President Barack Obama said the goal of the talks was to resolve all final status issues
US President Barack Obama has urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders not to let the chance of a permanent peace deal “slip away”.
“This moment of opportunity may not soon come again,” he said, pledging US support for the new negotiations.
Mr Obama spoke the day before a new round of direct talks between Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas was due to begin.
Earlier, he condemned the “senseless slaughter” of four Israeli settlers.
They were shot dead by gunmen near the West Bank city of Hebron on Tuesday, with the armed wing of Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip and opposes peace talks with Israel, saying it had carried out the attack.
And in another attack, two Israelis were shot and wounded on Wednesday in the West Bank at Rimonim Junction, near the Jewish settlement of Kochav Hashahar and east of the city of Ramallah.
The victims were a woman and a man, Israeli officials said, adding that the man was in a serious condition in hospital. Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld blamed Palestinian militants for the attack.
Mr Obama spoke at the White House on Wednesday evening after meetings with Mr Netanyahu, Mr Abbas, Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Analysis
President Barack Obama has had to rescue the talks before they have even properly started.
The Israelis say they will not renew a partial freeze on building homes for Jews in the occupied West Bank when it expires at the end of this month. The Palestinians say that without a freeze they will walk away.
If that hurdle is cleared, three big issues will top their agenda.
First, Jerusalem. Both sides want a capital there.
Second, they need to agree the borders of an independent Palestine.
Third, the future of Palestinian refugees – people whose families fled or were driven out of what became Israel in 1948.
Even if Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu do manage to agree, both men would face serious domestic opposition to the necessary compromises.
Mr Netanyahu would have to take on the Jewish settlers, whose political representatives make up the spine of his own government.
President Abbas presides over one wing of a deeply-split Palestinian national movement – the other wing, Hamas, is against the talks.
His remarks came on the eve of the first direct negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian leaders in 20 months, which he said were “intended to resolve all final status issues”.
In remarks ahead of a Wednesday evening dinner with the Arab leaders, Mr Netanyahu described Mr Abbas as a “partner in peace”, and said he would not allow the latest attacks to “block our path to peace”.
Speaking next, Mr Abbas condemned attacks on Israelis and urged an end to bloodshed. He also called for a freeze in Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank, and said it was time to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land that began in 1967.
Mr Mubarak called Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories “contrary to international law”.
King Abdullah said the group needed Mr Obama’s “support as a mediator, honest broker and a partner”.
“If hopes are disappointed again, the price of failure will be too high for all,” he said.
Mr Obama said the goal of the talks, which are expected to last a year, was a permanent settlement that ended the Israeli occupation that began in 1967 and resulted in an independent, democratic Palestinian state existing peacefully beside Israel.
He said the US could not impose peace on the two parties, and that the US could not want peace more than them.
And he praised Mr Abbas and Mr Netanyahu as leaders “who I believe want peace”.
Earlier, Mr Obama said Wednesday’s initial meetings were “very productive”.
But disagreement over Israeli settlement construction in the occupied West Bank has also threatened to cast a pall over the talks.
The Israelis have said they will not renew a partial freeze on building homes for Jewish settlers when it expires towards the end of this month, but the Palestinians say that without a freeze they will walk away from the talks.
On Thursday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is to hold discussions with the Israeli and Palestinian negotiating teams.
Mr Netanyahu and Mr Abbas are to then meet for the first face-to-face talks between Israeli and Palestinian leaders since late 2008.
US officials said they wanted to at least get agreement from the two sides to meet again, possibly in the second week of September.
Another meeting between Mr Obama, Mr Abbas and Mr Netanyahu could be held during the UN General Assembly at the end of the month.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
