He served as an American ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Egypt, assisted Henry Kissinger's Mideast shuttle diplomacy effort, worked with Egyptian President Anwar el-Sadat throughout the Camp David Accords, and dodged a Libyan hit team.
[2] Eilts was one of only a few of the State Department's Arabist diplomats who did not advocate a blindly pro-Arab policy in the runup to that conflict, as he wrote cables saying that the views of other diplomats regarding hostile responses to a planned (later aborted) Western flotilla to re-open the Straits of Tiran to Israeli vessels were overstated because the Arab states lacked the materiel to counter such a move, and that forcing the Egyptians to back down here would reduce the risk of open warfare.
He aided former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger during the 1974-75 period of shuttle diplomacy and became close to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat during the tense negotiations with Israel in 1977 and 1978.
"[4] That alliance, as well as his standing as a leading American in the region, apparently prompted Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to send hit squads to Cairo in search of Mr. Eilts.
U.S. intelligence agencies discovered the plot, and President Jimmy Carter immediately warned Gaddafi that he would be held responsible if Mr. Eilts was harmed.