U.S. mediators talk publicly about the need to maintain the Middle East "peace process," but that phrase implicitly acknowledges how far away real peace is. Recently returned from the Middle East, TIME Diplomatic Correspondent Strobe Talbott offered this assessment:
American officials, both in Washington and along the shuttle route, privately describe their task as a holding action, a way of buying time while a discouraged Anwar Sadat and a defiant Menachem Begin learn to engage in the pragmatic diplomacy that last year's euphoric summitry made possible.
That holding action will probably have to last...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
