"The Palestinians want specifics," Ibish continued. "The Israelis want the vagueness. That's a difficult gap to bridge. Also, the Palestinians are very keenly aware of the dangers of a complete meltdown at the diplomatic level and want and need some assurances that this will not be a complete catastrophe. ....Proximity talks allow them, and everyone to ease back into the negotiating process with some political protection." Hussein Ibish quoted by Laura Rozen on Politico

Parsing Mitchell's statement