Obama and the "Quartet"

The foreign ministers of the Middle East Quartet will be meeting Monday in Washington and are expected to release a statement endorsing U.S. President Barack Obama's May 19 speech on the Middle East, which called for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians on the borders of a future state based on pre-1967 lines with agreed-upon land swaps. According to sources in Jerusalem, the Quartet, which consists of the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia, will not invite the parties to a summit meeting but will instead send a delegation to the region to determine if the will exists and the time is ripe for renewed negotiations. The U.S. is proposing a Quartet statement that mentions the Obama address in relatively general terms and announces that a Quartet delegation would visit the region for additional talks.