President Obama has told the Israeli and Palestinian leaders that the direct peace talks that are due to start in Washington on Thursday present a moment of opportunity for peace that must be seized. Mr. Obama was speaking at the White House after separate meetings with the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Obama said the goal of the talks, which are expected to last a year, was a permanent settlement that ended the Israeli occupation that began in 1967 and resulted in an independent, democratic Palestinian state existing peacefully beside Israel. He said the US could not impose peace on the two parties, and that the US could not want peace more than them.