The Madrid Conference

The Madrid Conference

In 1991, the United States, together with Russia, convened an Arab-Israeli peace conference in Madrid—the first of its kind. For the first time, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and a Palestinian delegation (officially part of the Jordanian delegation) met together for negotiations. Over the course of 18 months, a series of bilateral negotiations—between Israel and Syria, Israel and Lebanon, and Israel and the Palestinian delegation—took place. While symbolically significant, very few practical outcomes resulted from the conference. These negotiations fizzled out when Israel and the PLO reached an agreement in 1993.