As she walked into an ornate conference room in Hafez Assad's Damascus palace last week, Madeleine Albright stole a quick glance at the door to a nearby bathroom. The only excitement during her previous meeting with the Syrian President had been getting locked in that bathroom until a security agent pried open the door. She'd avoid the room this time, but Albright expected the same demands from Assad that had so far blocked talks with Israel on returning the Golan Heights to Syria. Twenty minutes into the meeting, however, the Secretary of State and her Middle East aide, Dennis Ross, looked...
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