Camp David Accords: The high cost of peace

Oh, the irony. In the Middle East, which birthed three of the world's greatest religions — Judaism, Christianity and the Islamic faith — there had not been peace for 30 years. And then, in 1978, two leaders from key nations in that war-torn region, Egypt's Anwar Sadat and Israel's Menachem Begin, signed the Camp David Accords. The accords were so named because the negotiations leading up to them took place at Camp David, Md., the retreat used by every American president since Dwight Eisenhower. Then-President Jimmy Carter had invited Sadat and Begin to Camp David in the hope that, with his help, they could agree to end three decades of war between Israel and its most powerful, most antagonistic Arab neighbor.

Carter's invitation had not come out of the blue. In 1978, in a move that had stunned the world, Sadat became the first Arab leader ever to journey to Jerusalem to speak before Israel's Parliament. In his speech, Sadat offered peace to the Jewish state under certain conditions, one of which was the return of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, the 23,000-square-mile territory that Israel had captured in the Six-Day War of 1967.

Sadat also wanted peace because constantly fighting Israel had ruined Egypt's economy and stunted modernization. It was true that Sadat had led the 1973 attack on Israel during the Yom Kippur Jewish holiday — an attack that caught Israel completely by surprise before it recovered and drove invading Arab armies back — but Sadat had launched that war more as a bargaining chip than as a final victory. As Sadat had hoped, his army acquitted itself well in that war, enhancing both his prestige in the Arab world and his negotiating position with Israel. He believed that it was a propitious moment for a peace overture to Israel.

He was right. Shaken by the Yom Kippur War, Israel was receptive to a genuine peace, so at Camp David, after 12 days of intense, often acrimonious negotiations, Sadat and Begin agreed to Israel's complete evacuation from the Sinai in return for a peace treaty and a pledge to negotiate Palestinian autonomy in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza.

It was among the most historic events of the 20th century and easily earned Begin and Sadat the Nobel Peace Prize, which they won this week in 1978. Alas, it cost Sadat his life — in 1981 he was assassinated by Islamic extremists angered at his agreement with Israel.

But through it all, the peace — cold though it may be — between Egypt and Israel has held, which should serve as a reminder, and rejoinder, to those who say there can never be a peace in the Middle East. There can be, because there has been.

"Bruce's History Lessons" appears Sundays. E-mail author Bruce G. Kauffmann at bruce@historylessons.net.