Ambassador Daniel Kurtzer offered an insider's analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and its connection to the work of the North American Jewish federations at the Sept. 9 Family Circle Major Gifts function.

The event, hosted by Eunice and Andy Melnick of Monmouth County, was a joint effort of the Jewish Federations of Ocean and Greater Monmouth counties for each organization's major donors.

Kurtzer, the keynote speaker at the event, said his time in Israel and Egypt as a U.S. ambassador and member of the foreign service, as well as a dean at Yeshiva University, has placed him in areas where he could see first-hand the results of the work of the Jewish federations.

"So the real applause goes to you tonight, for the commitment that you demonstrated in past years as major donors, and also to the challenge that you've accepted for this coming year to meet the requirements not only of Monmouth and Ocean counties, but also the state of Israel and the Jewish people," Kurtzer said.

Kurtzer entered the foreign service in 1976, and since then has been intimately involved in Arab-Israeli negotiations and the formation of U.S. policy toward Israel and the Middle East.

He was involved in the resolution of the Israel-Egypt Taba border dispute, the regional conference in Madrid, and the end of the second intifada.

He was a recipient of the President's Distinguished Service Award, the Department of State Distinguished Service Award and numerous other honors.

Because of the threats to Israel's security and survival, Kurtzer said, conversations about Israel can feel foreboding or pessimistic. When he was in Israel, the threats Israel faced were generally put into three major categories: the threat of Palestinian violence and terrorism; the threat from Israel's northern neighbors like Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon; and the existential threat coming from Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons.

But Israel is truly a success story, he said.

In the first six months of 2007, the economy grew by 6.6 percent, unemployment dropped three percent, inflation is under control, and the technology sector continues to drive Israeli exports.

To that end, Kurtzer sits on the board of an investment company based in California. The company decided its mission would be to make 80 percent of its high-tech investments in the U.S. and the other 20 percent in Israel. But for the last year and a half, he said, the company has done 90 percent of its high-tech investment in Israel, "simply because the products coming out of Israel are too good to pass up."

Socially, Israel is a success story as well, he said. Thanks in large part to the work of the North American Jewish federations, immigrants from the Former Soviet Union, Ethiopia, and other countries around the world have taken their place as productive members of Israeli society.

And there's another success that hits closer to home for Kurtzer and many Americans. When Kurtzer was growing up in Elizabeth, he and his friends would sit in shul and talk baseball -- about guys like Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Elston Howard. And when Kurtzer recently attended a shul in Modi'in, he said the Israeli kids -- unaware of his involvement with the league -- were talking about the best players in the Israel Baseball League.

"So the kids of Israel now have an opportunity not only to face what they will face when they grow to be 18 and join the army, and the challenges of defending their homeland, but they have a chance to enjoy themselves and to have a little fun," Kurtzer said of the nascent league.

Attendees at the Family Circle events usually look forward to getting some insight into current events in Israel, and Kurtzer spent some time talking about what he saw in the Arab-Israeli conflict and U.S. policy during his time as ambassador.

The administration of President George W. Bush, Kurtzer said, has been friendly to Israel, but also relatively dormant in pursuing a peace process. That has especially been the case since Bush's 2002 speech introducing a chain of events that would lead to formation of the "Road Map" to peace.

The initiative failed, however, and after Arab violence and Israeli retaliation, Yasser Arafat once again turned his back on the peace process.

"And we lost what could have been a moment in time when a pathway toward peace might have been possible," Kurtzer said.

The administration's efforts resurfaced this year, when on July 16 Bush announced plans for a regional peace conference, to be held in the fall.

In addition to hopefully spurring real peace negotiations, Kurtzer said the conference will also answer questions about the Bush administration. Is it, as its critics maintain, simply trying to find a diversion from the war in Iraq, and trying to further isolate Hamas and Syria?

Or is it, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice maintains, prepared for a year of transformational diplomacy?

Another question about the conference, Kurtzer said, is whether Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is strong enough politically to bring about true change, and rally the Israeli public in support of his plans.

And how strong is Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas? Kurtzer said Abbas presides over a political infrastructure that has so far proven to be stronger than Abbas, yet not nearly as strong as it needs to be.

But Abbas has provided some reason for hope, Kurtzer said. Prior to the second intifada, Abbas argued to Arafat that the intifada would only hurt Palestinians. He said that because the Palestinian leadership had failed to define realistic and tangible goals of the intifada, the people would simply be consumed by violence.

"So we know that Abbas's thinking is different from that of Arafat, and is more progressive in terms of understanding the need not just to use the stick in dealing with Israel, but also to use the carrot," Kurtzer said.

But Abbas has been a terrible implementer of policy, hesitating to dismantle terrorist groups and unable to reform Palestinian institutions, he added.

Abbas also has Hamas breathing down his neck, Kurtzer said, which begs the next question: Where is Hamas's place in this conference? There's no indication of any weakening of the terrorist organization's political power, and they might feel that the failure of this conference could allow them to consolidate that power. For that reason, Hamas has incentive to play "spoiler", Kurtzer said.

But Kurtzer said there is one encouraging piece of the puzzle that was overlooked in 2002, and if the 2007 conference is to succeed, it must not be overlooked again. That fact, Kurtzer said, is the change in the Arab state of mind toward Israel.

Until 2002, the Arab policy of questioning Israel's legitimacy was not a negotiation tactic, it was simply the Arab way of thinking. That changed in 2002, however, when Arab nations offered, in part, recognition in return for an Israeli retreat to 1967 borders.

"Now, Israel would not be well advised to simply accept the Arab initiative and declare a victory, because the initiative also contains problematic elements, including ambiguous language with respect to the right of return for Palestinian refugees," Kurtzer said. "But Israel would also be foolish, and the United States would be foolish, not to recognize the fundamental change that took place in Arab thinking. Because, in some ways, what the Arab world is now saying is that the problem with Israel is not a 1948 problem, it's not a problem of Israel's existence, it's a problem of occupation of territory."

The Arab position continues to be maximalist, Kurtzer said, and far too demanding for their own or Israel's good. But the shift in their mindset toward Israel is "of cosmic importance."

"And so it behooves the president, in constructing this conference, to try to capture that conceptual change, that revolution in Arab thinking, and to harness it as a support mechanism for the bilateral negotiations that must take place between Israelis and Palestinians," he said.

And the last major question on the conference, Kurtzer said, is what the conference will seek to achieve. Kurtzer told the audience that there are three commonsense objectives that the president should, but has yet to, lay out.

The first is setting a horizon to the end of the conflict. Kurtzer said that while change would have to take place in small increments, it is important to note that both Israelis and Palestinians have similar general ideas of where the conflict would end, and what both nations would look like thereafter. That would likely include a return to pre-1967 borders with some swaps of territory, and a shared Jerusalem.

The second would be to establish core principles that would lead toward that end, something Olmert and Abbas have already begun to do.

And the third, Kurtzer said, would be to establish a realistic timetable. Bush would have to understand that peace cannot be achieved during his term, and that someone else will have to pick up the torch after he leaves office.

Put in this context, Kurtzer said, the significance and the logic of the work done by the Jewish federations of Ocean and Greater Monmouth is magnified.

The communities have their own local needs, Kurtzer said, for the young and old alike, such as education and health and social welfare. But they also know the needs that Israel has in order for the Jewish state to remain strong as it confronts its diplomatic challenges.

"So over the next few months, as you launch your campaign for 2008, please bear in mind, for the good of our community both here and in Israel, that we are part of something much larger than ourselves," Kurtzer said. "And what we do, in small ways at home, contributes to what we hope will be peace within our community at home, and peace between Israel and its neighbors."