Just saw last performance of CAMP DAVID in Washington. Heres my piece that ran today in McClatchy Newspapers: Camp David ghosts stalk Netanyahu BY BEN BARBER; McClatchy-Tribune News Service, May 7, 2014 I was able to get one of the last seats Sunday night to the last performance of Camp David, a play about the 13-days of talks at the presidential retreat in 1978 that led to a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt. It was a fitting reminder of what could have been accomplished this year as talks on peace broke down a few weeks ago between Israel and the Palestinians. And Secretary of State John Kerry had more than 13 days to reach peace - he had nine months . What was most striking about the play were the personalities of the three leaders � President Jimmy Carter, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Compared to the 1978 leaders of these three countries, todays leaders are lightweights, fighting over scraps of public opinion rather than leading their peoples towards a new frontier. Carter, 89, attended a performance of the play and called it amazingly good. I couldnt believe how good it was, Politico reported. The main lesson that will come from this play is that peace is possible. Carter, the character, was shown walking in the night under the trees at the retreat in Marylands Catoctin Mountains, searching for the strength to bring two hostile leaders of Israel and Egypt to compromise and settle on the words and nature of peace. Carter is also shown as ready to face the loss of a second term if either the talks fail or if they succeed and produce an unworkable or unpopular peace in the Holy Land. Most of all, it shows Carter as a devout and personable guy. He was voted out of a second term in 1980 as a cranky, prickly person who was seen as helpless and unable to free the 52 hostages at the U.S. embassy in Iran. He also had a reputation as a control freak who determined who could use the White House tennis courts. But after leaving office, he was perhaps the first U.S. president to use the power of his post-presidential pulpit to travel the world for human rights, monitor elections and and defeat Guinea worm. Begin was shown as a cranky, grumbling man, haunted by the Holocaust, who resisted every word in Sadats initial proposals � going so far as to say the West Bank and Gaza were not occupied but liberated. But Begin broke down in the end when the talks stalled and Carter handed him souvenir photos of the failing talks � each one signed by Carter and dedicated to each one of Begins grandchildren. Carter was able to break down Begins final objections by reminding him of the future generations who might be able to enjoy a world without constant wars and also without the shadow of the Holocaust hovering always close by. Sadat was shown as a strong leader imprisoned by his stereotypes of Jews and by the need to reverse the verdicts of previous military defeats by Israel. His opening gambit � which Carter labeled maximalist � called for return of all of Sinai to Egypt, evacuation of the few Israeli settlements in Sinai, halt to settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, and Jerusalem to be placed under international control. In return, Israel will be recognized as a state and its ships would have access to the Suez Canal as well as the Gulf of Aqaba. In the end, Sadat got Sinai �without settlers. In a sad and poignant reminder that this play is rooted in historys tragedy, Sadat says all 1,500 Jewish settlers would have to leave the West Bank. But today there are 500,000 Jewish settlers on Palestinian territory, making it much more crowded and humiliating for Palestinians � who see the orange clay tile roofs of the Israeli towns spreading on the ridgelines about Ramallah and other Arab cities. Begin and Sadat broke down under Carters relentless badgering. At times it seemed he was far more severe on Begin, especially after the Israeli leader argued over nearly every word and said the peace process would take years. Another wonderful window onto the Camp David talks was the role played by First Lady Rosalynn Carter, whose personal diary of those days provided author Lawrence Wright with much of the substance of his play. She comes across as an astute woman who understood the pain that Begin lived with as the survivor of a Holocaust that had killed his own parents. When Jimmy Carter was close to giving up in exasperation, she reminded him that Begin felt the existence of the Jewish people was on his shoulders. Sadats own Egyptian delegation was opposed to making peace with Israel and his foreign minister resigned during the talks. But he was unafraid to stand alone against public opinion of 500 million Arabs throughout the Middle East. And for this he paid the ultimate price in 1981 when he was assassinated. But it was not for signing Camp David. He was slain by the Egyptian Islamic Jihad for cracking down on Islamist extremists. Begin too is gone from the earthly stage. But one wonders, when applauding after the final scene, if his ghost does not remain behind in the personage of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu � quibbling over details, refusing to halt settlement construction and unable or unwilling to deliver peace like the one that has lasted for 35 years between Egypt and Israel.
Posted on: Wed, 07 May 2014 17:11:21 +0000
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