US envoy holds Mideast talks as Obama wins Nobel

JERUSALEM — When President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday, his Mideast envoy was hard at work in Jerusalem trying to revive a faltering peace process on which Obama has staked his credibility and that of the United States.

Israel’s refusal to freeze settlement construction, a Palestinian refusal to resume peace talks without that freeze and widespread predictions of failure overshadowed George Mitchell’s meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders — underscoring the tough road ahead for the Obama administration’s Mideast peace ambitions.

Mitchell talked with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for two hours Friday about peace efforts, and the two men agreed to meet again in the next few days, said a statement released by Netanyahu’s office after the closed-door meeting.

The statement described the meeting as “effective and constructive” but did not detail its contents. It said Mitchell and his advisers would meet the next day with senior Netanyahu aides.

Later Friday Mitchell visited Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank town of Ramallah, where Abbas reiterated his demand for a full Israeli settlement freeze, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said.

Leaving the meeting, Mitchell told reporters that efforts to find a solution would continue, although at a lower level for the time being.

“We invited the two sides to send their representatives to Washington in the very near future to continue our discussions,” he said.

Obama began his term in office with a Mideast peace push that included an unequivocal call for Israel to halt settlement activity in the West Bank — a call that was enthusiastically embraced by the Palestinians.

Though Netanyahu agreed in principle to the formation of a Palestinian state and said he would limit settlement construction for a limited time, he refused to agree to a full halt.

At a summit meeting last month in New York, Obama appeared to yield to the Israelis, which — along with Obama’s growing domestic woes — made him appear weak to both sides.

Commenting on the president’s award Friday, former Israeli U.N. Ambassador Dan Gillerman said he hoped Obama would live up to the expectations the Nobel committee had vested in him.

“I’m a little surprised at the choice, not because I don’t appreciate the efforts of the president of the United States for peace, but because in my opinion the test is in the results and not in the attempt,” Gillerman told Israel Radio.

“I think that at this time he has done very little, at least from the point of view of results,” he said. “This choice is somewhat premature.”

Abbas has been weakened by public protests against his decision not to pursue war crimes charges against Israel over the Gaza fighting earlier this year.

In Syria Friday, at least 2,000 Palestinians marched in the Yarmouk refugee camp carrying banners calling Abbas a “traitor.” There have also been protests in the Gaza Strip.

Under attack from his own people, who accuse him of buckling to Israeli and U.S. pressure, Abbas could find it far more difficult to compromise on his call for a settlement freeze.

In an interview published Friday in the Israeli daily Haaretz, Jordan’s king, Abdullah II, warned that the sides were “sliding back into the darkness.”

He also expressed alarm at repeated clashes between Israeli police and Palestinian protesters in Jerusalem, describing the city as “a tinderbox.”

There were isolated outbreaks of stone-throwing in Arab neighborhoods of the city on Friday after Muslim prayers, but demonstrators were dispersed by police who were deployed in strength, expecting disturbances.

Police said 11 officers were lightly injured by stones and two demonstrators were arrested. There was no word of any Palestinian casualties.

Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said that on Thursday night police arrested 14 Palestinians suspected of throwing rocks or molotov cocktails over the past few days.

There have been repeated outbursts of unrest since last week, when rumors spread among Palestinians of an attempt by Jewish extremists to harm the Islamic holy sites in the compound known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary.

No such attempt was made and nobody has so far been seriously injured.

Associated Press writer Mohammed Daragmeh in Ramallah contributed to this report