"On Tuesday, I will meet President Mubarak in Cairo. It will be our fifth meeting in the space of a year. I hope to work together with him to promote direct talks with the Palestinians," Netanyahu said in public remarks at a cabinet meeting.

Netanyahu met US President Barack Obama at the White House last Tuesday and both leaders said they hoped face-to-face Israeli-Palestinian negotiations would begin soon.

Israel and the Palestinians are currently negotiating indirectly through Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell.

Netanyahu promised publicly in Washington to take "concrete steps" within weeks to persuade the Palestinians to upgrade the peace talks.

Palestinians have said they would wait and see what those measure entail before agreeing to direct talks.

They also said they wanted to see progress on the issues of the future borders of a Palestinian state and security before engaging in direct negotiations.
 

In Ramallah, West Bank, the Palestinian president said direct talks with Israel would be futile under current circumstances.

President Mahmoud Abbas is under pressure from the US to resume negotiations that broke off in 2008, under Netanyahu's predecessor.

But he has said he won't return to the table unless Netanyahu commits to a settlement freeze and agrees to pick up talks where they left off.

Netanyahu hasn't agreed to either demand. He has curbed, but not frozen, settlement activity.

Abbas said late on Saturday that if the Israelis say, "come let's start negotiations from zero" that is "futile and pointless."

His aide, Yasser Abed Rabbo, has said that the Palestinians won't return to talks without a framework and a timetable.