The Pros And Cons Of Creative Ambiguity.
Lawrence Wright has written a fascinating book about the thirteen days of intense negotiations at Camp David in 1979 leading to a peace agreement between Egypt and Israel. Earlier, Wright earned a Pulitzer Prize for his book The Looming Tower about events leading up to 9/11.
Thirteen Days in September can be read as a background briefing about the political, historical, and religious obstacles to peace in the Mideast, as a collection of vignettes of the leaders and their entourages, as a meditation on war and peace, and as a detailed account of the procedural and psychological dynamics of immensely complicated negotiations.
The negotiations are an example of opposite sides dealing with seemingly intractable problems and “getting to yes”. In fact, President Carter and Secretary of State Cyrus Vance borrowed a concept from Harvard Law’s Roger Fisher, co-author of Getting to YES, by taking control of the negotiating document, and using it to narrow issues. The process did not start out that way, as Carter naively thought that bringing together Begin and Sadat would lead to an exchange of goodwill, and a mutual recognition of the shared interest in peace, but in fact, quite the opposite occurred, and it became necessary to separate Sadat and Begin.
Carter developed a rapport with Sadat, but not with Begin, whom Carter found to be legalistic and obstructionist. For Begin, the security of Israel was an existential problem, and he balked at exchanging the security buffer of the Sinai for the promise of peace.
On the brink of humiliating failure, Carter changed his role as facilitator and became more directive. The negotiation process evolved painfully, and at times dramatically, while the US draft progressed through 23 revisions. At several points, one side or the other threatened to walk out, and Carter played his trump card: you will destroy your relationship with the US, and you will be blamed for the failure of the peace talks.
Sadat and Begin each achieved important goals: a formal peace agreement between Egypt and Israel, and a continuing relationship for Egypt and Israel with the United States. Egypt regained control of the Sinai Desert. Since 1979, the peace Carter brokered between Israel and Egypt has lasted – between Israel and Egypt.
Carter hoped to successfully link the agreement between Israel and Egypt with an agreement to address UN Resolution 242 and the rights of the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank. However, the Palestinians were not “present at the table”, and their issues were of secondary concern to Begin and Sadat. The agreement between Egypt and Israel was achieved by drafting “creative ambiguities” that imprecisely addressed the rights of Palestinians, without solving profound problems that were simply “papered over.” Thirty-five years later, the agreement between Israel and Egypt is still in place, and the issues presented by UN Resolution 242, Gaza, and the West Bank remain as open sores.
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