Washington -

Martin Indyk's new book, "Master of the Game: Henry Kissinger and the Art of Middle East Diplomacy", examines the history of Henry Kissinger's participation in peace negotiations, the National Security Adviser and former US Secretary of State. The Middle East, and its consequences for the ongoing conflict until today.

The book details Kissinger's mission after the "October 1973 War", which led to building a mechanism for the Middle East peace process in the years following the war.

Indyk previously served as US Ambassador to Israel twice, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and US Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations.

In his 688-page book, he presents a close analysis of one of the most influential figures in the history of American foreign policy in the second half of the 20th century.

Al Jazeera Net obtained an early copy of the book, which will be available in the US markets on October 26.

Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (Reuters)

About "Master of the Game"

Indyk takes the reader back to the 1970s, when Kissinger negotiated with former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, Jordanian King Hussein bin Talal, and Saudi King Faisal bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, to detail how he managed to Maneuvering with the leaders of the Middle East towards peace.

“If diplomacy was the art of taking political leaders to places they hesitated to go, then Kissinger was the master of the game,” says Indyk.

The book is based on thousands of declassified documents from American and Israeli archives, extensive and frequent interviews with Kissinger himself, as well as meetings that the author brought together with senior officials in the peace process files in the countries concerned.

In a meeting with the Council on Foreign Relations a few days ago, attended by Al Jazeera Net, Indyk indicated two reasons that prompted him to complete this book on Kissinger.

The first relates to Kissinger's depth and strength in laying the foundation for the core American role in the peace process between Arabs and Israelis. As the envoy to the peace process during the Bush and Obama eras, and twice ambassador to Israel, Indyk says, "I should have learned well from what Kissinger did."

Indyk sees "the absence of a detailed presentation among dozens of books that dealt with Kissinger's history about his role when he was Secretary of State in the success of reaching 3 agreements, two between Egypt and Israel, and one between Israel and Syria after the October war."

He says that the second reason is personal, "In October 1973 I was an Australian student studying international relations at the Hebrew University in Israel, and I was a volunteer in one of the settlements near the Gaza Strip, when the war broke out, and I used to hear every day the huge American C-type transport planes - 5A), which transports everything from military equipment, including armored vehicles, tanks, and others.

He adds, "I was listening to BBC Radio for the latest developments, and Kissinger's moves that contributed to the ceasefire. In these moments, I pledged to myself to work on finding peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors; With her, back to the original.


Kissinger narrative

The book quotes Kissinger as saying that "peace in the Middle East was a problem, not a solution, and the desire for peace requires a stable order in this highly volatile part of the world."

According to Indyk, Kissinger's most important achievements are the ceasefire agreement that ended the October 1973 war, the agreement between Israel and Syria that maintained peace in the Golan Heights for 40 years, and two disengagement agreements that pulled Egypt out of the conflict with Israel, and laid the foundations a peace treaty between the two countries.

While the United States suffered the consequences of its costly intervention in Vietnam on the one hand, and President Richard Nixon's standing and focus on the other hand due to the Watergate scandal, Kissinger used his skillful diplomacy to marginalize the Soviet Union in the midst of the Cold War and build a US-led Middle Eastern order.

Rather than trying to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in one fell swoop, as Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton later hoped, Indyk wrote that Kissinger's mediation of cease-fires and limited temporary agreements was a wise tactic, because it preserved a fragile stability without aiming too much.

Indyk asserts that "Kissinger realism" is the solution to the dilemma of ambitious liberal foreign policy, and says that "Kissinger's realistic gradation provided a middle way between ambition for comprehensive peace on the one hand, and despair, stagnation, and the status quo. Kissinger believed that the path toward peace must remain. Gradual, slow, and in many cases uneven.

The book explains that Kissinger believed that peace would be achieved when the Arab world had exhausted all alternatives, and had become accustomed with the passage of time to the existence of Israel.

By choosing a step-by-step process, rather than rushing toward a comprehensive settlement, Kissinger's diplomacy provided a dependence on a long road to peace.

Meanwhile, the goal was stability, avoiding anything that could disturb the peace process while teaching both sides patience and building some mutual trust.

Indyk believes that Kissinger's study of international relations and his focus on the stage of European stability in the nineteenth century ruled his vision of the world, whether in dealing with China or with the Soviet Union or between Arabs and Jews.

