Please join us for a conversation between Seth Anziska (UCL) and Ahmad Khalidi (Oxford) on the historical roots of the Oslo accords and the consequences for political conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Seth will discuss his recently published book, Preventing Palestine: A Political History from Camp David to Oslo, which is based on newly declassified international sources to chart the emergence of the peace process and the persistence of Palestinian statelessness. In linking the 1978 Camp David Accords with broader efforts to sideline Palestinian political aspirations, this account raises crucial questions about the role of Egyptian-Israeli peace in subsequent negotiations with the Palestinians. Ahmad will draw on his extensive regional expertise and experience as advisor to the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid/Washington peace talks in 1991-1993 to situate these developments in political contact. How did events in the 1970s and 1980s shape the course of the Oslo Accords, and what are the implications for the Middle East today?  

The discussion will launch an event series marking the 25th anniversary of the Oslo Accords bringing together scholars and activists to discuss the cultural, social and political ramifications of “Oslo” as event, structure and effect.

Seth Anziska is the Mohamed S. Farsi-Polonsky Lecturer in Jewish-Muslim Relations at University College London (UCL) and a visiting fellow at the U.S./Middle East Project. His research and teaching focuses on Israeli and Palestinian society and culture, modern Middle Eastern history, and contemporary Arab and Jewish politics. He is the author of Preventing Palestine: A Political History from Camp David to Oslo (Princeton University Press, 2018), and his writing has appeared in The New York Times, Foreign Policy, and The New York Review of Books. Seth received his PhD in International and Global History from Columbia University, his M. Phil. in Modern Middle Eastern Studies from St. Antony’s College, Oxford, and his BA in history from Columbia University. He is a 2018-2019 Fulbright Scholar at the Norwegian Nobel Institute, and has held fellowships at New York University, the London School of Economics, and the American University of Beirut.

Dr. Ahmad Samih Khalidi is a Palestinian from an old Jerusalemite family. He is a graduate of Oxford and London Universities, and is currently an Academic Visitor at St Antony’s College, Oxford and an Associate Fellow at the Center for Security Policy, Geneva, and Senior Fellow at the Institute of Palestine Studies, (IPS) Beirut. He is the co-editor of the Journal of Palestine Studies (Arabic edition) published by the IPS, and has served as an advisor to the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid/Washington peace talks in 1991-1993 and as senior advisor on security to the Cairo-Taba PLO-Israeli talks in 1993. He was co-chair of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences project on Israeli-Palestinian security in 1993-1995 and Associate Fellow of the Middle East program at Chatham House (Royal Institute for International Affairs) in 1995-96. He has been active in Palestinian politics and Track-2 activities for over forty years. He has been a senior advisor to PA Presidents Arafat and Abbas and has served as consultant on Middle East Affairs to various European governments. He has written widely on Middle Eastern political and strategic affairs in both English and Arabic. His books (co-written with Hussein Agha) include Syria and Iran: Rivalry and Cooperation (Chatham House, 1995) Track-2 Diplomacy; Lessons from the Middle East (MIT Press, 2003) and A Palestinian National Security Framework (Chatham House, 2006).