Is Mideast peace possible? The U.S. has tried for decades to get Israel and the Palestinians to reach a peace deal.

• Position: Debate

For seven weeks this summer, the Palestinian militant group Hamas fired rockets into Israel and Israel launched airstrikes against Gaza (see story, p. 10). Israelis and Palestinians have been fighting since the founding of Israel in 1948.

The United States has tried for decades to get Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a peace settlement, which would result in the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. But the two sides remain apart on many issues, including security for Israel and the status of Jerusalem, which both Israelis and Palestinians claim as their capital. Further complicating the situation is the division of Palestinians into two factions: Hamas, which the U.S. considers a terrorist group, controls Gaza, while the more moderate Palestinian Authority controls the West Bank.

YES As President Bill Clinton's chief negotiator for Arab-Israeli peace from 1993 to 2001,1 spent literally thousands of hours negotiating with the Israelis and the Palestinians.

The Israelis and Palestinians claim the same land. The conflict between them cannot be resolved until they find a way to divide up that land into two nation-states: Israel and Palestine. In September 1993, Israelis and Palestinians formally recognized each other for the first time as part of the Oslo peace accords.

In the following years, I helped negotiate several interim agreements between the Israelis and Palestinians--including the establishment of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Gaza, which created self-government for Palestinians for the first time in part of historic Palestine. While none of these agreements succeeded in producing an independent Palestinian state, ending Israeli occupation in Palestinian territories, or settling the conflict, they did produce tangible results that many would have considered unachievable even a few years earlier.

Because it's been more than 20 years since the beginning of the peace process and there's still no peace, many despair and believe peace can't be achieved. But I ask two simple guestions: Are Israelis going anyplace? Are Palestinians going anyplace? The answer is no. So long as these two distinct national peoples live next to each other, they will have to find a way to peacefully coexist.

There are solutions for where to draw the border, how to ensure Israeli security, and how to reconcile both sides' needs on the issues of refugees and control of Jerusalem. I know from long talks with both sides that this...