US Must Sell Peace Talks To Israeli, Palestinian Public
The US has the additional task of having to convince the Israeli and Palestinian people of the merits of the current talks.
Peace talks generally require a parallel strategy aimed at communicating and convincing a reluctant public of its importance, value and ultimate benefits to the warring parties. One might think that nine months of publicly stated "secret" talks would require little communication. But the contrary is the case.
The United States, which is the single and only direct patron and sponsor of the current peace talks, is pulling all the stops to make sure that the Palestinian and Israeli public "are well-informed" — even if all sides agree that the talks are to be private.
US Secretary of State John Kerry has told the world that both Palestinian and Israeli leaders have agreed that he is the only official who can make an authoritative comment or revelation about the peace talks.
Having added the role of peace communicator-in-chief to that of negotiator-in-chief, Washington now has the task of delivering information to the two publics. US officials called back from retirement one of their experienced hands in this area. Veteran communications diplomat Bill Cavness, who served as the information officer both in east Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, was asked to fill in at a position vacated in Jerusalem in the summer, when a sudden breakthrough in talks caught everyone off guard.