Indyk believes that Kissinger's success provided lessons in "how to maintain peace after war", at a time when he did not believe in peacebuilding as an end in itself, but as a means to maintain stability and order.

Kissinger believed that the enthusiastic pursuit of peace produces the opposite, as happened at the beginning of World War II, and as happened under President Clinton!

This acceleration shakes stability.

Therefore, the objectives must be specific, limited and realistic at each stage so that the peace process does not set back and be difficult to restore again, as is the case today!

Indyk was exposed to the grant offered by President Anwar Sadat to the United States in expelling Soviet experts from Egypt in 1972 without receiving a price (social networking sites)

Free Sadat Scholarships

The book details what Kissinger considered a serious maneuver and initiative by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, which Washington did not pay attention to until belatedly, as he sent his National Security Adviser Hafez Ismail to Washington in February 1973 carrying a peace initiative.

Kissinger met and listened to Ishmael, and postponed the response without seriousness and without urgency, despite Ishmael's affirmation.

Kissinger presented the idea to Nixon, then discussed the matter with the Israeli ambassador to Washington, Yitzhak Peres, who downplayed and rejected it, as did Golda Meir, who eliminated the initiative, and said, "Forget it."

Kissinger pledged to return to the initiative after holding the Israeli elections that were scheduled for December 1973, but Sadat went to war in October of the same year.

Before that, the Egyptian president surprised the world with his decision to expel 20,000 Soviet experts from Egypt on July 18, 1972, and the American reaction was sufficient evidence to recognize the importance and danger of this step. Kissinger said, “If President Sadat telephoned Washington and asked for anything before He expelled the experts from Egypt, he would have gotten what he wanted, but he offered us this great work for free.”

But the book indicates that Sadat relied on different calculations, and believed that getting rid of the experts would free him from the burden of the Soviet Union's approval of any military action in the future.

Of Kissinger, Indyk says, "We thought Sadat was stupid, and he couldn't do anything of value, and he wasn't."

Henry Kissinger talks in recent days about radical changes in the international system due to Corona (Al-Jazeera)

Kissinger's vision for Palestine and the Palestinians

Kissinger considered the Palestine Liberation Organization to be a terrorist organization, and held Yasser Arafat responsible for the killing of American diplomats in Khartoum in 1972.

Because of his European experience, Kissinger dealt with sovereign states, and left the vice president of the "CIA" (CIA) to meet Arafat in Morocco to convince him not to provoke the Palestinians into violence or chaos during the negotiations, and to work to contain them even for a while.

Kissinger believed in the importance of the major players first, and saw that non-state groups, and thus deal mainly with Egypt, Syria and Israel in the three disengagement agreements.

Kissinger did not care about Jordan, despite King Hussein's insistence, and left it for the next stage, and focused on Egypt's strategy first, and he had what he wanted.

Henry Kissinger (right) in a meeting with former US President Richard Nixon (Agencies)

Kissinger's Judaism, his upbringing, and the dilemma of neutrality

Kissinger told historian Neil Ferguson, "It is difficult to be part of a people who have suffered what the Jews have suffered for a thousand years without having a strong sense of your identity, a sense of duty to your Jewish faith."

The book notes that Kissinger lost 13 members of his family to the Nazis and the Holocaust, and many of his schoolmates were killed.

Indyk explains that Kissinger's early experience while fleeing Nazi Germany during World War II made him disillusioned with the "Wilsonian ideal of peace to end all wars", and this prompted him to treat the peace process file with caution and great skepticism.

At the same time, President Richard Nixon was known for his anti-Semitic tendencies, and his sensitivity to Kissinger's Judaism, and he was entrusted with the file of Arab-Israeli relations only in the last years of his rule, leaving it to Foster Dulles for a few years.

Therefore, Kissinger did not supervise the Middle East file until before the outbreak of the October 1973 war.

Kissinger tried historically, during negotiations, to preserve the safety and security of the Jewish state at a time when Israeli leaders considered his presence in the American decision-making circle as a means to protect their interests because he is a Jew. As for the Arab leaders, they believed that Kissinger’s Judaism was enough to gain Israel’s confidence, which would push it to accept major concessions.

Between this and that, Kissinger took advantage of the parties' vision of him to achieve what he saw as an American interest, according to Martin Indyk's analysis.