Israeli/Palestinian Politics, Diplomatic Relations, Israel/Palestine - History, Jewish History, Diplomacy & International Relations, Middle Eastern Politics
Log in to track your reading progress.
Overview
On September 13, 1993, the world watched, thrilled and still disbelieving, as on the sunny White House lawn the prime minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, and the president of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Yasser Arafat, shook hands, thereby sealing the Declaration of Principles, the beginning of a peace agreement for the Middle East. The Norway Channel tells how this accord between representatives of two ancient enemies - an accord that had eluded presidents, secretaries of state, special envoys, and numerous back channel negotiators - was accomplished by an unknown Norwegian couple. For nine months, in Norwegian country mansions and homely log cabins, far from the prying eyes of the media and the critical forces within their own communities, Israelis and Palestinians ate, drank, walked, and laughed together as they hammered out a peace deal. There were moments of high drama, screaming matches, and sometimes farce, but the participants resolved never to look back into their troubled history and blame one another. They would only look forward, to the futures of their children and of the generations to come. The two sides were brought together by a remarkable husband and wife team, Norwegians Torje Larsen and Mona Juul. They created the framework of what came to be known as the Norway Channel and kept it going through the roller coaster of euphoria and depression that characterized the meetings. Larsen is a social scientist who runs a research institute; Juul is a middle-ranking official at the Foreign Ministry. The Norway Channel brings to life the characters involved on both sides. For the Israelis there was an idealistic young Labour MP, Yossi Beilin, whose courage launched the channel, and his best friend, Uri Savir, an urbane young diplomat and masterful tactician. Joel Singer, a tough lawyer and former colonel in the Israeli military, and Yair Hirschfeld, an absent-minded professor, completed the team from Jerusalem. For the Palestinians there wasBook Details
Published
March 1, 1994
Publisher
New York : Atlantic Monthly Press, c1994.
Pages
213
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780871135766