The United States has dismissed an offer from Arab leaders to Israel for normal relations in return for withdrawal to 1967 borders as a "missed opportunity".
A announcement read out at the final session of an Arab summit in Algiers said peace was the "strategic option" of Arab states to settle the conflict with the Jewish state. The offer of peace for land was a relaunch of a 2002 peace initiative.
"I would note that 13 of the 22 heads of state were there [at the summit], but I would say that the final communiqué did not have anything noteworthy, one way or the other, to comment on," a US State Department spokesman said.
"I would note that the final communiqué does not appear to reaffirm support for the trend toward greater democratisation and freedom in the Middle East. We think that was a missed opportunity," he added.
An Israeli foreign ministry spokesman said the reference to peace as a strategic option was positive but his government regretted the summit had not proposed dialogue.
The communiqué, at the insistence of governments opposed to easy normalisation, set out in details the conditions Israel should meet for integration into the region.
They included full Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders, a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and a just solution for refugees based on a 1948 UN resolution that gives them the right to go home or receive compensation.
Egypt and Jordan have full diplomatic relations with Israel. Several other countries have had less formal ties that fluctuate according to the state of the Middle East conflict.