The Foreign Service Journal, February 2006

F E B R U A R Y 2 0 0 6 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 59 Coming Up Short The Truth about Camp David: The Untold Story about the Collapse of the Middle East Peace Process Clayton E. Swisher, Nation Books, 2004, $14.95, paperback, 455 pages. R EVIEWED BY W ILLIAM B. Q UANDT The subject of this book, the his- toric summit held at Camp David in July 2000, brought together Presi- dent Bill Clinton, Israeli Prime Min- ister Ehud Barak and PLO leader Yassir Arafat. The most sensitive issues in the Israeli-Palestinian con- flict were discussed, some for the first time, but the issue of sovereign- ty over the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount area of Jerusalem proved to be a sticking point. After nearly two weeks, the talks ended in failure, despite attempts to revive them later in the year. This much everyone agrees on. But on almost every other aspect of this intriguing historical moment, there is discord. The American and Israeli versions agree that Barak made an offer that went further than ever before, but Arafat was passive and refused to engage in real negoti- ations. (The Palestinians dispute this, of course.) Both sides had reservations, but those of Arafat, according to Dennis Ross, were out- side the parameters laid down by Clinton. Thus, in what has come to be the standard version, Arafat bears the blame for the summit’s failure. Anyone who cares about Middle East peace would do well to try to wade through the various accounts of the summit. After all, for better or worse, U.S. policy toward the Israeli- Palestinian conflict in recent years has been based on an interpretation of those events that seems flawed in a number of ways. Clayton Swisher’s book ambitious- ly claims to tell us “the truth” about Camp David. This goal is beyond his reach, and beyond the reach of any author writing today. Still, his work is valuable because he questions the conventional story and places consid- erably more blame for the failure of the talks on mistakes made by the American side. A former special agent in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security who was assigned to the Secretary of State and visiting Arab and Israeli leaders in support of the Oslo process (including trips to Jerusalem, Ramallah, Washington and Camp David), Swisher has talked to many of the participants and usual- ly quotes them by name. He has also had some access to documents. Sometimes he seems too ready to credit a single anonymous source for a telling anecdote, but on the whole, his picture of what happened has to be taken seriously. I found him particularly good on the Israeli-Syrian track and the way it affected the Israeli-Palestinian nego- tiations. His account of what hap- pened when Clinton and President Hafiz al-Assad met in Geneva in March 2000 is insightful. But I think he is too quick to blame Dennis Ross for many of the mistakes on the American side. Instead, I would point the finger at the president him- self. He had a poor sense of timing in calling the summit, which would have been far more promising had he moved the previous year. Clinton also did not have a disci- plined team or a tightly controlled approach to negotiations, believing that he could improvise, charm and cajole his way to an agreement. Sometimes he seemed impatient with details, and was afraid to put American ideas in writing until the very end. When he finally submitted his famous “parameters” on Dec. 23, 2000, it was much too late. He was on his way out of office; Barak and Arafat were both politically weak; and George W. Bush would be the next president. (Amazingly, Arafat seems to have thought he would get a better deal from the new president than from Clinton, perhaps because the Saudis had led him to believe that.) There are no heroes or villains in the Camp David story as I read it. Each party made serious mistakes; each of the key personalities was problematic in important ways; each wanted peace, but on terms that the other would not accept; and the fail- ure to reach agreement proved to be enormously costly for all of them. Clayton Swisher’s book helps us bet- ter understand this sad story. It is not B OOKS Swisher’s book helps us better understand this sad story.