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in legal and diplomatic terms, null and void. The package Arafat had ultimately rejected had not even been presented by me. It was an American proposal. Besides, it was obvious no serious negotiations were going to happen anyway for the foreseeable future. Arik, however, said he wanted not just a “full divorce” from Camp David. He insisted we formally declare an end to the entire Oslo process.

I told him that was a price I was not prepared to pay for his support. Despite the failure of the summit, and the terrible human cost from Arafat’s choice of violence over diplomacy, there was a wide international recognition that it was the Palestinians, not Israel, who were responsible. For us to end the Oslo process meant inviting accusations we’d never intended to reach a peace agreement in the first place, and that it was Israel that was closing the door. We would also risk forfeiting the American support we’d secured by our efforts to reach a peace deal, an asset all Israeli governments would benefit from in other circumstances and contexts in the future.

Fortunately, I had an alternative to a coalition with the Likud. Alarmed at the prospect of a having Sharon in the government, the Oslo-era doves in Labor, led by Yossi Beilin, worked out a new deal with Shas. The Sephardi Orthodox party was still not prepared to rejoin the cabinet, but it did promise a “safety net” in the Knesset to ensure we would not have to worry about no-confidence votes while confronting the Palestinian violence. I knew Shas’s support would waver if there was a resumption of serious peace negotiations. Still, as Clinton continued to insist we make one final attempt to get a deal, I felt we had a responsibility to play our part. I wasn’t prepared to put us in the position of appearing to stonewall his efforts, and encourage the false narrative that Israeli “intransigence” was somehow frustrating Arafat’s readiness to make peace.

The Palestinian campaign of violence was getting worse. An Islamic Jihad car bomb near Mahaneh Yehudah market in Jerusalem injured nearly a dozen people and left two dead. Hamas blew up a school bus in one of the Gaza settlements, killing two more people. In Hadera, halfway up the coast from Tel Aviv to Haifa, a car bomb on a main street left two people dead and more than 60 injured. Palestinian snipers from near Bethlehem began opening fire on Gilo, one of the post-1967 Jewish suburbs of Jerusalem, and home to more than 30,000 people. Yet despite all this, I authorized Shlomo Ben-Ami, Gili Sher, Amnon Lipkin and Yossi Ginossar to continue talks with Palestinian negotiators on the terms of the President’s last-ditch peace proposal.

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