"Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was at the White House giving President Barack Obama a report on efforts to relaunch Middle East peace talks, aides say. Obama had requested the progress report at a trilateral meeting with the Israeli and Palestinian leaders in New York last month. A White House readout of Clinton's oral briefing suggested that despite some progress, success in getting peace talks relaunched still eludes the Obama administration.....
"The Palestinians have strengthened their efforts on security and reforming Palestinian institutions, but they need to do more in these areas and on stopping incitement and preventing terror," the statement continued. "Israelis have facilitated greater movement for Palestinians and responded to our call to stop all settlement activity by expressing a willingness to curtail settlement activity, but they need to translate that willingness into real, meaningful action and do more to improve the daily lives of Palestinians. And both sides need to move forward toward direct negotiations." ....
The process of late has been frustrated by Palestinian Authority President's Mahmoud Abbas' domestic political problems, diplomats said. Abbas' political problems were triggered by his initial decision to decline to push for UN investigation of the Goldstone Gaza commission report -- a decision he later reversed. Abbas' political problems have made him resistant to agree to go into permanent status talks with Israel without a total settlement freeze, diplomats said. (I don't recall that things were IN THAT ORDER, ... but anyway...!)"
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