians as a whole, and specifically Hamas, felt really left out of that process of bringing Israel more into the region and building ties between Israel and other Arab states, specifically the Saudis. And so there were warnings coming in to Washington, to the White House, saying,

look, that could be an outburst of violence here, because they feel that the deal you'll try to get by the administration officials just before this. On October 2nd, you had Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, say, the region is calmer than it's been for two decades. They were presenting themselves as bringing in a period of new stability, all the while their own professionals, their own diplomats, saying, hey, this is leaving out this group, they might make a choice to react. Now, we also know from other reporting that the Israelis had intelligence that Hamas had

battle plans. And that's part of the fact that too is there was a willful blindness from both the Netanyahu and Biden administrations on October 6th. It's important. It's important to understand this part of it, right? And so why are the Israelis caught so off guard? It's a tremendous question. There's several aspects today. The big one is, look, I've reported from Gaza, I've reported from Israel, that Erez crossing, Israeli border communities were aware of the risk, right? And we're again saying we feel kind of vulnerable. Netanyahu had come in eight months prior to October 7th, bringing in the most far-right government

in Israel's history, and making choices like, for instance, moving a lot of weapons away from those border communities towards settler communities, which his far-right government is supporting in the West Bank. So these political narratives and choices become a factor too. And then there's a real breakdown within Israel's own democracy that again, the Biden administration was aware of, where Israeli military legal establishment was saying, we feel that Anahu's not only not listening to us, he's going for a power grab, we're concerned, but everything's become so politicized, we can't kind of get our warnings, decision making isn't happening in the way it should be. Okay. All right. So now we have the attack and Joe Biden flies to Israel, right? Doesn't you go to Israel?

Very quickly soon after it's the Israeli's idea. He lands on the tarmac and it's exactly the footer-up that Netanyahu wanted. And this is where, you know, I, again, Hamas initiated the spirit of violence with its choice to attack on October 7th. Biden's choice to give Netanyahu that kind of open support to choose to be a bear hug, rather than saying, I know who Netanyahu is, I've dealt with him. I also know many Israelis are wary. Let's not enable this fully. He didn't choose that route. He instead chose to go there beyond a tarmac, embrace Netanyahu in front of the whole world. But, you know, we learn that Biden is trying to tell Netanyahu, please don't overreact.

Don't make the mistake that the Americans make in Afghanistan. and Yvonne. So, you know, again, I'm asking you for your personal opinion. It's in the book. But he does overreact, doesn't he? I think Netanyahu does overreact. Does he, why does he overact? Is it for his own political purposes?

Is it something, is it the will of the Israeli people? What is it? Because I think he's hurt. I mean, listen, this is my opinion. I'll share it. I think he's hurt Israel's brand, you know. And they get very sensitive. If someone calls it a genocide, they flip out and they, they, they, they, they, they,

They register complaints or embassies with other governments and stuff like that. And again, I'm not calling it a genocide. I'm just saying I think this hurt Israel's brand. By the way, I saw the security tapes. I've watched the 45-minute IDF tape. And I find the actions that took place on October 7th absolutely despicable and atrocious. So I'm not here saying that, you know, we're in a war. Violent things happen in a war.

But you tell me, tell me your opinion of the whole. So based on what I got from, again, these U.S. officials I talked to national security experts, certainly the Israelis were going to react to what Hamasad fighters had chosen to do, right? There were mass atrocities committed that day. And importantly, there were 251 Israeli hostages. Among them, some American citizens taken back to Gaza. So both the U.S. and the Israel had an onus to respond in some way. the debate that I chart inside the Biden administration, and this is the first time that

a lot of this is out there for the public to assess and make their own judgment, is there were different ways to do this, right? By the time Biden embraced Netanyahu on the tarmac, the Israeli government had already said, we're cutting off all food and water to the Palestinians in Gaza, 2.2 million people dependent on outside shipments. They had already said, we are going to go in using military force, right? So pushing back on the idea of any diplomacy or deal-making, which could also happen with Hamas potentially,

