Camp David Accord Research Paper

The Camp David Accord By 1978 the thirty-year war that had been fought between Egypt and Israel had come to a point where there was a chance for peace. The area that had been at the center of the turmoil was the West Bank of the Jordan River and the Gaza Strip. The problem was that both countries believed that they had the rights to this land: Israel, biblically and Egypt, politically. So an invitation by President Jimmy Carter to President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel was extended. The invitation was for a meeting in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland at the presidential retreat, Camp David. The meeting was so that the framework of a peace agreement, known as the Camp David Accord, could be laid out between Sadat and Begin, with Carter as the mediator. Both Sadat and Begin had their reputations and their countries' futures on the line, not to mention the future of the Middle East. All of the countries
The American delegates thought that if the Egyptian and Israeli leaders were to budge it would be necessary to understand them and the way they thought (Blitzer 48). It was also decided that the Camp David meetings would be completely unstructured, without even an agenda to get them started, (Three 227) the hope was that this would be more conducive to the free exchange of thoughts and ideas. As the summit convened, Rosalynn Carter (President Carter's wife) recognized that the three men had one thing in common, that is, their deep religious convictions (Blitzer 48). She suggested that the summit begin with some sort of prayer. So on September 6, 1978, as the summit was starting, the three leaders issued a prayer for peace to the world, saying: "Conscious of the grave issues which face us, we place our trust in the God of our fathers, from whom we seek wisdom and guidance" (Mideast