Ambassador Alfred L. "Roy" Atherton Jr.

As this issue of the Bulletin was going to press, we received word of the death at 80 of Ambassador Alfred L. "Roy" Atherton Jr. Roy was a wonderful man who, in addition to ascending to the highest ranks of US diplomacy, played a key role in building Search for Common Ground in the Middle East.

He joined our Advisory Board in 1991 and served as its Chair from 1993 to 2000. We were a small NGO, and he was a foreign policy luminary. Along with the late Ambassador Peter Constable, Roy brought credibility and recognition at a time when we very much needed it. He gave us the gift of integrity, wisdom, and indomitable spirit, and we shall always be grateful.

From 1947 to 1985, he led what Secretary of State Colin Powell described as "an exemplary Foreign Service career." He reached the highest levels of Track I, official diplomacy, serving as U.S. Ambassador to Egypt, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, and Director General of the Foreign Service. Then, in retirement, he turned out to be a natural for unofficial, Track II work.

Always accompanied by Betty Atherton, his beloved wife and life partner, Roy was a fixture at our Core Working Group meetings. His regular spot on the program was to deliver the view from Washington, and participants listened to him as if he were providing received truth. In 1993, Bonnie Pearlman of our staff invited Roy and Betty to take what was the first of many trips to the region on our behalf. He came to see that there is a distinct field called conflict resolution, and he became a champion of our efforts to institutionalize it in the Middle East. Like the Moliere character who stated that, without knowing it, he had been speaking prose for 40 years, Roy said that, even though he had not known the field existed, he had practiced conflict resolution during his whole career.

Copyright 2004 Search for Common Ground