and ultimately was the way some of the hostages did come home. The Biden administration knew that the Israeli public had this sense of deep anger and a real shock of their sense of security. And that's why President Biden said things. Like, don't do what we did after Iraq and Afghanistan, after 9-11, it backfired on us, you got the rise of ISIS, you didn't lead to the end of al-Qaeda in the world, by the way, we're 25 years into the war in terror, and there's still a huge risk

of the same folks linked to 9-11. All of that said, what the Biden administration didn't do is apply any real force or leverage to shape Israel's approach. So while they were saying, we want you to respect international law, we don't want you to overreact, we don't want this produced this backlash that Anthony, you point out, has happened globally to the perception of Israel in the U.S. and internationally. So I, you know, Akbar, I'm going to test something on you and I want you to either say, I'm right or I'm wrong, pushback on me. I feel October 7th, I feel like the Iranians sort of got what they wanted, right?

They expected Israel to overreact or to act in the way that they did and they did exactly that and it did cause a negative pressure tension for Israel and it did hurt Israel standing globally. I mean, these are facts. If the Israelis are upset with me for saying that, I'm just pointing out the objective facts. But the flip side is, I think it also triggered this Iranian war where the Israelis were pushing the Americans to attack Iran. And Donald Trump took the bait of that and attacked Iran. So I feel like all roads lead back to October 7th and all roads lead back to what you're writing about with the Biden administration. Had they handled this differently, we might be in a different outcome, right? So I'll endorse half part of that and maybe push back on a little bit.

I would say that the intelligence officials I talk to and other reporting have not found a direct Iranian linked to the October 7th attack. Of course, the Iranians had supported Hamas prior to it, and Palestinian Islamic Shahad, some of the other groups. The actual attack that hasn't been proof that the Iranians necessarily directed it or even knew it was

coming in that way. All of that said, certainly Hamas, I've interviewed the Hamas leadership, that's in the book two. I've interviewed several folks across Palestinian politics and affairs. Hamas expected the Israelis to lash

out in a huge way and made the calculation that in their view, that might be worthwhile because they wanted to upend regional affairs. I do think they thought the US was going to, or they say, they thought the US was going to reign in Israel sooner. And that's where that Biden administration enabling, I will totally agree with you, the Biden administration enabling paved the way for Trump to work with Netanyahu, to take Netanyahu's argument that it was going to be easy to have a war in Iran and kind of enable what we've seen as our quagmire, right? The US and Israel being stuck in this regional situation, they don't want to be in and that doesn't benefit either of them strategically. The Biden administration, of course, also, you know, in that period, yes, they were very focused

on defending Israel and the Iranians did begin. They struck Israel in a way they never had before. But as I chart in the book, Anthony, there were several moments of escalation by Netanyahu and the Israelis, where the Biden administration let them do that and didn't impose consequences. So it wasn't that the Iranians were upping the ante in this moment. It was really Netanyahu again and against, striking the Iranians in Syria, then launching another attack, then killing more, killing people into Tehran, for instance, at the inauguration of that current president. So that's a trajectory that the Biden administration allowed.

They also took credit saying we're helping the Israelis deal with the Iranian backlash without looking forward to say, oh, is this creating a sense that it might be too easy, you know, to take on Iran and for the U.S. and Israel to be aligned, which led to the Trump kind of policy. Guys, thank you so much for listening and subscribing to open book. You know we've got 200 authors on this show. It's been a lot of fun for me, but I'm also an author now too. And I've got all the wrong moves available. Go to scaramucci.net backslash all the wrong moves. You can buy your copy today. It's a lot of fun and lots of commentary about what's gone on in the U.S. over the last three decades. What would you have done differently? Be the national security advisor for the Biden

