Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip. (Hatem Omar, Maan Images)

Call it peace process envy. If they have any sense, Israelis and Palestinians will have a bad case of it this week, as they eye with jealousy the photographs flashed around the world from Belfast. How they must pine for the luck of the Northern Irish, as they gaze at Gerry Adams and Ian Paisley sitting side by side, promising their war is over and vowing to govern their bruised land together. How the people of Tel Aviv and Ramallah must wish their leaders would show some of that same Belfast determination which, after a long, torturous decade, has finally wound up what once seemed an intractable conflict. Instead, Israel and Palestine watch months turn into years without progress.

Now there is a chance to break the deadlock. The 22 member nations of the Arab League are meeting for two days in Riyadh, with the Arab-Israeli conflict high on their agenda. They are preparing to make a remarkable offer: if Israel withdraws to its 1967 borders, pulling out of the West Bank and Gaza, they will agree to a full and comprehensive peace, including normal relations, between the entire Arab world and Israel.

This, in case anyone has forgotten, is what Israel says it has yearned for since its creation 59 years ago, the acceptance of a Jewish state in the Middle East by its neighbours. What's more, Israel has always feared that a separate accord with the Palestinians would not hold because the Palestinians would be too weak to make historic compromises - on, say, the holy sites of Jerusalem - alone. An accord with 22 Arab nations would remove all such worries. Any final settlement between Israel and the Palestinians would be underpinned, with the leading Muslim states giving their blessing to the concessions that would be required. And they would promise what Yasser Arafat never could: that the conflict was truly, finally, over.

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How could Israel pass up such a great opportunity? The answer is that it already has. The Arab League approved what began as the Saudi peace plan when it met in Beirut back in 2002. Among the signatories then were Libya's Muammar Gadafy and Saddam Hussein of Iraq. That's right: Saddam Hussein was ready to recognise the Jewish state.

Nevertheless, Israel's then prime minister, Ariel Sharon, ignored the Beirut declaration, pretending it had never happened. Admittedly he was handed a gilt-edged excuse. The Arab League initiative came when the second intifada was at its bloodiest; indeed, the Beirut text was issued hours before a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 29 Israeli civilians gathered at a hotel to mark the Passover festival. Sharon was less interested in peace with Saddam than he was in rooting out Palestinian fighters in Jenin, and so the moment passed. An Israeli cliche is that the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. In fact it's Israel that keeps missing opportunities - with the Beirut offer of 2002 the stand-out example.

To read the full article please visit The Guardian's website.