The Camp David Summit, 2000

The challenge

The Oslo interim period ran out in May 1999 with no permanent settlement. The Sharm el-Sheikh Memorandum set a new target: a framework agreement within five months and a comprehensive one within a year¹.

According to the Chatham House researchers, Barak preferred a single decisive summit to step-by-step moves at a time when his coalition was falling apart; Arafat came in a defensive frame of mind, fearing a trap and feeling the summit was premature².

The road there

1. 4 September 1999The Sharm el-Sheikh Memorandum sets target dates for a permanent-status agreement¹.
2. 11 July 2000The summit opens at Camp David³.
3. 25 July 2000The summit ends; a trilateral statement is issued, with no agreement³.
4. 28 September 2000Riots break out after a visit by Ariel Sharon, then leader of Likud, to the Temple Mount / Haram al-Sharif⁴.
5. 23 December 2000Clinton presents his parameters to the two sides⁵.

The people

Led

Ehud Barak · Yasser Arafat

Negotiated

Ehud Barak · Yasser Arafat

Mediated

Bill Clinton

Hosted

Bill Clinton

What was discussed

• The core permanent-status issues were on the table. According to the US Office of the Historian, the sides remained divided on borders, Jerusalem and the right of return of Palestinian refugees⁴.
• The ideas were not written down as a formal offer. According to Malley and Agha, the first of whom was on the US team, they were put orally, sometimes as American ideas, and remained conditional⁶.
• According to a document published by the Palestinian side, the proposal on the table involved Israel annexing about 9% of the territory in return for about 1% of Israeli land, with about a further 10% under long-term lease⁷. No agreed text exists to confirm or refute these figures.
• In the closing trilateral statement both sides undertook to keep negotiating on the basis of Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338, to avoid unilateral steps, and to conduct the talks free of pressure, intimidation and violence³.

Read the document

The geography

The hard decisions

• Barak entered the summit with his coalition falling apart; Arafat feared that fierce opposition to any agreement on Jerusalem and refugees would force him to suppress resistance from Hamas².
• Jerusalem and the refugees were the most sensitive issues for both sides².

Where accounts differ

According to President Clinton and his envoy Dennis Ross

The main responsibility lies with Arafat. According to Malley and Agha, Clinton publicly blamed the Palestinian side after the summit⁶. Ross wrote that all sides made tactical errors, but that Arafat was passive, rejected proposals again and again and showed no capability to conclude a permanent-status deal⁸.

According to Robert Malley, a member of the US team, and Hussein Agha

All three parties made mistakes. There was no formal, written Israeli offer; Barak held back implementation of earlier commitments and expanded settlements; the United States did not act as a neutral broker. They too write that Arafat presented no detailed counter-proposals⁶.

According to The Palestinian negotiating side

The proposal was not a basis for a viable state: according to the Palestinian document, it divided the territory into four cantons surrounded by Israel, required giving up parts of East Jerusalem, offered unequal land swaps, and the refugee question was never seriously discussed⁷.

According to Ehud Barak

Arafat did not intend to reach an agreement: he made no counter-proposal at all, and the Intifada was planned in advance⁹.

According to Yossi Beilin, a minister in Barak's government

Barak wanted peace but did not know how to make it or how to show the other side his readiness; the American delegation did not prepare properly for the summit¹⁰.

What changed in real life

• Two months after the summit, on 28 September 2000, riots broke out that developed into the Second Intifada⁴. The causal link between the summit's failure and the outbreak of violence is disputed.

What remains open

• Negotiations went on after the summit: in December 2000 Clinton presented his parameters, and in January 2001 the Taba talks were held⁵.
• The Chatham House researchers also point to structural failings: the absence of clear “red lines” and the lack of advance backing from Arab leaders².
• Because there is no agreed record, almost every account of “what was offered” at Camp David rests on the testimony of one of the participants, and should be read that way.