2000 Camp David Summit
[2] Reports of the outcome of the summit have been described as illustrating the Rashomon effect, in which the multiple witnesses gave contradictory and self-serving interpretations.
[3][4][5][6] After the summit, the Israeli narrative was widely accepted by the American media, which sought to cast Arafat as a villain and that Palestinians did not want peace.
[7] U.S. President Bill Clinton announced his invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat on 5 July 2000, to come to Camp David, Maryland, in order to continue their negotiations on the Middle East peace process.
The Oslo Accords of 1993 between the later assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat had provided that agreement should be reached on all outstanding issues between the Palestinians and Israeli sides – the so-called final status settlement – within five years of the implementation of Palestinian autonomy.
Dan Kurtzer and Scott Lasensky wrote that American diplomats "scrambled at the last minute to put together U.S. positions on complex issues such as Jerusalem and borders.
"[11] Israeli diplomat Gilead Sher would later write, "the most serious shortcoming of the American team was that some of its members appeared to be less knowledgeable than the president in the details and implications of the process.
As no agreement was reached and there is no official written record of the proposals, some ambiguity remains over details of the positions of the parties on specific issues.
[15] They maintained that Resolution 242 calls for full Israeli withdrawal from these territories, which were captured in the Six-Day War, as part of a final peace settlement.
[17][18] The Palestinians rejected the Halutza Sand region (78 km2) alongside the Gaza Strip as part of the land swap on the basis that it was of inferior quality to that which they would have to give up in the West Bank.
[20][21][22] By contrast, Ehud Barak said the West Bank would only be divided by a wedge of Israeli territory stretching from Maale Adumim to the Jordan River, but would otherwise be continuous.
"[27] At the opening of Camp David, Barak warned the Americans he could not accept giving the Palestinians more than a purely symbolic sovereignty over any part of East Jerusalem.
[30] The historically important Arab neighborhoods such as Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan and at-Tur would remain under Israeli sovereignty, while Palestinians would only have civilian autonomy.
[33] According to U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, some of the Palestinian negotiators were willing to privately discuss a limit on the number of refugees who would be allowed to return to Israel.
An international fund of $30 billion would be set up, which Israel would help contribute to, along with other countries, that would register claims for compensation of property lost by Palestinian refugees and make payments within the limits of its resources.
Israel also wanted the right to deploy troops on Palestinian territory in the event of an emergency, and the stationing of an international force in the Jordan Valley.
[41] On refugees, Palestinian insisted on the Right of Return but the proposal would, according to Robert Malley, respect the "preservation of Israel's demographic balance between Jews and Arabs".
Most sources agree, that under Israel's final proposal, the Temple Mount (including Al-Aqsa) would remain under Israeli sovereignty.
From 18 to 23 December they held negotiations, followed by Clinton's presentation of his "parameters", in a last attempt to achieve peace in the Middle East before his second term ended in January 2001.
Clinton's initiative led to the Taba negotiations in January 2001, where the two sides published a statement saying they had never been closer to agreement (though such issues as Jerusalem, the status of Gaza, and the Palestinian demand for compensation for refugees and their descendants remained unresolved), but Barak, facing elections, re-suspended the talks.
In a 2005 book published by Heribert Adam and Kogila Moodley, the authors state "Informed observer blamed all three parties' negotiation strategies for the failure", referring to the Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans.
[60][61] Ehud Barak portrays Arafat's behavior at Camp David as a "performance geared to exact as many Israeli concessions as possible without ever seriously intending to reach a peace settlement or sign an "end to the conflict".
"[65] Dennis Ross, the US Middle East envoy and a key negotiator at the summit, summarized his perspectives in his book The Missing Peace.
During a lecture in Australia, Ross suggested that the reason for the failure was Arafat's unwillingness to sign a final deal with Israel that would close the door on any of the Palestinians' maximum demands, particularly the right of return.
[66] Ross also quoted Saudi Prince Bandar as saying while negotiations were taking place: "If Arafat does not accept what is available now, it won't be a tragedy; it will be a crime.
"[67] In his book, The Oslo Syndrome, Harvard Medical School professor of psychiatry and historian[68] Kenneth Levin summarized the failure of the 2000 Camp David Summit in this manner: "despite the dimensions of the Israeli offer and intense pressure from President Clinton, Arafat demurred.
Alan Dershowitz, an Israel advocate and a law professor at Harvard University, said that the failure of the negotiations was due to "the refusal of the Palestinians and Arafat to give up the right of return.
Malley pointed out that the Palestinians starting position was at the 1967 borders, but they were ready to give up Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, and parts of the West Bank with Israeli settlements.
[74] Norman Finkelstein published an article in the winter 2007 issue of Journal of Palestine Studies, excerpting from his longer essay called Subordinating Palestinian Rights to Israeli "Needs".
"[26] Political Scientist Menahem Klein, who advised the Israeli government during the negotiations, confirmed that "The professional back channels did not sufficiently treat Jerusalem as a religious city...
[80] 25 July 2000[13] President William J. Clinton Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser ArafatBetween 11 and 24 July, under the auspices of President Clinton, Prime Minister Barak and Chairman Arafat met at Camp David in an effort to reach an agreement on permanent status.
