ABSTRACT
Joseph Sisco was on a mission to the Middle East to sound out reaction to the impending US peace initiative. While in Israel, prior to Sisco's crossing of the Allenby Bridge to Jordan, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) organized a mass protest demonstration in Amman that brought over 10,000 Palestinians into the streets of the capital on April 14. The PLO's propaganda media even allowed themselves to attack Egypt's acceptance of the US initiative, as a result of which Nasser closed the Fatah and PLO broadcasting stations in Cairo on July 27. The Egyptian president had, agreed to let the king "clip the wings" of the PLO sufficiently to eliminate their opposition to the Rogers Plan. Egypt, for its part, was pleased to reappear as a friend of the PLO in order to reverse its virtual abandonment of the fedayeen during the civil war.
