"Oslo" chronicles the negotiations that led to the 1993 Peace Accords. But it can't bring itself to examine what started the conflict in the first place.
‘Oslo’ Review: Timely HBO Movie Tackles Landmark Israeli-Palestinian Peace Talks Variety 1 hr ago
Perhaps it’s time for another meeting between officials from Israel and Palestine like the series of off-the-books negotiations that took place in Oslo, Norway, back in 1993. Those sessions conducted in secret over nearly six months, since Israeli policy forbade interacting with or otherwise acknowledging the authority of the Palestinian Liberation Organization paid off in a very public handshake between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat, photographed with then-U.S. President Bill Clinton.
But the U.S. had little to do with the Oslo Accords, as J.T. Rogers’ Tony-winning play “Oslo” reminded audiences when it premiered at New York’s Lincoln Center Theater in 2016. The discussions were brokered by a nonpartisan Norwegian couple, which provides a uniquely neutral framing device for an in-depth look at the issues concerning both sides.
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HBO’s new drama “Oslo” goes behind the scenes of the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, a landmark moment that marked the first face-to-face agreement between the government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and an unprecedented move toward peace.
Premiering Saturday, the drama chronicles the extraordinary efforts of Norwegians Mona Juul (Ruth Wilson), a Ministry of Foreign Affairs diplomat, and her spouse, Terje Rød-Larsen (Andrew Scott), a sociologist and director of the Fafo Foundation think tank, who together organized clandestine meetings between the warring parties in Oslo as an alternative to U.S.-led negotiations that had stalled. It resulted in not only the accord, but also the now-famous symbolic gesture of hope: a handshake between PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in front of President Clinton on the White House lawn. The final moments of the 118-minute film feature that image, as if to say:
We will facilitate and facilitate only.
Mona Juul (Ruth Wilson) makes her husband Terje Rød-Larsen (Andrew Scott) repeat these words forces him, really just before their guests arrive at Norway s Booregaard Manor. This is no cocktail party. The guests come from both sides of one of the most intractable conflicts of the 20th- and 21st century. The Norwegian couple, without official government approval, opened up secret back channels, bypassing the traditional diplomatic process. Under the auspices of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (where Mona is employed) and Fafo Foundation (Terje s think tank), the couple hope to facilitate a dialogue between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (then exiled in Tunis). Mona and Terje will not insert themselves into the process. They will facilitate only. The result of all of this, of course, were the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, and the subject of HBO s Oslo, premiering this weekend.