Israel freed nearly 200 Palestinian prisoners yesterday in a gesture aimed at bolstering the moderate Palestinian leadership, hours before the US Secretary of State arrived in the region for the next round of peace talks.

One of the freed men, Said al-Atta-ba, 57, had been in jail for 32 years. He was the longest-serving inmate held by Israel and is seen widely by Palestinians as a symbol of the 9,000 of their countrymen held in Israeli prisons.

In her 24-hour visit, Condoleezza Rice will try to silence doubts voiced recently by senior Palestinians and Israelis over the likelihood of a US-sponsored peace deal coming to fruition this year. “We continue to have the same goal, which is to reach agreement by the end of the year,” Dr Rice said on her arrival. “[There is] a lot of work ahead to do that and obviously it’s a complicated time, but it’s always complicated out here.”

Progress towards a peace deal has been hampered by uncertainty over the political futures of the Israeli and Palestinian leadership.

While Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, continues to confront low poll ratings and the sustained popularity of Hamas, Ehud Olmert, the Israeli Prime Minister, will step down next month amid corruption charges and one of the lowest approval ratings in Israeli political history.

A US official involved in the talks said that progress was made with the release, in which Israel made the rare decision to free two men with “blood on their hands” — those who participated in attacks that harmed Israelis.

Israelis appeared divided over the prison release, which some feared would weaken Israel’s ability to negotiate for Gilad Schalit, the kidnapped soldier who has been held in the Gaza Strip for two years. Even among Palestinians, opinion was divided. Edwan Sadaka, 37, from Ramallah, said: “It depends on what the Israelis demand in exchange. I am suspicious of any Israeli gesture . . . there is always a price to pay.”

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