The Peace Puzzle: America's Quest for Arab-Israeli Peace, 1989–2011

Daniel C. Kurtzer; Scott B. Lasensky; William B. Quandt; Steven L. Spiegel; Shibley Telhami

Published by Cornell University Press 2017

The Peace Puzzle

America's Quest for Arab-Israeli Peace, 1989–2011

Daniel C. Kurtzer , Scott B. Lasensky , William B. Quandt , Steven L. Spiegel and Shibley Telhami

https://doi.org/10.7591/9780801465864

Overview
Contents

About this book

The Peace Puzzle tracks the American determination to articulate policy, develop strategy and tactics, and see through negotiations to agreements on an issue that has been of singular importance to U.S. interests for more than forty years.

Author / Editor information

Daniel C. Kurtzer is the S. Daniel Abraham Professor in Middle East Policy Studies at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University. He retired in 2005 from the U.S. Foreign Service, having served as U.S. ambassador to Egypt (1997–2001) and Israel (2001–2005). He is coauthor with Scott B. Lasensky of Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East. Scott B. Lasensky served as a senior researcher at the U.S. Institute of Peace from 2004 to 2011 and is coauthor (with Daniel C. Kurtzer) of Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East. William B. Quandt is Edward R. Stettinius, Jr. Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia. His books include Peace Process: American Diplomacy and the Arab-Israeli Conflict since 1967. Steven L. Spiegel is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for Middle East Development at UCLA. He is the author of The Other Arab-Israeli Conflict: Making America's Middle East Policy, from Truman to Reagan. Shibley Z. Telhami is the Anwar Sadat Professor of Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, College Park, and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of The Stakes: America in the Middle East and coeditor of Identity and Foreign Policy in the Middle East.

Reviews

General Anthony Zinni, USMC (Retired):

This is a superb account of the Arab-Israeli peace process. It offers remarkable insights into the process and exceptionally valuable lessons learned. It is the work of brilliant authors who possess unique knowledge and experience in this process. This is a must-read for anyone who desires to truly understand this critical and complex quest for Middle East peace.

Shlomo Ben Ami, Vice-President, Toledo International Centre for Peace (CITpax):

The failure of American diplomacy in its persistent attempts to coax Arabs and Israelis into a peace settlement had far-reaching consequences for the Middle East, and indeed for U.S. standing in the region. The many memoirs and personal accounts that described this frustrating story of vain efforts and missed opportunities have all offered, inevitably, only partial and frequently one-sided descriptions. This is precisely what makes the thorough and balanced The Peace Puzzle such an indispensable work for our understanding of past failures and the lessons to be drawn from them.

David Ignatius, columnist for the Washington Post and author of Body of Lies:

Read it and weep. The Peace Puzzle brilliantly dissects what has gone wrong in what the all-star cast of authors rightly describes as 'the decline of American Mideast diplomacy.' The concluding summary of 'lessons learned' should be required reading for any American president who is serious about Arab-Israeli peace.

Marwan Muasher, Vice President for Studies, The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and a former foreign minister of Jordan:

Because the window of the two-state solution is rapidly closing and the next American diplomatic attempt may be the last, the United States must avoid repeating some of the same mistakes that are well documented in this volume. This is not only an extremely well-researched account of what took place but also an important reminder that one cannot keep applying old policies to new realities.

A must-read for anyone who desires to truly understand this critical and complex quest for Middle East peace.

The originality of this new book is to propose a distanced analysis that draws on 120 interviews with the implied decision-makers of American political involvement in the Middle East from 1989-2011...The authors take care to compare the remarks of their interviewees with available official documents, journalist investigations, as well as already-publicized testimonies. The result is a study that draws constantly on its foundational material, citing interviews that support and enrich the argument.

The collective Middle East experience of the authors is unsurpassed. Their analysis is terse, and their portrait of U.S. efforts to broker Arab-Israeli peace is bleak.... The authors assert that American policymakers must address the core issues, transform their natural bias toward Israel into a positive factor, recapture bipartisan resolve to tackle the issue, maintain continuity across administrations, and persuade the Israelis and the Palestinians that Washington understands and respects their fundamental interests.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Preface Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	vii
Introduction: The Decline of American Mideast Diplomacy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Opportunities Created, Opportunities Lost: Negotiations at Oslo and Madrid Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	15
2. Within Reach: Israeli- Syrian Negotiations of the 1990s Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	59
3. The Collapse of the Israeli- Palestinian Negotiations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	105
4. George W. Bush Reshapes America’s Role Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	154
5. The Annapolis Denouement Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
6. Obama: An Early Assessment Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	241
Epilogue: Lessons Learned and Unlearned Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	268
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	277
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	327

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 352
Illustrations
- Illustrations: 2
- Other: 2 maps
Keywords: Arab-Israeli conflict; peace negotiations; American diplomacy; U.S. politics; United States Institute of Peace; Middle East peace; American political involvement in the Middle East; U.S. administrations of the post–Cold War period

eBook

Published: November 15, 2012
ISBN: 9780801465864