Dennis Ross
The Diplomat
People, composure and the difficult conversation held well.
Dennis Ross is a seasoned diplomat with extensive experience in Middle Eastern affairs, particularly in Israeli-Palestinian relations. This interview highlights his strategic approach to diplomacy, focusing on the necessity of understanding and engaging with various political actors to achieve lasting peace.
“So it's easy to sort of focus on all of that, at the same time look at the Palestinians who seem dysfunctional. They're divided between Hamas and Fatah in the West Bank and Gaza. They tend to focus on symbols not on substance and so forth.”
“Yes, for several reasons. One is it also gives the Palestinians an excuse to be more open to having talks. Not that I think talks are going to lead anywhere quickly, but just like when you have vacuums that we talked about earlier get filled by the worst forces, well, when there's no political, there's no process of trying to promote peac…”
“Of course, it was a natural place to go. She was about four feet nine inches tall. During the Vietnam War, she was out like in all the demonstrations. She had a real, I'll just say that her political views were quite sharp.”
“Right. You think about, okay, you want to prevent vacuums. You don't want to be the only one to do it. You need local partners to do that. The local partners have to be credible.”
The Axe Files with David Axelrod — Ep. 357 – Amb. Dennis Ross
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