PRIO is proud to present a unique primary source from the 1978 Camp David negotiations – the notes of US Middle East advisor William B. Quandt. These notes were taken by William B. Quandt during the Camp David summit, and are published here for the very first time.
Quandt worked on President Carter’s National Security Council, and he was present at Camp David in 1978. Since leaving the Carter administration, Quandt has become a leading figure in the academic community on the Arab-Israeli conflict and US Middle East policy. Of Camp David, Quandt would later write that “this remarkable adventure in summit diplomacy achieved more than most of its detractors have been willing to acknowledge and less than its most ardent proponents have claimed”. Quandt’s notes show that the American mediators of “untiring energy” as Begin dubbed it, deserves, in Sadat’s words, “our keenest appreciation”. The notes, chronicling the 5-17 September 1978 arduous negotiations, give a revealing insight into the summit diplomacy, and the clashes of iron wills, as well as the continuous domestic considerations, sentiments and ideology that are the heart of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Cite as “Personal Notes on the Camp David Summit by William B. Quandt”, downloaded from Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO),
