 The Middle East is topping the World Economic Forum agenda |
A double-take reveals that the figure in the red polo shirt and golf trousers sitting behind me is Colin Powell.
At breakfast, the next table is occupied by the Israeli foreign minister.
The businessman I'm chatting to casually tells me he is the owner of a billion dollar company.
The World Economic Forum was founded to help top business-people meet policy makers.
Today the Swiss charitable foundation has an income of about $50m a year and has become the most extraordinary gathering of the international great and good.
It usually takes place in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, high in the Alps.
After 11 September, the meeting was held in New York, as an act of solidarity.
This time, at the invitation of Jordan's King Abdullah, it is taking place some 460 metres below sea level on the shores of the Dead Sea.
 Apart from the complete contrast in the weather, the most obvious change from Davos is the complete absence of anti-globalisation demonstrators  |
The forum has no powers to make decisions.
But its influence can be seen from the guest list: not just the US Secretary of State, Mr Powell, but the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan; Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister; Nato's Lord Robertson; Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president; and the chief executives of big American corporations like Hewlett Packard and Boeing.
The WEF has an ambitious mission: it says it is committed to improving the state of the world.
The Middle East, divided, largely undemocratic, poor and torn by conflict, is certainly in need of some of that reforming zeal.
So this gathering of the international economic and political elite has been devoted entirely to the Middle East. It is being referred to as the global reconciliation summit.
The delegates here have been focusing on two issues: the stumbling Israeli-Palestinian peace process and Iraq.
The single theme of many of the discussions has been the prospects for democracy across the region.
'Reserved chilliness'
Addressing the opening session, the meeting's host, King Abdullah of Jordan, said he hoped to see a "reconstruction of Iraq that respects the rights of its people to determine their own future".
On the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, the King said: "I have called this a critical moment because at no other time has there been such despair and yet such hope, such misery and yet such promise, such bloodshed and yet such a passionate yearning for peace."
 The world's political and economic elite gather in Jordan |
This is the lowest place on earth, with temperatures routinely exceeding 100 degrees.
Apart from the complete contrast in the weather, the most obvious change from Davos is the complete absence of anti-globalisation demonstrators.
That may be because instead of Swiss police officers with tear gas and water cannon, protestors would find the Jordanian Army.
There are dozens of roadblocks reinforced by machine guns mounted on American-built Humvees.
Although the outlook for an Israeli Palestinian cease-fire seems bleak, there are about 50 Israelis here.
They include the Foreign Minister, Silvan Shalom, the former prime minister, Simon Peres, and a number of senior business-people.
The Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth wrote that only a year ago any such conference with Israeli participation could not have been held: "The Arab street would have responded furiously."
The newspaper added: "That definitely is a dramatic change in the Arab approach to Israel. In Arab consciousness, Israel, once again, is a partner for dialogue; a partner who is received with reserved chilliness, but to whom one need not turn one's back."
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