Making Peace With The Plo

Jewish Book World

With meticulous research and interviews with nearly all of the key Israeli players, the author provides a clear, detailed and very readable account of how, and equally important, why the Oslo agreement came about. It unravels the politics of why Prime Minister Rabin shifted policy in the course of 1993 and decided to deal with the PLO. An important adition to the literature on the topic.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

This clear, concise explication of the complicated diplomatic process that preceded that famous 1993 White House Lawn handshake would be impressive under any circumstances, but it is particularly enlightening now. Makovsky, the diplomatic correspondent for the Jerusalem Post, puts Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat into domestic and international context. Started secretly under the aegis of a Norwegian academic in early 1992, the Oslo talks moved at an impressive speed. Rabin was clearly aware of a window of opportunity defined in part by the Gulf war, which left the PLO weakened (Arafat had backed Iraq, to the chagrin of other Arab states), and in part by the June 1992 election, which, for the first time in 15 years, freed Rabin's Labor Party from the conservative Likud. Convinced that an agreement with the PLO was beneficial to Israel's long-term security and that the Norwegian track was a valid avenue, Rabin stayed the course. Even when an unrelated scandal threatened his administration, rather than stop the potentially damaging negotiations, Rabin formally raised the idea of mutual recognition in order to speed them along. Although publication was too far along to allow for changes after Rabin's assassination, Makovsky makes clear the importance of both Rabin and Peres in this negotiation. ``It's a testament to Israel's highly personalized decision-making process that so few could make such a momentous decision for so many, essentially short-circuiting top-level security institutionsand more criticallywith virtually no cabinet debate.'' (Jan.)

Library Journal

Makovsky, a respected Israeli journalist, delves into the inner workings of the Israeli government from December 1992 to August 1993, when it secretly negotiated with the PLO under the auspices of the Norwegians in Oslo. In a tightly organized, well-researched, and well-supported exposition, he sets out the intricacies involved in arranging a meaningful dialog between a government and a nongovernmental political entity to achieve regional peace in the Middle East. The sensitivities of the Israeli political scene along with the political craftsmanship of Yitzhak Rabin are molded with the important input of American and Norwegian diplomacy to create a fine case study of contemporary international political negotiations. Although the events described here are overshadowed by the recent terrorist bombings in Israel, this book is still essential for anyone interested in the Arab-Israeli conflict and the contemporary peace process. Recommended for academic collections.Sanford R. Silverburg, Catawba Coll., Salisbury, N.C.