Israeli-Palestinian conflict - Rock bottom?

Fourteen months after the start of this round of hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians, more than two months after the terror attack on the US, it appears as though the lat decade's search for a Middle East peace, ushered in by the Madrid Conference in 1991 and the Oslo accords of 1994, has been futile. But is there really no hope for settlement? The present round of violence and bloodshed, cruel and unnecessary though it may be, has created the conditions for a higher level of understanding between the parties.