A Palestinian man wear a button with a picture of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. (Maan Images)

Israeli, Palestinian, and American leaders met at Camp David in July 2000, to negotiate final status issues, at the invitation of President Bill Clinton. Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yasser Arafat came reluctantly, believing a leadership summit to be premature, but received reassurance from President Clinton that Palestinians would not be blamed if the meeting were to end without an agreement.

American negotiators advanced a written draft of a proposed agreement, to which Israeli and Palestinian negotiators responded.

Palestinian negotiators consistently offered concessions beyond the international consensus. They were prepared, for example, to accept Israeli annexation of large Jewish settlements in the West Bank, in return for land of equal value and size in Israel, instead of complete Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank. They were also open to Israeli sovereignty over parts of East Jerusalem.

Israeli negotiators, on the other hand, demanded sovereignty or long-term control over 20% of the West Bank, and all of Jerusalem except a few distant Palestinian suburbs. Under the Israeli proposals, the Palestinian areas would have been fragmented into four units, separated from each other by Israeli settlements and their connecting roads, jeopardizing the viability of the prospective Palestinian state.

Both Israeli and Palestinian negotiators were hampered by the vagueness of some of the American proposals, validating Arafat's concern that the summit was premature. In the eyes of Palestinian negotiators, American officials - in particular, Middle East special envoy Dennis Ross - showed clear bias in favor of Israel.

The summit ended without an agreement, after which President Clinton praised Prime Minister Barak's "courage," and, contrary to his earlier promise, blamed the failure of the summit on Arafat and the Palestinians.

Further reading: Shattered Dreams by Charles Enderlin (Other Press); The Truth about Camp David by Clayton Swisher (Nation Books/Avalon Publishing) .