administration and then give me some advice if you were also working for Donald Trump. What would you have done differently? I'll put the caveat. I'm a reporter. I'm not a policymaker, but I will see talking to policymakers in these rooms, in these discussions who get how U.S. leverage works. People were trying to say, look, can we get the Israelis to, for instance, reign in their military campaign earlier, cut a deal with Hamas and try to move really quickly towards de-escalation, towards some kind of settlement that brings the hostages home, begins the rebuilding of Gaza, doesn't lead to the picture we have today, which is a picture of 60% Israeli control of Gaza. No future for the 2 million Palestinians who are now displaced and in kind of mass travest. and the continuation of the Israeli block aid on aid. I mean, I think a lot of people in the Biden era are humanitarian officials. I spoke with Samantha Power, for instance, the head of U.S. aid,

who talked about how you couldn't get a message through to the Israelis because you knew the Biden administration wasn't going to impose consequences. What I'd also point to for both the Biden team and the Trump team is a moment I really hinge on before crossing the red line, the title of my book, the World Central Kitchen Killing April 1st, 2024, I think a lot of us remember the Israelis talked at a convoy

belonging to WCK-A group foreign passport holders killed what happened after that is Biden picked up the phone and told that in Yahoo, you have to change your approach or something will shift from our policy and for a month it did change. So a lot of the officials I talked to at that moment

said US leverage can work on Israel and we in fact saw that with President Trump too, right? He was able to get them to a ceasefire in January, didn't last very long, also to a ceasefire in October, also questionable. But it's what you do around that application of pressure. Listen, if you like or dislike Trump, you have to give him credit for pushing to get the 20 hostages freed. Absolutely. And now, right, he remains the person with the most influence over the Israelis.

However, it's also about, and this is what I really tried in the book. having that kind of strategy around it, having that kind of commitment to American and international law, which people told me in the Biden administration wasn't happening. They were never able to reach a single conclusion that the Israelis had violated the law and in fact often prolonged state department or White House discussions to avoid holding the Israelis accountable. And that's continued into the Trump era, but then if you're just going out and saying, due to ceasefire, okay, that'll lead to some improvement. But if you want a longer term improvement, you have to be talking about things like

accountability. You have to be talking about a broader Israel-Palestine policy. Neither administration has wanted to listen to their own experts on this region or on U.S. and international law. I think it's very well said. And I guess the other thing I want to ask you, because you've wrote this book for a number of different reasons, but I see this book is something that would be at, like the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in terms of a case study of what happens when you get

some policies wrong. And so I guess the thing I would like to ask you is where do you think we are now going, okay? Whether it's a Democratic or a Republican administration, describe what you think the post-Gaza, post-Iran war relationship will be with Israel. That's certainly my hope, right, is that this is a kind of book that can be looked at for future policymakers. But I think a big part of that discussion begins with people taking responsibility from the Biden administration and from the Trump administration for the Iran War, which we haven't seen. We continue to see an effort to deflect responsibility. So if we're looking at a future policy, I think acknowledging that people like Jake Sullivan, people like Brett McGur, Biden's Middle East

advisor, who was also in the Trump administration, are trying to shape our policy conversation without acknowledging what they got wrong. I think that's a big part of the question, because we haven't seen that kind of accountability even for decisions like the invasion of Iraq in 2003. That pattern has to break. And I think when we look at now public sentiment towards Israel and Palestine, you referenced this several times in this conversation, a lot of Americans, both Republicans and Democrats and especially younger folks, are not comfortable with you. relationship with Israel. Anyone who cares about peace in that region, who cares about Israel and its kind of future, I think has to be looking at that and saying, does that become a relationship

of isolation or is there a mutually beneficial partnership that can still happen here that's based on, again, values, again, US law, international law? Can that relationship be salvaged? So if you look at Democrats and Republicans going forward, I think it's about looking at that question of again accountability for alleged war crimes. How are American weapons used? Because there's now a new conversation about cutting off military to Israel. Netanyahu himself has said maybe the Americans should stop funding our weaponry. But American weapons and bombs are still going to be bought by the Israelis. How they're used matters a lot. Talking about the specifics matters a lot. And I think ignoring that conversation is a really risky place to go for anyone who is about the region because it really

leads you towards more violence. Yeah. I mean, look, it's such a complicated thing. I mean, I guess the thing I got out of the book is that this stuff is super complicated. The U.S. now, this is hard for me to believe, but I always saw Israel as a democracy in the Middle East and the United States in a bipartisan way had. universal public support for Israel. The public opinion in the United States has changed, which is shocking to me, given the 80-year history that we've had with the country.

