From 2008 to 2012, the United States Institute of Peace undertook a major analytical study of Arab-Israeli peace negotiations dating back to the preparations for the Madrid Conference in 1991, focusing on U.S. peacemaking strategies and initiatives.

20160301-President_Bush_addresses_the_Middle_East_Peace_Conference_at_the_Royal_Palace_in_Madrid,_Spain_-_NARA_-_186439-wiki.jpg
Photo Courtesy of Wiki Commons/National Archives

Its results are published in two books entitled Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East (2008), written by Amb. Daniel C. Kurtzer and Scott Lasensky, and The Peace Puzzle: America’s Quest for Arab-Israeli Peace, 1989-2011, which was co-authored by Kurtzer, Lasensky, William B. Quandt, Shibley Telhami, and Steven Spiegel.

The first volume, Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace, offers ten core lessons learned from peacemaking efforts in this conflict as well as policy recommendations for American administrations looking to undertake an effort to resolve the conflict. The Peace Puzzle" co-published by USIP Press and Cornell University Press, is a comprehensive history of efforts to resolve the conflict from the Madrid Conference through the end of Senator George Mitchell's term as Special Envoy to the Middle East in 2011. Both volumes were made possible by the authors' broad access to key policymakers and official archives and their background as diplomats and analysts of the region.

In reference to Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace, Harold Saunders, former deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs and Middle East negotiator under four presidents, said the book is "the most forceful, thorough, concrete, and concise analysis of the U.S. performance in the Arab-Israeli peace process since it was born as a political process in 1974."

Of the second volume, David Ignatius of the Washington Post wrote, “Read it and weep. 'The Peace Puzzle' brilliantly dissects what has gone wrong in what the all-star cast of authors rightly describes as ‘the decline of American Mideast diplomacy.’ The concluding summary of ‘lessons learned’ should be required reading for any American president who is serious about Arab-Israeli peace.”

View Online Documents and Primary Resources
Download "Making Peace Among Arabs and Israelis" the 1991 monograph by Kenneth W. Stein and Samuel W. Lewis

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