Ethno-politics perceptions and foreign policy: A case study of the activities of the organized American Jewish community in regard to the decision by the United States to enter into a diplomatic dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization (1967-19

This study seeks to explain the role and activities of the organized American Jewish community in the decision by the United States to enter into a diplomatic dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization.; I argue that American Jewish support was essential for the success of the U.S.-led peace process; that this support depended on changing perceptions about the nature of the Arab-Israel conflict among American Jewish leaders, and that this perceptual change was connected to political suasion or manipulation from outside the American Jewish community and from within.; My approach is to associate perceptual changes to political suasion and agenda setting. A conflict that had been zero sum became non zero sum. A dispute involving the Arab states versus Israel became a struggle between an indigenous Palestinian Arab population and Israel. The PLO, whose raison d'etre was Israel's annihilation, became a multifaceted NGO capable of self-reformation.; Without minimizing the impact of other variables (facts-on-the-ground, reversals of Arab policy, etc.), this study examines changing perceptions of the Arab-Israel conflict and argues that leadership elements in the American Jewish community played a critical role in evaluating and codifying the perceptual transformation of the conflict. All of these perceptual changes were politically necessary prerequisites before "talking" to the PLO was possible. The US approach to resolving the conflict benefited immensely from the facilitating role played by various Jewish leadership elements.