Why Camp David Failed, I
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The Palestinian Position Immediately After the Summit.

On July 26 the Palestinian delegation returned to Gaza where they received an enthusiastic welcome by the Arab 'street". This was reported in the July 27 issue of the Jerusalem daily Al-Quds which announced that the Palestinian masses had "spontaneously expressed their appreciation of, and pride in, President Yasir Arafat's firm stand at the summit. The editorial repeatedly praised Arafat's "steadfastness", "refusal to make concessions", "wisdom and resolve". Specifically he was lauded for having "refused to make any concessions on the national issues that represent red lines, such as Jerusalem, the refugees' right to repatriation under Resolution 194 and the return to the June 4, 1967 borders..." (20)

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This same report of Arafat's heroic "steadfastness" against US-Israeli pressure was repeated by an editorial in the July 28th issue of Al-Quds. (21) It expressed also its disappointment that the Arab world had remained silent , "leaving the Palestinian delegation alone defending the interests" of the Arab nation and of the Islamic world.

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We have already mentioned Abu Mazen's description of the pre-summit negotiations. In that same July 28th, 2001 article he also discussed the actual negotiations at Camp David. (22) Here are some relevant excerpts:

"Later on, when I met with Barak, and when he said: 'we will give you eighty percent' I replied: 'the issue is not eighty or ninety percent. Give me one hundred percent of my borders, and if [there is going to be a need for border] changes, I am ready to accept them under the condition that they will be equal [on both sides] in both value and size.' We will not agree to anything less than that. They offered ninety percent, and they have already offered ninety, ninety-one percent [before], and told us to accept the nine percent [in return for] one percent in Halutza [in the Negev]; any sensible person could not have agreed to this."

When asked about the refugees, Abu Mazen gave the following account :

"We made our position clear: they (the Israelis) must take historical responsibility and accept the right of return and[responsibility for compensation for both those who wish to return and those who do not. For those who wish to return- compensation would be for the use of their property, and for those who don’t wish to return - the compensation [will be for] the value of their property and sufferings. Additionally, they must pay compensation to the countries who host the refugees; this was all that we demanded. Unfortunately, when we were at Camp David, there were no more than two or three serious meetings regarding this issue, and when the Israeli side realized what our position was, they started stalling from the second or third day and until the end of the Camp David summit."

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A July 30 editorial in Al-Quds attacked Clinton for supporting Israel at Camp David and interpreted the "tumultuous reception" accorded to Arafat upon his return from Maryland as sending the following message to Tel Aviv and Washington: (23)

"This message says that the legitimate Palestinian rights concerning Arab Jerusalem and the refugees' right to repatriation are the sole basis of any just settlement satisfactory to the Palestinian people in the homeland and abroad..."

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An extended account of the Camp David summit by Akram Haniyah, editor in chief of Ramallah Al-Ayyam and member of the summit delegation, was published in the August 8 and August 10 issues of that newspaper. (24) It described Arafat as rejecting "categorically" all US ideas -which were really Israeli ideas- despite numerous threats and financial enticements. The Palestinian leader was proudly portrayed as "insisting on the right of the Palestinian refugees to repatriation under Resolution 194" as well as rejecting all Israeli annexation proposals. For not only was such territorial acquisition illegal, but it was also intended to destroy "the geographic and demographic unity" of Palestine. According to Haniyah, the most heated discussion concerned east Jerusalem. On the very last day, Clinton offered a compromise, which would have given Palestinian self-rule in the Muslim and Christian quarters of the old city, while the Jewish and Armenian quarters would have been annexed to Israel. But Arafat, speaking in the name of the Muslim world, insisted on Palestinian rule over all of East Jerusalem.

Haniyah stressed it had been a difficult effort defying the American President, but the Palestinian delegates had stubbornly persisted in defending their national rights. Haniyah described their feelings of pride as they left Camp David for home: "They had said a clear 'no' to the United States on its own ground."

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To assure the Palestinians that Arafat had been justified in rejecting all concessions, Yasir Abd-Rabbu, Minister of culture and information and a member of the Palestinian delegation, convened on August 25 a national conference of "media men" (presumably TV, radio and newspaper journalists) to whom he described the American and Israeli proposals at Camp David as a "conspiracy against our rights".(25) He told his audience that these proposals had "sought to impart legitimacy to the settlements, replace the independent state (of Palestine) with a form of protectorate, usurp the symbol and heart of our people, Jerusalem, spread rejected sovereignty over Al-Haram al-Sharif and impose a solution which gives independence in form only, after annexing 10-30% of the West Bank and Gaza. According to this solution, the Israelis want to give us formal functional and municipal powers in Jerusalem, while eliminating our national identity and character."

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As we can see, all cited Palestinian actions and accounts confirm the Abu Mazen thesis. The delegation had gone to the summit convinced that by accepting the State of Israel in its June 4, 1967 borders the Palestinians had done all the compromising they were willing to do. They had therefore insisted upon Israel's withdrawal behind those 1967 borders - which meant, of course, abandoning all settlements as well as all of East Jerusalem. But that was not the end of the Palestinian demands. Besides insisting upon returning to the June 1967 status quo, they raised also one non-territorial demand - the Right of Return of all Palestinian refugees - which transformed their "minimum" demand into an existential threat to Israel's survival.

