Pledges ring hollow to many

Promises by Israeli and Palestinian leaders to make a fresh attempt at serious peacemaking during the next year were met back home Wednesday with broad doubt that the two sides can reach a lasting agreement that soon.

Though some observers found hope for a new start, ordinary people and commentators on both sides for the most part treated the outcome of the U.S.-sponsored peace conference in Annapolis, Md., with the world-weary air of those who have heard this before.

To many, the gathering produced good speeches but little else to allay concerns that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas lack the public standing to make the concessions that will be needed to overcome decades of conflict.

And people were reminded anew how many blown deadlines already litter this troubled landscape. The U.S.-backed peace initiative known as the “road map,” unveiled in 2003, envisioned a Palestinian state by 2005, for example.

“If I had to describe it in one word, it’s skepticism,” Gadi Wolfsfeld, a professor of political science and communications at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, said of the prevailing mood. “These are not the leaders. There’s certainly no euphoria.”

The Bush administration called the conference to reignite formal Israeli-Palestinian peace talks after a seven-year lull. Olmert and Abbas said they would seek to forge an agreement by the end of next year, just before President Bush’s term ends.

There were protests this week against the Annapolis gathering by hard-liners on both sides. In the West Bank city of Hebron, demonstrators and Palestinian police clashed Wednesday during the funeral of a man killed during a protest the day before. At least 30 civilians and about 20 police officers were hurt, though most of the injuries were minor.

But overall, the decibel level was remarkably muted Wednesday -- a likely sign that few here believe the conference will affect their lives any time soon.

The leaders of two right-wing Israeli parties, Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu, appeared to be in no hurry to abandon Olmert’s governing coalition despite earlier threats to leave if he came close to conceding on core issues, such as full control over Jerusalem.

“They are staying in the government because they think the conference was more symbolic than real,” Wolfsfeld said.

Skeptics point to a variety of reasons why it is doubtful peace talks will go far, even though polls show majorities on both sides favor a negotiated solution to the conflict. Olmert is unpopular and his standing shaky because of corruption allegations and uncertainty over how he will be judged by an official inquiry probing the government’s performance during last year’s war in Lebanon. Abbas is on even less stable ground, with the radical Hamas movement in sole control of the Gaza Strip and his rule limited to the West Bank.

Abbas’ Fatah party remains discredited among Palestinians because of years of corruption and misrule, leaving him with a creaky political base from which to try to sell concessions on such volatile issues as the right of Palestinians to return to homes from which they were expelled or fled during Israel’s 1948 war for independence.

Israel doubts Abbas has sufficient muscle to crack down on armed Palestinian groups, as required under the road map, to which both sides have committed themselves anew.

For their part, Palestinians say Israel must improve daily living conditions, such as by removing roadblocks and checkpoints from the West Bank, before they can take seriously the revival of talks surrounding issues at the heart of the conflict.

“How can an ordinary Palestinian believe that something is changing? The economic strangulation, the walls, the checkpoints, the settlements,” said Ali Jarbawi, a political science professor at Birzeit University near the West Bank city of Ramallah. “What has changed basically? Three speeches.”

As dignitaries gathered in Annapolis, Gaza-based Palestinian militants continued firing rockets into Israel, while Jewish settlers boasted that they were expanding their presence in the West Bank by erecting mobile homes.

Nonetheless, some were buoyed by the Annapolis gathering, which Bush administration officials had billed as the launch of a new peace process, not a climax. Israel’s mass-circulation Yediot Aharonot newspaper trumpeted a “New Beginning” on its front page.

Tamir, a caller on an Israeli talk show dominated by skeptical voices, said he was encouraged by a new and much-needed dialogue between the two sides.

“The easiest thing is to fall into a sense of apathy and indifference, say there’s no one to talk with and continue sitting on this keg of gunpowder,” Tamir said.

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ellingwood@latimes.com