ON MARCH 3rd, America's president, Barack Obama, will host Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, for talks in Washington, DC. A meeting with Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority, is likely to follow soon after. Mr Obama appears to be trying to give a hand to his secretary of state, John Kerry, as the (self-imposed) deadline for an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement approaches on April 29th.
With just weeks to go, Mr Kerry's officials seem stumped on how to bridge what one calls the “many wide gaps”. Perhaps more realistic than they once were, they put the odds of success at just fifty-fifty. Israeli nor Palestinian leaders stopped formally negotiating with each other in November. If there is one issue they agree on, it is in advising him to stay away. Mr Kerry used to come fortnightly to Jersulem. But his last visit was almost two months ago, and momentum has since slipped.
The once-supportive Arab League has shied away, too, for reasons that have little to do with the process itself. The region’s monarchs and generals supported the Israeli-Palestinian talks when they started again in July after a three-year lull. But they have since become increasingly miffed at what they see as the Obama administration ignoring their interests, whether by preaching power-sharing with Islamists or in its outreach to Iran. They are counselling Mr Abbas to not sell out on core issues.
