Quartet Envoys to Meet Palestinian, Israeli Negotiators

Envoys of the Middle East Quartet are to hold separate talks on Wednesday with Palestinian and Israeli negotiators in a bid to find a way to bring the two sides back to the negotiating table.

But the chances a breakthrough in the deadlock which has gripped the negotiations for more than a year look extremely remote with both sides taking very different positions on the conditions for restarting talks.

Wednesday's round of talks, which will take place at the Government House, the U.N. headquarters in annexed east Jerusalem, is the latest in a series of international initiatives aimed at resuscitating direct talks which broke down in autumn 2010.

Envoys from the European Union, the United States, Russia and the United Nations will first hold talks with Quartet envoy Tony Blair before meeting Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat during the afternoon, a diplomatic source told Agence France Presse.

They will then sit down for discussions with Israel's chief negotiator Yitzhak Molho.

"The whole aim of this is to bring them back to negotiations," the source told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"They're trying to do it back-to-back at this stage to get them back to negotiations because that's probably the only way it's going to happen."

It will be the first time the Quartet envoys have met the two sides since Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas submitted a controversial request for U.N. state membership on September 23 in a move sharply condemned by both Israel and Washington.

Just hours later, the Quartet issued a loosely-worded statement proposing that Israel and the Palestinians resume direct peace talks within a month and make a commitment to securing a deal by the end of 2012.

But October 23 came and went with no sign that the parties were any closer to resuming talks, with both sides holding a different interpretation of the initiative.

Israel says it accepts the Quartet's proposal for an immediate resumption of talks as long as there are no "preconditions".

The Palestinians say there will be no negotiations until Israel freezes settlement -- a demand they say is written into the Quartet proposal.

The Quartet's proposal of September 23 was issued with the aim of heading off a diplomatic showdown over the U.N. membership bid, which is set to be put to a vote in the U.N. Security Council in the coming weeks.

Washington and Israel say a Palestinian state can emerge only as the result of a negotiated settlement between the parties, and not through a U.N. resolution. But Abbas says the bid can run concurrently with peace talks.

The United States has vowed to veto the request in a move many fear could spark a backlash in the Middle East.