LONDON (AFP) — Israel's President Shimon Peres said Tuesday he felt confident about the prospects for a Middle East peace deal next year following the election of Barack Obama as leader of the United States.
Starting a visit to Britain, Peres -- who has hailed Obama's election as "the strongest answer to Hitler" -- said there was a "fair chance" Israel would strike an accord with the Palestinians in the next 12 months.
"I feel confident we're at the same camp, I don't see any contradiction," Peres said, when asked what he thought of Obama's views on the Middle East.
"There is no need to press Israel to go for peace, Israel is going to peace out of her own choice, out of her own will," he told BBC radio, on the first full day of a three-day visit to Britain.
He added: "I think there is a fair chance to have an overall peace in the Middle East once we shall conclude our negotiations with the Palestinians.
"We made some headway, it has not yet concluded, but there is a chance that in the coming year we shall conclude the agreement."
While peace talks have made little headway in recent months, Israel's outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed to free 250 Palestinian prisoners in a goodwill gesture after meeting Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Monday.
Their talks, however, took place under the shadow of fresh violence in the Gaza Strip which is controlled by the Islamist movement Hamas, a rival to Abbas's Fatah faction and which does not recognise Israel's right to exist.
Asked whether the position of Hamas was a stumbling block to peace, he said the movement was "not a problem in their own right" but part of an overall struggle between Iran and more moderate Arabs.
"Hamas does not serve the Palestinian cause, it serves in my judgment the anti-Palestinian cause because it prevents the Palestinians building a state of their own," Peres added.
Peres, a former prime minister whose current position is largely ceremonial, also spoke about Obama's pledge to hold "tough" negotiations with Iran, stressing: "There must be a purpose to the talks".
Highlights of Peres's visit to Britain include addressing both houses of parliament Wednesday, and an audience with Queen Elizabeth II plus talks with Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Foreign Secretary David Miliband Thursday.
Before the trip officially started, Peres renewed his praise for Obama in an interview with the Times newspaper Monday.
The president said Obama's election represented "the beginning of the end of racism".
"A black man reaching the top position is the strongest answer to Hitler," he told the newspaper. "It is the political equivalent of the black runner (Jesse Owens) who won the gold medal in 1936...
"The capacity of America to renew itself is a welcome surprise. Obama was elected by the American people, but he was chosen by the world."
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