The Israeli press on Friday greeted the relaunch of direct Middle East peace talks with hope thickly clouded with scepticism, wondering what would happen after the "show" in Washington.

Columnists across the board described Thursday’s fanfare around the relaunch of talks in Washingon as political theatre while doubting the ability of present leaders to reach an historic breakthrough.

“What was presented yesterday and two days ago in Washington was theatre... It was dignified, dignified to the point of boredom,” Nahum Barnea wrote in the mass-selling Yediot Aharonot.

But he went on to express cautious optimism, noting the strong US involvement in the process and the apparent “personal commitment” of Israel’s hawkish prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach an agreement.

“The reader, who has long since despaired of hoping that something will come out of the Washington peace ceremonies, is no doubt wondering whether the current round of talks is any different from previous ones,” he wrote.

“Yes, it is different. The dramatic difference is in the extent of American involvement... Maybe this wasn’t a show. Not just a show. Not this time.”

The right-leaning Jerusalem Post was more sceptical, noting the twin attacks carried out by the Islamist Hamas movement on the eve of the talks, which killed four Israeli settlers and wounded two others in the occupied West Bank.

It expressed doubt that Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas would be able to follow in the footsteps of the late Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, who signed a landmark peace agreement with Israel in 1978.

“The heart so fervently wants to see all the current pessimism proved wrong,” editor David Horowitz wrote.

“But the head deduces that Netanyahu’s admirable hope of finding in Abbas a new Sadat will prove forlorn and fears that this week’s return to terror attacks was only the first murderous consequence.” The Maariv daily said the latest attempt at a negotiated peace was doomed to fail, but that it might set the stage for US President Barack Obama to propose his own solution to the decades-old conflict and rally the two sides behind it.

“Obama will understand that that peace process, as we know it, has exhausted itself and that if the Israelis and the Palestinians are incapable of changing their modes of thought, perhaps the United States must be the one to do so,” it said.