West Bank

The West Bank is more than a name in the Oslo negotiations: it is one half of a territorial question that Ahmed Qurie argues cannot be separated from Gaza. In the play, claims to Jericho, security arrangements, and joint control of checkpoints make the West Bank a measure of whether the secret talks can move beyond broad declarations toward a workable distribution of authority.

Place in the Negotiations

The West Bank enters a scene that first names Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, then pairs the West Bank with Gaza. Terje Rød-Larsen responds with affection for the people of the region, while Mona Juul remarks on how unfamiliar Gaza was to them. The brief exchange places the West Bank within the human landscape that the negotiators are trying to address, even as the play soon shifts from attachment to the precise, contested terms of control.

The negotiations themselves arise from a clandestine channel intended to make progress where public, government-level pronouncements had not. Terje Rød-Larsen proposes private discussions between people from Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, held in an isolated place. When the Palestinian delegation appears, Ahmed Qurie speaks with Rød-Larsen as if by telephone and insists that the delegation be met personally and that no one else handle its passports. The West Bank is not identified as the meeting place; its importance emerges instead through the substance of the proposals being carried into the channel.

Gaza, Jericho, and Territorial Connection

The difference between general language and a specific offer becomes explicit when Ahmed Qurie asks where the Israeli draft answers the Palestinian proposal for control of Gaza. Yair Hirschfeld points to the Declaration of Principles (DOP), but Qurie judges its proposals eloquent generalities rather than a direct reply. The exchange establishes a recurring tension: the draft's broad formulations do not satisfy negotiators seeking concrete territorial commitments.

When Uri Savir says Israel is willing to relinquish control of Gaza, Qurie makes acceptance conditional on Israel relinquishing control of Jericho at the same time. He argues that Gaza alone would leave Palestinians like an island surrounded by Israeli forces, and that Jericho is needed for their protection. Savir stresses that Jericho is only twenty kilometers from Jerusalem; Qurie answers that it is a Palestinian city in the West Bank and that Palestinians need a foothold in both Gaza and the West Bank. The dispute is therefore not simply over whether to transfer control of one place: in Qurie's argument, the West Bank connection changes what control of Gaza would mean.

The positions remain conditional. Savir offers Gaza first and says Jericho can be discussed after the killing of Israeli soldiers in Gaza stops, presenting that sequence as an offer from Shimon Peres. Qurie rejects it and leaves the offer available for revision and re-presentation. Later, the negotiators agree that outstanding disputes will not be referred to international arbitration and that they will negotiate turning over Gaza and Jericho. The wording marks an opening for negotiation, not a completed transfer of either territory.

Security, Authority, and the Limits of Agreement

The West Bank's role continues into discussions of border security and checkpoints. Ahmed Qurie accepts that Israeli forces may be responsible for border security but insists that Palestinian forces have joint control of all checkpoints. Shimon Peres refuses to cede that point. Qurie's position thus distinguishes one form of security responsibility from authority at the checkpoints, while Peres's reply exposes the remaining limit of the proposed compromise.

The play also shows the secret channel being offered a change in status: Joel Singer tells the Palestinians that, on behalf of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the State of Israel, Israel proposes that the back channel become the official channel. That offer follows the negotiations over concrete proposals, including territory, but does not resolve their outstanding disputes. The West Bank remains consequential precisely because the talks can advance toward formal status while questions of territorial control and shared authority remain contested.

Narrative Significance

Through Jericho, the play gives the West Bank a precise place in the negotiations rather than treating it as a general backdrop. Its relation to Gaza becomes the core of Qurie's argument about protection and Palestinian connection; its proximity to Jerusalem becomes part of Savir's security objection; and checkpoint control carries the disagreement into the practical administration of borders. The territory's significance is therefore built through competing claims and proposed arrangements, not through a claim that the negotiations settled them.