Direct talks have begun between the Palestinians and Israelis in Washington after a 20-month hiatus and to give the negotiations a good start, President Barack Obama organized a glittering political gathering.

Not only were Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu there, so were Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and King Abdallah of Jordan.

The presence of the Jordanian monarch and the Egyptian president is significant. Within the context of Arab Peace Initiative adopted at the Arab Summit in Beirut in 2002, Jordan and Egypt have been designated as the sole states to negotiate with the Israelis (other than the Palestinians themselves) on behalf of the Arabs. Their presence in Washington demonstrates symbolically that the negotiations have the active support of the Arab world and that the negotiations there are aimed not only at bringing about Palestinian-Israeli peace but also a new relationship between the Arab states and Israel.

Nonetheless, despite the star-studded cast, there is little Arab confidence in the talks. The skepticism is based both on previous experience of peace negotiations and Benjamin Netanyahu’s record as a politician who pretends to want a deal but has done everything to prevent one from happening. In particular too, in the Arab world (and probably among Israelis), the negotiations are seen as Obama’s talks, with the Israeli and Palestinian governments turning up and going through the motions largely to suit the American president’s agenda.

While there is no doubt about Obama’s sincere desire for peace, it cannot be built to suit his wishes. The White House wants peace, the Arabs want peace, even the Israelis want peace. But the fundamentals for it are not there. Blocking any realistic progress is the Israelis’ refusal to permanently freeze the settlements.

The issue is crucial. The Israelis say: “We want peace.” But they also say: “We want more Palestinian land.” They cannot have both. It is one or the other. Land-for-peace is the only basis of the Arab Peace Initiative.

It is plain that there are those, both on the Israeli and the Palestinian and Arab sides, who want the talks to fail, who in their vicious fantasies dream of total victory and the destruction of the other — such as Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the spiritual leader of the Shas political party who, donning the mantle of Hitler and wanting a very different final solution, calls for the destruction of the Palestinians. There are those who, for less bloodthirsty reasons, likewise want the talks to fail. It may be that the drive-by shooting of four Israeli settlers in the West Bank this week, for which Hamas claimed responsibility, was an attempt to derail the talks. Hamas is certainly opposed to them.

The Arab position is wholly different. The negotiations are fully supported, if more out of hope than conviction as to the outcome.

There has to be hope — and the comments by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak that the Arab areas of Jerusalem will be handed back are encouraging, although he may have been speaking for himself, not for the Israeli government. But while there have been warm words by both sides in Washington, what is needed are concrete offers. Of them, there is scant expectation.