08/02/2026 21:23

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In October 1997, Tripp offered to play the tapes for aNewsweek reporter and did play them for Lucianne Goldberg, a conservative Republican publicist. He said that Shepherdstown was a failure, that Barak was not sincere, and that he would have to say as much to President Assad. I had stepped into what Dick Holbrooke called “the greatest collective security failure of the West since the 1930s. That enabled us to maintain our influence with them, but weakened our claim to be an honest broker with the Palestinians.

Now it was my turn. The thirty-three democratically elected leaders of Canada, Central and South America, and the Caribbean were t e he and Crown Prince Abdullah had the distinct impression Arafat was going to accept the parameters. He was given two minutes to say what separated him from the other two candidates.