Were they aware of the implications of this additional demand? In fact, they were, as is apparent from the following exchange between Abu Mazen and his interrogator in that same July 28, 2001 article. His interviewer asked Mazen:

"Q: "Many Israelis claim that the goal of Palestinian insistence on the right of return is to destroy the State of Israel, since it is possible to demographically destroy the state of Israel with the right of return. Are these really the Palestinian goals?"

"Abu Mazen: We do not wish to destroy the State of Israel. From the very beginning, when we entered into the peace process,we decided in principle that we would live with the State of Israel in co-existence. The Palestinian refugee issue is a very sensitive one. You have four million refugees which all came out of the land of historical Palestine, and they have the right to return to their homes. We do not force the refugees to return, but if some of them will decide to do so they must have the ability. This will be done through an agreement between us and the Israelis."

In other words, Abu Mazen tried to allay Israel's existential fears, by arguing that while all four million refugees must "have the right to return to their homes" , only "some" may choose to take advantage of this offer. But this is not much reassurance since "some of them" may turn out to be two, three, or perhaps even four millions. As to Abu Mazen's assurance that "we" will not force the refugees to return, two obvious rejoinders come to mind: Abu Mazen's colleagues may not feel bound by his commitment and secondly, even if the PLO does keep its words and refuses to encourage such mass return, what about Hamas and Islamic Jihad who have their own rather different agendas.

I find nothing in Abu Mazen's statement which should convince the Israelis that the Palestinian right of return would not lead to Israel's destruction.

Reports by Israeli and American participants at Camp David:

According to Abu Mazen, Arafat had set himself two tasks at the Camp David summit and performed both successfully: He had forcefully presented the Palestinian "minimum settlement", as validated by 242, 338 and 194; and he had also vigorously rejected all Israeli and American attempts to have him deviate from his "minimum settlement". In particular, as stressed by a number of Palestinians, Arafat had made no "concessions". How does this account agree with those presented by U.S. and Israeli participants? In particular, how does it agree with the extensive reports by Shlomo Ben Ami, Israel's foreign minister, Dennis Ross, Clinton's lead negotiator on the Middle East peace process and Robert Malley, Clinton's special assistant for Arab-israeli affairs?

As it turns out, all three participants, though having somewhat different positions on the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, agreed that Arafat had refused to make any counter proposals and, instead of engaging in the give and take of a normal negotiation process, had restricted himself to rejecting all proffered proposals. All three also agreed that the Palestinians had made some "concessions", but disagreed as to their significance. Thus, Ben Ami took note of exactly one concession by Arafat but then dismissed it since Arafat had retracted the concession after a few days. Ross acknowledged many other Palestinian concessions; however, when questioned, admitted that they had been made only by second tier Palestinian negotiators, and that Arafat himself had either dismissed them, or, at the least, ignored them. Malley, on the other hand, took these concessions very seriously and never admitted their possibly dubious nature.

Let us first consider Arafat's refusal to advance any "counter-proposals" of his own. Here is Ben Ami's description: (26)

"And that is the heart of the matter. Never, in the negotiations between us and the Palestinians, was there a Palestinian counter proposal. There never was and there never will be."

Or, somewhat later in the same interview:

"Camp David collapsed over the fact that they (the Palestinian delegation) refused to get into the game. They refused to make a counterproposal. No one demanded of them that they make a positive response to that particular proposal of Clinton .....What was being asked of the Palestinians was far more elementary: that they put forward, at least once, a counterproposal. That they not just say all the time 'That's not good enough' and wait for us to make more concessions."

On this item, Robert Malley agreed with Ben Ami: (27)

"Indeed, the Palestinians' principal failing is that from the beginning of the Camp David summit onward they were unable either to say yes to the American ideas or to present a cogent and specific counterproposal of their own."

Dennis Ross made a similar observation: (28)

"Rob (Malley) has a quote in his article where he quotes the President telling Arafat: 'In 14 days, all you have said is no.' My point is, in 14 days he did not just say no. He also created or invented new mythologies that were completely unhelpful. " (One of the "new mythologies" denied that any Jewish temples had ever stood on the Temple Mount site.)

These descriptions of Arafat's negotiating strategy very much agree with Palestinian reports of Arafat's "steadfast" rejection of all Israeli and American proposals -- but for one difference. Whereas the American and Israeli commentators criticized Arafat's strategy for rendering negotiations difficult, if not impossible, the Palestinians praised it as a principled rejection of unacceptable and dishonorable proposals.

Which brings us to the vexing question of Palestinian concessions. While all Palestinians assert that Arafat had firmly rejected all concessions, we find different, and conflicting reports from American and Israeli participants. To be specific. In his interview, Ben Ami cited the following July 17 entry in his Camp David diary: (29)

"Yesterday Arafat made a proposal to Clinton in relation to the scenario of the previous night. He is ready to give territory of between 8 and 10 percent. He told Clinton: 'I leave the matter of the [territorial] swap in your hands, you decide.' He is ready for security arrangements as will be decided. He places the emphasis on an international force. We will find a solution on the refugee issue, too. Everything now stands or falls over Jerusalem. Arafat wants a solution there that he can live with."

