The Israeli and Palestinian leaders met here on Tuesday amid growing dissonance over the content of their talks and the kind of agreement they are trying to achieve.
The prime minister of Israel, Ehud Olmert, and the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, met in the evening at Mr. Olmert’s official residence, first accompanied by their negotiating teams and then alone, a spokesman for Mr. Olmert said.
Mr. Olmert and Mr. Abbas have met twice a month since attending the American-sponsored peace conference in Annapolis, Md., in late November. There, they pledged to begin negotiations on all the core issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “in order to conclude a peace treaty,” and to “make every effort to conclude an agreement before the end of 2008.”
The negotiating teams have met frequently in recent days, and have honored an agreement not to disclose details of the talks.
Publicly, though, there are signs of discord.
Aiming to stave off pressure from the Israeli public and a religious party in his governing coalition, Mr. Olmert said Mr. Abbas had agreed to delay talks on the future status of Jerusalem, one of the most delicate issues for both sides.
In a speech here on Sunday to the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Mr. Olmert said that the issue would be addressed only in the “last phase of negotiations” and that Mr. Abbas “accepted it.”
Mr. Olmert said that discussing Jerusalem now could stymie the whole process. Lurking in the background is a threat from the religious Shas Party to leave Mr. Olmert’s coalition as soon as talks on Jerusalem begin.
Israel annexed the eastern part of Jerusalem after the 1967 war. The Palestinians demand it as the capital of a future independent state.
Palestinian officials denied that there was any agreement to delay talks on Jerusalem. “That is not the case,” Saeb Erekat, a senior Palestinian negotiator, said in a telephone interview shortly before the meeting. He contended that the issues of Jerusalem, borders and settlements could not be separated.
“We have a principle that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. It’s a package,” Mr. Erekat said.
The contradiction may stem from differences over the type of deal each side is working toward. The Palestinians want a final agreement for the establishment of a state with defined borders. Israeli officials say that at this stage, they are not aiming for a deal that involves drawing lines on a map, but only for a framework of basic principles referring to all the core issues.
Adding to the fog is the issue of Israeli construction in areas of Jerusalem and the West Bank beyond the 1967 lines, activity the Palestinians oppose.
The Palestinians demand a freeze on all such building, citing the American-backed 2003 peace plan known as the “road map,” which calls for Israel to halt all settlement activity. Israel has pledged to fulfill its obligations under the road map, but reserves the right to continue building in all parts of Jerusalem and in populous West Bank settlement blocs that it intends to keep under any future agreement.
In an effort to impose more control over construction, Mr. Olmert wrote a letter to government ministers in December saying that his and the defense minister’s authorization would be required for any new building, planning or land expropriation for Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
Mark Regev, a spokesman for Mr. Olmert, said the letter did not mention Jerusalem, but he added, “Obviously, we are very conscious of the sensitivities and we take them into account.”
Last week, Israel’s minister of housing and construction, Zeev Boim, said bids would soon be submitted for the construction of more than 1,000 apartments in Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem. He denied reports that building was being held up there.
Israel has said that the fulfillment of any eventual agreement will be conditional on the Palestinians’ meeting security commitments of the road map.
In general, both sides appeared to be lowering expectations. Salam Fayyad, the Palestinian prime minister appointed by Mr. Abbas, told the Conference of Presidents on Tuesday that it was his sense that “not enough has happened” since Annapolis to suggest that “a treaty per se is going to be possible by the end of 2008.”
Mr. Erekat said the negotiations were “going O.K.”
“We’ve been having in-depth talks,” he said, adding that he “wouldn’t say there has been real progress” toward an agreement.
Mr. Olmert is being cautious even about the chances of an agreement of principles. In his speech on Sunday, he said he hoped “that at least the negotiating part of the basic principles can be achieved still in the year 2008.”
In Gaza, a Palestinian medical official said Tuesday that a 10-year-old boy had been killed by Israeli Army fire during an incursion near the central town of Deir al Balah. An Israeli Army spokeswoman said there had been “limited activity” inside Gaza. But she said that the forces were not near the town, and that they reported hitting a gunman after they were fired on.
Israeli soldiers shot and killed another gunman before dawn after he approached the border fence and opened fire, the spokeswoman said. The militant was from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine and had tried to plant an explosive device along the border, his group said.
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