What are your thoughts on that? What do you think changed public opinion so drastically? And if you were advising the Israeli government, what would you say to them in terms of what they would need to think about vis-a-vis the relationship with the American public? It's remarkable that happened under President Biden, right? Himself a lifelong open Zionist, proud supporter of Israel, I would argue he and his administration has sort of irreversibly changed the American relationship with Israel. You cannot go back to the place it was on October 6th because, again, American officials so denied the reality of what so many Americans were seeing in terms of U.S. complicity in mass violence

toward Palestinians, a regional policy spiring the out of control, now a war with Iran. And so I think a big part of that conversation going forward is also just a little less hubris from Washington, from people at the White House and the State Department when you look at where the American public is on this issue, a little more engagement, a little more willingness to engage with critics, because that, again, drives the public backlash we're seeing. I think you're seeing really interesting moves in Congress, where people like Senator Chris Van Holland and Maryland, some Republicans are talking about ways to apply U.S. War to Israel, bring that into a relationship, to build back any credibility and support for that relationship.

That's the kind of move, I think, is going to have to happen. And again, also an engagement with the Palestinian side, a recognition that while it is the and Israel have had this sort of special relationship, there's deep empathy for Palestinians now, and there's a real sense among Americans of responsibility for what happens in Gaza, given

the sense of fingerprints in its decimation. And so that kind of responsibility can't just be pushed off and ignored. I think that the Americans now, the perception of American power in the Middle East,

both from the Sunni side, in the Shia side of the Gulf? What's the perception of American power? I've been doing, ongoing reporting, beyond the book, talking to people throughout the Iran war. I just did a story covering how Persian Gulf states, so the richest countries, kind of these semi-majority countries, you're talking about Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, they feel that their economic future has been shortchanged by that thought. I mean, it's not only a sense of how did you fail to reign in Netanyahu, it's also a sense of you've put us in tremendous danger, both because the Iran war has kind of diverted their attention

and made it impossible to plan their futures, right, any kind of post-oil future that they wanted to have, and because of a sense of they're so cautious with their publics. The perception of America now in a lot of the Muslim majority world, I grew up in Pakistan, and, you know, I talk to people back there very often, is irrevocably changed by Gaza. And again, a kind of reckoning with that is really important. And a reckoning linked to that with the Iran war,

with the question of whether the US is making the right, strategic and moral moves is really important to kind of build back any of that trust. But right now the perception is a sort of rudderless US. I also talk about in the book about a broader perception, Anthony, not just in the Middle East, but Ukraine, for instance, US support for Ukraine was hurt by the fact that other countries looked at what was happening in Gaza and said, we don't want to align with the U.S. and we don't believe it anymore in criticizing Russia and Ukraine

or criticizing what's happening in Sudan anywhere else, because look at what they're connected to. So there's a lot of kind of acknowledgement that has to happen, I think, to build back any of that faith. I would say if I had Blinken, Sullivan, and Biden in the room with us, how would they push back on what you wrote? Sure. You've, you know, you've had, you've had Sullivan come out now and see, I think the time is right now to cut off weapons to Israel. You've had Blinken come out and see we had to support these Israelis. They were traumatized. You can't imagine how traumatized they were. Biden, of course, is a longstanding supporter of Israel. I think he'd say, that's what I have to be president. Hunter Biden, interestingly, has come out and said, in retrospect, it was the wrong policy.

but to all of those folks what I'd see and what I think the book provides for the historical record and for future policymakers, whether it's Fletcher or wherever else, is they knew at the time. You know, denying that is really hard for people. I mean, it's hard for people who are in government, so many of whom I talk to. One of the things I'm proudest of is that I spoke to so many people who would never talk to a journalist before, but felt such a deep disillusionment with the leadership of, Blinken-Solven Biden. This sense that Blinken, for instance, was unwilling to acknowledge even his own embassy in Jerusalem saying, you should go ahead and sanction certain Israeli military units.

