At Least They're Still Talking

After the round two meeting yesterday in Sharm al-Sheikh, the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks have moved to Jerusalem.

A sign of the problem facing these talks is that we've reached the point where we're inclined to interpret the fact that the talks haven't collapsed after two meetings as an optimistic sign, when in fact the lack of visible movement on the settlements issue means any real breakthrough seems unlikely. It's possible Netanyahu will have some sort of de Gaulle moment and decide he wants to be a peacemaker. (Whoever thought Ariel Sharon would give up Gaza?) Or unicorns could appear, persuading everyone to make peace.

It's long been a cliche to say that the peace process has become all process and no peace, so I'm not being very original in saying it again, but it says something about the process that what passes for good news is "they're meeting for a third time and no one has walked out yet!"