Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace

Catalog records differ on the principal directing credit. The National Library of Israel credits Dan Edge as producer-director and Norma Percy, Mark Anderson, and Nava Mizrahi as producers, while a CAMERA film-review listing credits Percy as producer and director.[1][4] The NLI describes the work as a Brook Lapping production for the BBC, in association with ARTE and other partners, narrated by Juliet Stevenson.[1]

The NLI catalogs three episodes of approximately 60 minutes each, totaling 180 minutes, while the CAMERA listing gives a runtime of 150 minutes.[1][4] The latter figure is consistent with CAMERA's statement that PBS showed a slightly shortened version in the United States.[2]

The episodes are titled "Clinton" (covering 1999–2000), "Arafat" (2001–2002), and "Sharon" (2003–2005).[1] The series was first broadcast on BBC Two on 10, 17, and 24 October 2005.[1] The DVD record lists English, Arabic, and Hebrew audio tracks with English subtitles.[1]

The UK National Archives' Discovery catalogue separately lists an archival item under the title as a post-production script dated May 2002, including transcripts of interviews with leading participants. The record identifies its repository as Oxford University's St Antony's College Middle East Centre Archive rather than The National Archives.[5]

The diplomatic landscape the documentary chronicles grew out of decades of conflict and intermittent negotiation. The 1948 War of Independence ended in armistice agreements with most Arab states, though Iraq remained in a formal state of war with Israel.[6] Subsequent wars with neighboring Arab states shaped Israeli foreign policy, economics, and society for generations.[6]

After the 1967 war, Moshe Dayan captured the stalemate in a remark recorded in Ynet's historical account: "We are waiting for a telephone call from the Arabs."[6] Ynet characterizes UN Security Council Resolution 242, adopted in November 1967, as including the concept of "land for peace."[6]

A significant breakthrough came in 1977 when, following secret contacts, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat announced his intention to visit Jerusalem and address the Knesset to discuss peace.[6] Sadat visited Israel on November 19, 1977, and formal talks began under American auspices.[6] The Camp David Accords were signed at the White House on September 17, 1978, following a private twelve-day summit among Sadat, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, and U.S. President Jimmy Carter.[7] At the summit, prospects appeared so bleak at one point that Sadat threatened to leave; agreement was ultimately reached on the final day after Begin and Sadat compromised on the question of Israeli settlements in Sinai, leaving their fate to the Knesset.[7]

The accords produced two framework documents: one governing Egypt-Israel relations and one addressing the broader Middle East, including a proposed transition for the West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria — and Gaza lasting no more than five years, with an elected self-governing authority to replace the Israeli military administration.[8] The frameworks identified UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 as the basis for a comprehensive settlement and called for negotiations on Palestinian final status and the refugee issue.[8] The Egypt-Israel framework anticipated a peace treaty within three months, including Egyptian sovereignty to the internationally recognized boundary, Israeli withdrawal from Sinai, and normalized diplomatic, economic, and cultural relations.[8] That treaty was signed in 1979.[7]

Egypt's peace with Israel brought harsh criticism from Arab states, some of which declared a political boycott of Egypt.[9] The peace agreement nevertheless opened the way to official civil and economic partnerships between Egypt and Israel.[10]

A new phase of multilateral peacemaking began with the Madrid Peace Conference of October 1991, which launched parallel diplomatic tracks addressing interstate Arab-Israeli relations and the Israeli-Palestinian dimension.[11] The 1993 Oslo Accords — signed in Washington on September 13 after secret talks in Oslo — established mutual recognition between Israel and the PLO and a commitment to resolve disagreements through negotiation, while providing for Palestinian autonomy in parts of the West Bank and Gaza.[11][6] A preliminary accord with Jordan followed days later, and a full Israel-Jordan peace treaty was signed in October 1994.[11] Israel also began tentative peace talks with Syria during this period.[6]

Advances in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations during the 1990s contributed to a short-lived blossoming of relations between Israel and other Arab states.[10] U.S. President Bill Clinton invited Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and PLO leader Yasser Arafat to Camp David in July 2000, but the talks collapsed and, according to Ynet's account, the Intifada resumed the following September.[6] The documentary's coverage begins around this period.[1]

The documentary traces peace negotiations and their breakdown from the Camp David II summit of July 2000 through Israel's disengagement from Gaza in 2005, while its episode chronology begins in 1999.[1][2] The National Library of Israel's catalog description says President Clinton, Yasser Arafat, Israeli prime ministers, generals and advisers, and people involved in suicide bombings and assassinations recount what happened behind closed doors.[1]

Among the events covered are the Camp David II talks, the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifada, fighting in Jenin, a 2002 cease-fire effort, the Aqaba Summit, the 2003 Road Map for Peace, and Israel's 2005 withdrawal from Gaza.[2] CAMERA reports that the closing narration said Israel withdrew all its settlers and soldiers and destroyed everything but a few synagogues; CAMERA disputes that account as incomplete.[2]

A Spring 2012 syllabus for SIS-319, "U.S.-Israel Relations," at American University's School of International Service assigned the documentary in two parts. Part I accompanied a session on Camp David II, Taba, and the Clinton years; Part II accompanied a session on the Road Map, Annapolis, and the Bush years.[3] The placement used the film as a teaching resource on U.S. mediation across the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations.[3]

CAMERA, the pro-Israel media-monitoring organization, published a sharply critical review of the documentary, arguing that its framing favors the Palestinian perspective and portrays Israel negatively.[2] Among its specific criticisms, CAMERA contended that the film attributed the renewed intifada primarily to Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount and narrated that Israeli police killed seven Palestinian protesters the following day; it also criticized the film's account of humanitarian aid during the Jenin operation and its presentation of Israeli involvement in a failed cease-fire effort involving Hamas leader Saleh Shehadeh.[2] CAMERA further described the documentary's closing account of the Gaza withdrawal as incomplete.[2] These represent CAMERA's attributed evaluations and do not constitute an independent or consensus assessment of the film's accuracy.