Jake Sullivan not being willing to take seriously the question of limiting weapons and then a year leader saying, oh, let's limit weapons to pressure the Israelis. That, again, kind of responsibility is what I hope those folks will begin to have, because again, they're going to continue shaping the policy discussions for for you come even if Biden himself isn't okay we're now down to the five words okay pick five words from your book you're going to give me one or two sentences about the word you ready yep i say the word israel to you you say what to say about israel to you you say what to say i mean it's obviously a hugely important state to the global jewish community it's a country that exists it's a country that's mired in a tremendous tremendous morally and strategically different

difficult position and I think it's struggling to figure its way out of that. We'll have an Israeli election in October. I think Israelis are trying to seek out new leadership, but there's a real sense of where do we go from here. It's a country adrift and as we've discussed, that's really facing a strategic change of losing its most important partner to the United States. Yeah. Well, listen, I optimistic for Israel. I see, I hear Israel, I hear renewal and I hear a, a right sizing and a right setting of the direction that they want to go in, which I think is more consistent with their long-term eight-decade national identity. I say the word Gaza to you. You say what?

Unfortunately, just a wasteland now. I talk to people in Gaza still for my reporting. It's the place where not just two million people continue to live among unexploded American bombs, right? Through rats, sewage, all of that. It's the place where a lot of national security experts have said to me international law and the principles that people held here have gone to die. Right. So Gaza is unfortunately incredible potential. You look at the actual real estate, the strip of real state. But I just see tragedy there, unfortunately.

And I just see a, you know, I mean, this is the worst of us, frankly, as human beings. It's not a comment on any individual ethnic group or anything like that. We've got to figure these things out as a group of people. Okay, I say the word Netanyahu to you. You say what? Someone who positioned himself as an iconic leader in Israel's history, serving longer than David Bangurian, but who may go down as one of its potentially weakest leaders in terms of its long-term interest, but certainly a savvy political operator, including in the U.S., not just Israel. Well, I mean, you know, when I hear the word Netanyahu, I definitely, I mean, people are going to be mad at

but I think that the Prime Minister of Israel is also the brand manager for international jewelry. And I think you got to be very, you got to be consistent with the values of what that religion is about, which is really, frankly, one of the more, it's the progenitor of Western civilization. I mean, the Ten Commandments is the bedrock of Western civilization. Guys, you got to handle this better. Okay. Donald Trump, I say the word Trump. You say what?

Two-term president, with his fingerprints on a lot of the decision, that I highlight is alarming in my book, but also the Trump administration still has an opportunity to try to make a positive impact in the Middle East and particularly Israel-Palest. He may luck out in Iran, you know. I mean, we're all talking about them closing the straight of a ruse, but, you know, the country's decimated and it could be ripe for eventually a more secular revolution. It's not impossible. You know, I mean, he may luck out. We'll see. Okay, last word. I'll give you the last word. Joe Biden, which is the whole thesis of your book? A leader who enabled a tremendous backlash to policies, champions, principles

that he held dear and wasn't able to take the reins in a moment where it really mattered. And a leader who unfortunately had had a lot of the tendencies of his opponent, Donald Trump, that I think have gotten overlooked and deserve closer examination. All right. Well, I'm going to leave you the last word. Akbar Shahid Ahmed, the title of the book, crossing the red line, Biden, his advisors, and Israel's war in Gaza. It's a great read, and it's very provocative, and I appreciate your writing. Thank you so much, Anthony, and congratulations on your book.