According to Ben Ami, it was this particular concession which persuaded the Israelis to offer Arafat 91% of the West Bank. They were soon disappointed, however, for only a few days later Arafat retracted his concession. "... He conveyed a note to Clinton in which he retracted."

Ross, on the other hand, mentioned not just one but a number of Palestinian concessions and concerned four areas -- Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, border modifications, the right of refugee return and security. There was juts one problem with these concessions - they had all been agreed to by second tier Palestinian negotiators. (30) Hence, when asked by his interviewer whether Arafat had ever confirmed those "very impressive Palestinian concessions", Ross admitted that they had not:

"There was no point at which he (Arafat)....explicitly with the President confirmed these. There was a point where a piece of paper was handed to the President with all sorts of qualifiers in it; actually it was not handed to the President, but to one of the members of our delegation by one of the members of the Palestinian delegation. But we never at any point during Camp David had Chairman Arafat say anything like that or confirm any of these points."

We turn now to Malley who ascribed great significance to these Palestinian concessions:

"Many have come to believe that the Palestinians' rejection of the Camp David ideas exposed an underlying rejection of Israel's right to exist. But consider the facts: The Palestinians were arguing for the creation of a Palestinian state based on the June 4, 1967 borders, living alongside Israel. They accepted the notion of Israeli annexation of West Bank territory to accommodate settlement blocs. They accepted the principle of Israeli sovereignty over the Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem - neighborhoods that were not part of Israel before the Six Day War in 1967. And while they insisted on recognition of the refugees' right of return, they agreed that it should be implemented in a manner that protected Israel's demographic and security interests by limiting the number of returnees." (31)

Malley again referred to these Palestinian concessions in an August 2001 article in The New York Review of Books (32), as well as in an exchange with Barak in a June 13, 2002 article. However, he never discussed whether Arafat had ever confirmed them. (33) A few weeks later, Barak responded to this June 13 article and, in particular, criticized Malley and Agha for implying that the negotiators were speaking for Arafat: (34)

"...readers should note that Malley and Agha invariably refer to what "Arafat's negotiators" said or accepted or proposed — never to Arafat's own views and actions. And this is no accident. Arafat himself has never affirmed Israel's right to exist or its legitimacy, and has never waived the Palestinian refugees "right of return" — and what his underlings "offer" or "accept" can always be denied or repudiated. This is the Arafat method and Malley/Agha enter the game with gusto, while pretending to their readers that what "Arafat's negotiators" said or did carried the old man's imprimatur"

It was a weighty objection, especially in light of Ross's admission that Arafat had never confirmed any Palestinian concessions, and surely deserved some response. Unfortunately Malley and Agha chose not to do so - for while they did indeed answer some other points raised in Barak's article, they ignored this particular item. (35)

As it turns out, Barak's claim that Arafat was the only Palestinian authorized to make any decisions during the negotiations was resoundingly confirmed by none other than Abu Mazen in his July 28,2001 interview:

"Even during unofficial negotiations, which they conducted with non-governmental Palestinian organizations, when they (the Americans or Israelis) would get any kind of word from a Palestinian, they would grab onto it and bring it to the formal negotiations and say: 'the Palestinians said this and that.' But who are the Palestinians? The Palestinians are President Arafat, and he is the one who makes the decisions. We would tell them: 'Have you heard anything from President Arafat? If you have not heard from him, anything else you've heard is a lie.' We repeatedly warned the Israelis and Americans regarding this issue. I told Barak, 'I hope that you will hear from us and not about us,' meaning, if he wishes to learn what is the Palestinian position he must hear it from President Arafat and not from anyone else. Only President Arafat represents the Palestinian position. "

What can we conclude? Given Abu Mazen's vigorous denial, Ross's admission that Arafat had never confirmed any of his negotiators' concessions and Malley's failure to confront Barak's objection, Malley's claim of significant Palestinian concessions seems quite improbable. Whatever Arafat's negotiators may have conceded at the summit, their "concessions" had no validity unless explicitly affirmed by Chairman Arafat. And from all accounts, he had had made no such concessions.

Conclusion:

Abu Mazen's account of the summit is well confirmed by other Palestinian, Israeli and American testimony. Arafat and his negotiators went to the summit - reluctantly but also determined to reject any concessions to their "minimal demands". But since these demands not only rejected all Israeli claims to East Jerusalem but threatened also Israel's survival as a Jewish state, the negotiations were clearly doomed to failure.

How does our explanation compare to the original three accounts? Since it holds Arafat responsible for the summit's failure, it is closest in spirit to the first account, differing from it in only one respect -- we do not evaluate the "generosity" of Barak's Camp David offer. Now, one could argue that any such evaluation is unnecessary, since even Barak's most generous plausible offer could not have satisfied Arafat's requirements. But since much of the existing literature proposes different explanations, I will examine them critically in Part II of this study.

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