Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt - With an admitted US failure to make Middle East peace a reality before the end of this year as promised by the now outgoing US President George W Bush, the international Quartet on the Middle East is meeting on Sunday with Palestinian and Israeli delegations in the Egyptian Red Sea city of Sharm el-Sheikh. The ministerial-level Quartet will hear from both the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni on what blocked the anticipated peace deal.
The Palestinian and Israeli negotiating team will directly brief the Quartet on the outcome of their negotiations, in two independent reports.
Quartet members - the US, Russia, European Union and the United Nations - would take their independent notes and issue a joint communiqué that reflects progress without specifying conclusions.
The communiqué would also express support for the continuation of the peace process under the new US administration of Barack Obama and a new Israeli government that should be elected next February, diplomatic sources who asked to stay unnamed told Deutsche Presse- Agentur dpa.
The foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan, the two Arab states that have peace treaties with Israel, may take part in Sunday's meeting. The two are delegated by the Arab League to discuss the Arabe Peace Initiative with Israel.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said Friday that Egypt was hoping that the meeting would produce "a peace document" that merges the basic conclusions of the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations.
However, informed Arab, Western and Israeli diplomats have told
