Strategic Assessment

The purpose of this essay is to propose resumption of the multilateral working groups in a revised format in the context of a comprehensive approach to Middle East peace. When the Madrid process was launched in 1991 it was hoped that the multilateral talks would assist the bilateral talks in concluding peace agreements with Syria, Lebanon, and at that time the Jordanians/Palestinians. These groups generally failed in fulfilling this role, although some of them had important achievements. The current idea is to tailor the multilateral groups so as to support the negotiations with the Palestinians.