Israel allowed a 10-month partial moratorium on settlement construction to expire on Sept. 26, setting off diplomatic anxieties within the Obama administration, which has encouraged the renewed Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Following the end of the freeze, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on Abbas to continue negotiations. Netanyahu has also called on Israeli settlers in the West Bank to show “restraint and responsibility,” suggesting he may seek to limit new settlement construction in spite of the official end of the building moratorium, as reported by the Financial Times.

The Palestinians plan to meet with Arab leaders in Libya to discuss the future of this round of talks, which resumed on Sept. 2 with Netanyahu and Abbas meeting with President Obama in Washington, D.C. The Obama administration has publicly urged Israel to extend the settlement moratorium.

Numerous issues of contention, settlements being one, threaten the continuation of the direct talks, the first in nearly two years.

“Everyone knows more or less what the peace is,” Doron Ben-Atar, professor of history, said. Any viable peace agreement, according to him, would include the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, an acknowledgement by the Palestinians of “the Jewish nature of the state of Israel,” a security guarantee from the Palestinians that Israelis will not be attacked and Israel’s acceptance of Palestinian sovereignty and claims to part of East Jerusalem.

In terms of making progress toward a peace agreement, halting the construction of settlements “would be a good start, at minimum symbolically,” John Entelis, professor of political science and director of the Middle East Studies program, said.

Ben-Atar disagreed, referring to efforts by the U.S. to make “settlements a crucial element of the negotiations” as setting the direct talks up for failure. “The settlements are a problem. They are not a wise or just move in my opinion,” he said. “But, Israelis and Palestinians [have] negotiated effectively while settlement construction was taking place because the belief is that ultimately settlements will be removed” from land falling within the borders of a future Palestinian state.

Ben-Atar called the settlements issue “a red herring,” explaining that once clear borders were established, settlements would become a non-issue. “No Israeli would be in the borders of official Palestine,” he said.

According to the BBC, more than 430,000 Jewish settlers are in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, alongside 2.5 million Palestinians. The settlements are illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.

Ebru Turan, assistant professor of history, said if Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank continues as it has, in the long term, “[settlements] might really make it impossible to form an independent Palestinian state.”

Borders between Israel and a new Palestinian state would consist of the 1967 borders “with amendments to acknowledge the reality of some Jewish presence in the West Bank,” according to Ben-Atar. “Israel [would have] to compensate the Palestinians inch for inch” in the form of land swaps.

“It’s easy enough to extend the moratorium,” Entelis said. “If that moratorium is lifted, I think that will send very bad signals, which of course hardliners from Hamas on down will jump all over.”

Following the end of the settlement freeze on Sept. 26, Hamas, the Islamist militant group that controls Gaza, urged President Abbas of the Palestinian Authority “to end the direct talks [with Israel] and concentrate on uniting the Palestinians,” as reported by the New York Times. Hamas has not participated in the renewed peace talks.

“The idea is you’ve really got to build this level of confidence between [Israelis and Palestinians],” Entelis said.

Turan agreed, claiming “a strong will from both parties to see that there should be a [peace] settlement” is necessary.  “There should be mutual trust to each other’s good intentions,” she said.

“The real problem is security because how do you guarantee security?” Ben-Atar said. “Every jerk can put together a rocket and shoot it. There’s no hundred-percent guarantee, just like with all terrorism.”

“I think [the peace process is] in their political interest,” Entelis said. “And I think [the two parties] see it as such given the global pressures and the U.S. administration. They both recognize that they may not have this kind of favorable opportunity in the future in terms of an administration that is viewed favorably on the Palestinian side and one that made clear that the U.S. supports Israel.”

Entelis offered two potentialities regarding the ongoing peace talks: “The optimistic one is that this process continue,” he said. “And the pessimistic one is that a terrorist act or a decision by the Israelis to continue settlements could put everything on hold.”

Citing the conservative political atmosphere in Israel, Turan said, “The Israeli public, especially in the last decade, has completely shifted to the right, and there are now less and less voices who want to make concessions for peace.”

“The [Israeli and Palestinian] people are ready for a [peace] settlement and their leaders have to do it,” Entelis said. “I think there will be a great deal of frustration on both sides on the part of [the public] if [the leaders] say we’re back to square one.”