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The Brink of Peace
A major casualty of the assassin's bullet that struck down Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was a prospective peace accord between Syria and Israel. For the first time, a negotiator who had unique access to Rabin, as well as detailed knowledge of Syrian history and politics, tells the inside story of the failed negotiations. His account provides a key to understanding not only U.S. diplomacy in the Middle East but also the larger Arab-Israeli peace process.
During the period from 1992 to 1996, Itamar Rabinovich was Israel's ambassador to Washington, and the chief negotiator with Syria. In this book, he looks back at the course of negotiations, terms of which were known to a surprisingly small group of American, Israeli, and Syrian officials. After Benjamin Netanyahu's election as Israel's prime minister in May 1996, a controversy developed. Even with Netanyahu's change of policy and harder line toward Damascus, Syria began claiming that both Rabin and his successor Peres had pledged full withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Rabinovich takes the reader through the maze of diplomatic subtleties to explain the differences between hypothetical discussion and actual commitment.
"To the students of past history and contemporary politics," he writes, "nothing is more beguiling than the myriad threads that run across the invisible line which separates the two." The threads of this story include details of Rabin's negotiations and their impact through two subsequent Israeli administrations in less than a year, the American and Egyptian roles, and the ongoing debate between Syria and Israel on the factual and legal bases for resuming talks.
The author portrays all sides and participants with remarkable flair and empathy, as only a privileged player in the events could do. In any assessment of future negotiations in the Middle East, Itamar Rabinovich's book will prove indispensable.
During the period from 1992 to 1996, Itamar Rabinovich was Israel's ambassador to Washington, and the chief negotiator with Syria. In this book, he looks back at the course of negotiations, terms of which were known to a surprisingly small group of American, Israeli, and Syrian officials. After Benjamin Netanyahu's election as Israel's prime minister in May 1996, a controversy developed. Even with Netanyahu's change of policy and harder line toward Damascus, Syria began claiming that both Rabin and his successor Peres had pledged full withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Rabinovich takes the reader through the maze of diplomatic subtleties to explain the differences between hypothetical discussion and actual commitment.
"To the students of past history and contemporary politics," he writes, "nothing is more beguiling than the myriad threads that run across the invisible line which separates the two." The threads of this story include details of Rabin's negotiations and their impact through two subsequent Israeli administrations in less than a year, the American and Egyptian roles, and the ongoing debate between Syria and Israel on the factual and legal bases for resuming talks.
The author portrays all sides and participants with remarkable flair and empathy, as only a privileged player in the events could do. In any assessment of future negotiations in the Middle East, Itamar Rabinovich's book will prove indispensable.
304 pages, Paperback
First published June 30, 1998
About the author
Itamar Rabinovich
31 books7 followersItamar Rabinovich (Hebrew: איתמר רבינוביץ or איתמר רבינוביץ') is the president of the Israel Institute (Washington and Jerusalem). He was Israel's Ambassador to the United States in the 1990s and former chief negotiator with Syria between 1993 and 1996, and the former president of Tel Aviv University (1999–2007). Currently he is professor emeritus of Middle Eastern History at Tel Aviv University, distinguished global professor at New York University and a distinguished fellow at the Brookings Institution.
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December 20, 2023
The Brink of Peace is an in-the-room telling of the embittered and ultimately fruitless negotiations between Israel and Syria during the early 1990s. Author Itamar Rabinovich, the head of the Israeli delegation in the peace talks and self-described “diplomatic historian,” recounts the tough bargaining, entrenched views, and missed opportunities that brought both sides to the brink of a settlement after over three years of painstaking dialogue. In analyzing these events, this book functions as a multi-pronged study of conflict resolution, negotiation, and international mediation. Rabinovich describes the emergence of a powerful, Arab nationalist Syrian state commanded by the opportunistic, prideful, and unexcitable Hafiz al-Asad, as well as the Israeli Labor coalition that made impassioned, yet skeptical, overtures towards a national resolution. Ultimately, the negotiators fell short of a peace agreement à la the Camp David Accords. Rabinovich chalks this up to Asad’s reluctance to accept reconciliation and normalization in exchange for Israel’s evacuation of the Golan Heights, as well as his unwillingness to play ball on the procedures of peacemaking, including supporting confidence-building measures, refusal to conduct public diplomacy, and averseness to making firm commitments. Rabinovich questions why Asad failed to agree to terms that he should have found acceptable. While Syria and Israel to this day do not have formal relations, the legacy of the 1990s peace talks will be described by perpetuity as the chance at peace that slipped away.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review