The US President, George W Bush, has expressed optimism about the prospects for peace in the Middle East, ahead of this week's conference in Annapolis.
Israeli and Palestinian leaders have voiced hope that Tuesday's conference in the US could produce a starting point for serious peace negotiations.
Speaking before holding talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Washington, Mr Bush said he wanted to see "whether or not peace is possible".
The Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert singled out "international support" as a crucial factor in his optimism.
Mr Olmert said he hoped to open serious negotiations with the Palestinians.
The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he was very hopeful that the meeting could lay down a timetable for talks on a permanent peace deal.
Mr Bush will later meet separately with the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, to prepare for the talks on Tuesday.
But correspondents say expectations for the talks in Annapolis remain modest.
More than 40 countries and organisations, including Saudi Arabia and Syria, have been invited to the conference at the US naval academy in Maryland.
More than 40 countries, including Saudi Arabia and Syria, have been invited to the conference at the US naval academy in Maryland. The US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, is meeting Israeli and Palestinian teams later on Monday to try to clinch a joint statement that sets out an outline for how negotiations will proceed post-Annapolis.
Earlier, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators met in Washington to set out basic terms for future negotiations.
'This time it's different'
'Serious process'
Mr Olmert and Mr Abbas had separate meetings with US President George W Bush in the White House on Monday.
Welcoming Mr Olmert to the White House on Monday, President Bush expressed optimism that the US-sponsored peace talks would succeed where many others had failed.
"This time it's different because we are going to have lots of participants in what I hope will launch a serious process of negotiations between us and the Palestinians," Mr Olmert told reporters after meeting with President Bush.
"I'm looking forward to continuing our serious dialogue with you and the president of the Palestinian Authority to see whether or not peace is possible," he told the Israeli prime minister.
We and the Palestinians will sit together in Jerusalem and work out something that will be very good and create great hope for our people Israeli PM Ehud Olmert
"I'm optimistic, I know you're optimistic, and I want to thank you for your courage and your friendship."
Mr Bush will make the opening remarks at the Annapolis meeting, including a personal commitment to remain focused on the issue for the rest of his time in office.
Mr Olmert said the international support from those nations which had agreed to attend the conference was "very important to us" and could make all the difference in reaching a lasting settlement.
"This time, it's different because we are going to have a lot of participation in what I hope will launch a serious process negotiation between us and the Palestinians," he said.
"We and the Palestinians will sit together in Jerusalem and work out something that will be very good and create great hope for our people."
After preliminary negotiations hosted US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday, both sides said they had made major progress towards agreeing a joint document setting out the basic terms of reference for future negotiations.
But Mr Olmert also cautioned that no peace deal could be agreed without the halting of rocket attacks into Israel from Gaza - controlled by the Islamist movement Hamas, which has stayed away from the conference.
Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to President Abbas, said a document would be made public later on Monday or Tuesday.
For his part, Mr Abbas praised the initiative but said talks would have to address the sticky obstacles to Palestinian statehood - the "permanent-status issues" - that have felled previous attempts at peace negotiations.
"There is a persistent American effort to have this statement," he told the Associated Press.
Israeli settlers voiced their opposition to the talks
The Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, Mark Regev, said the two sides had made "important progress", but denied they had agreed a final draft.
"We have a great deal of hope that this conference will produce permanent-status negotiations, expanded negotiations, over all permanent-status issues that would lead to a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian people," he said after meeting Mr Bush.
On Sunday, President Bush's National Security Advisor, Stephen Hadley, said the conference was not a negotiation session but was designed to launch negotiations.
"This is a great initiative and we need his [Mr Bush's] continuing effort to achieve this objective."
"If we get something, if they can agree on some things as an input to the negotiations, that would be fine," he said.
Mr Bush also earlier said he was also "optimistic" for the prospects for a serious dialogue.
'Non-binding'
All the participants are due to meet Monday night in Washington for a formal dinner, followed by the day of talks in Annapolis.
Palestinian optimism ahead of the conference has, however, tempered by the Islamist movement, Hamas, which has insisted that any decisions taken there would not be binding.
Scepticism
One of the group's leaders in Gaza, Ismail Haniya, said Mr Abbas had no right to make concessions in any peace deal.
Nevertheless, given the history of failed attempts at peace negotiations correspondents are not ambitious about what can be achieved at this meeting.
There is no readiness at the moment to agree a deal, says the BBC's Justin Webb in Washington.
"The people believe that this conference is fruitless and that any recommendations or commitments made in the conference that harm our rights will not be binding for our people," Mr Haniya said.
The talks simply seek to assure both sides that the United States and the big Arab powers will do what is necessary to support a dialogue, and to get a firm commitment to the launch of that dialogue, he says.
"It will be binding only for those who sign it."
High-level officials in Washington have expressed scepticism about the talks.
Mr Haniya was dismissed by Mr Abbas from his position of prime minister of a national unity government in June, shortly after Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip from the president's Fatah movement.
In Jerusalem, at least 10,000 Israeli settlers protested against the talks, some bearing placards reading "Don't feed Israel to the sharks".
He was appointed to the role following his group's landslide victory in the January 2006 legislative election.
And Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, has repeated its assertion that any decision taken at Annapolis would not be binding on the Palestinian people.
Another senior Hamas leader in Gaza, Mahmoud Zahhar, told the BBC that even if the group had been invited, it would be pointless participating because Israel was not prepared to end the occupation of Palestinian land.
"[They] have not authorised anyone, either Arab or Palestinian, to erase their rights," Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum told AFP news agency.
Hamas, which is designated a terrorist organisation by the US, EU and Israel, will not represented at Annapolis at all.
Hamas won a landslide victory in the January 2006 legislative election but is designated a terrorist organisation by the US, the EU and Israel.
Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also warned that the conference was ''doomed to failure''.
The government has been subject to economic and diplomatic sanctions by Israel and its allies in the West.
