Spoiling and Coping With Spoilers: Israeli-arab Negotiations

For as long as people have been working to bring peace to areas suffering long-standing, violent conflict, there have also been those working to spoil this peace. These ＂spoilers＂ work to disrupt the peace process, and often this disruption takes the form of violence on a catastrophic level. Galia Golan and Gilead Sher offer a broader perspective. They examine this phenomenon by analyzing groups who have spoiled or attempted to spoil peace efforts by political or other nonviolent means. By focusing in particular on the Israeli-Arab conflict, this collection of essays considers the impact of a democratic society operating within a broader context of violence. Contributors bring to light the surprising efforts of negotiators, members of the media, political leaders, and even the courts to disrupt the peace process, and they offer coping strategies for addressing this kind of disruption. Taking into account the multitude of factors that can lead to the breakdown of negotiations, Spoiling and Coping with Spoilers shows how spoilers have been a key factor in Israeli-Arab negotiations in the past and explores how they will likely shape negotiations in the future.

Ilan Danjoux is Affiliate Assistant Professor at the Azrieli Institute of Israel Studies, Concordia University. He is author of Political Cartoons and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.

Shira Dvir-Gvirsman is Senior Research Associate Lecturer of Communication at Tel Aviv University.

Gilad Hirschberger is Associate Professor of Psychology at the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzliya.

Sivan Hirsch-Hoefler is a Senior Lecturer in the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy, and Strategy at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya.

Galia Golan is Professor Emerita of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The most recent of her many publications is Israeli Peacemaking since 1967: Factors Behind the Breakthroughs and Failures. Golan is the recent recipient of the Distinguished Scholar Award of the International Studies Association (ISA) for her work in peace research.

Roee Kibrik is an Adjunct Lecturer at the International Department, at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and the Director of Research of Mitvim: The Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies.

Maya Kornberg is Doctoral Candidate in the Department of Politics and International Relations, Oxford University.

Tamar Saguy is Associate Professor of Psychology at the Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzliya.

Ofira Seliktar is Professor Emerita of Political Science at Gratz College. Her latest book (with Farhad Rezaei) is Iran, Israel, and the United States: The Politics of Counter-Proliferation Intelligence.

Tamir Sheafer is Professor of Political Science and Communication at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Shaul Shenhav is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of Analyzing Social Narratives.

Gilead Sher was Senior Negotiator at the 2000 Camp David summit and the 2001 Taba talks and served as Prime Minister Barak’s Chief of Staff. Sher leads the Center for Applied Negotiations (CAN) at the Tel Aviv Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). His books include The Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations, 1999-2001: Within Reachand The Battle for Home.

Deborah Shulman is a PhD student in Social Psychology at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and a member of the Psychology of Intergroup Conflict and Reconciliation lab at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzliya.

Shlomy Zachary is an Israeli lawyer, representing domestic and international human rights and peace organizations, and works in the areas of International Law and International Humanitarian Law.