JERUSALEM — One evening final month, a prime Israeli minister traveled the winding roads of the occupied West Financial institution to satisfy Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority.

The assembly between Protection Minister Benny Gantz and Mr. Abbas on the octogenarian Palestinian chief’s non-public residence — lower than a 10-minute drive from the Israeli navy’s regional headquarters — lasted solely about 90 minutes, but it surely instantly made waves in Israel and the West Financial institution.

It was the primary time in additional than seven years {that a} senior Israeli minister was identified to have met with Mr. Abbas. Israel’s earlier authorities, led by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, had denigrated Mr. Abbas as an intransigent inciter of violence and by no means met with him.

The August assembly is essentially the most outstanding piece of proof of a brand new, extra cooperative strategy to coping with the Palestinian Authority, which senior members of Israel’s new authorities see as a bulwark towards the Islamist militant group Hamas.

Because the authorities took workplace in June, different ministers have met with their Palestinian counterparts and Israeli officers mentioned they had been taking an array of concrete steps to learn Palestinians economically, to extend safety cooperation and to alter some insurance policies that had been denounced as discriminatory.

“The Palestinian Authority is the reputable consultant of the Palestinian folks, and we’re working to strengthen the P.A.,” Mr. Gantz informed diplomats at a latest briefing.

However the budding entente has clear limits, provided that Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has dominated out the opportunity of peace talks and the creation of a Palestinian state. These constraints have led some critics to characterize his authorities as a form of Netanyahu-lite and to assault the Palestinian Authority for going together with the brand new measures.

Nonetheless, the coverage represents a serious shift from the latest Netanyahu years, when the federal government steadily undermined the Palestinian Authority and threatened to annex giant components of the West Financial institution, main the authority to interrupt off safety cooperation with Israel. And the Biden administration is urgent each governments to enhance relations as a step towards peace, even when no peace talks are within the offing.

Along with the Gantz-Abbas assembly, two authorities ministers and President Isaac Herzog have spoken to Mr. Abbas by telephone and a minimum of 5 ministers have met with senior Palestinian officers.

The federal government can be taking a number of sensible steps which are doubtless to enhance the lives of many Palestinians.

The federal government has agreed to grant residency to 1000’s of undocumented relations of Palestinians within the West Financial institution who’ve lived in limbo with none formal authorized standing, typically for years, Israeli and Palestinian officers mentioned.

Final month, Israel moved to approve the development of about 1,000 new Palestinian housing items in an Israeli-controlled part of the occupied West Financial institution, an space the place the federal government has hardly ever allowed Palestinians to construct.

The federal government lent the authority $156 million to assist it via a monetary crunch, Israel’s regional cooperation minister, Esawi Frej, mentioned. And it has elevated by 15,000 the quota of Palestinian laborers allowed to work in Israel, the place the minimal wage is about thrice as excessive as it’s in Palestinian communities.

The Israeli military has supplied Palestinian safety forces with extra freedom of motion in areas beneath Israeli safety management, based on an Israeli safety official, who spoke on situation of anonymity to debate delicate issues. Palestinian officers had complained that the necessity for Israeli permission to enter sure areas had stymied lively legal investigations.

The military is decreasing Israeli raids into areas beneath Palestinian safety management, the official mentioned.

Israel and the authority have began high-level discussions about introducing 4G cellphone know-how to the occupied territories, officers mentioned. Palestinian telecommunications corporations want Israel to launch frequencies they’ll use for the service. The West Financial institution at present has 3G, whereas Gaza remains to be limping together with 2G.

Mr. Frej mentioned Israel was additionally reviewing potential financial growth initiatives within the West Financial institution.

Palestinians are largely proud of the brand new insurance policies, with 56 p.c contemplating them to be constructive, based on a poll printed by the Palestinian Middle for Coverage and Survey Analysis on Tuesday.

Haitham al-Natsheh, 34, a Hebron resident who has had no authorized standing since 1991, mentioned he was overcome with pleasure when he heard that Israel would supply residency to folks like him.

“It was a candy feeling,” he mentioned. “We’ve got lived via so many issues. Actually, if there are any measures meant to make our lives simpler, we help them.”

Nimrod Novik, an analyst for the Israel Coverage Discussion board, mentioned the brand new insurance policies marked “a dramatic departure from the technique of Netanyahu, who would weaken the authority to the purpose of collapse earlier than letting it breathe.”

As helpful as the brand new strategy could also be for Palestinians, the Israeli authorities’s blunt rejection of Palestinian statehood has opened it to criticism that it’s providing solely a gentler model of the Netanyahu imaginative and prescient of the Palestinian battle as an issue to be managed reasonably than resolved.

Mr. Bennett has mentioned that he opposes Palestinian statehood, and final week declared that he wouldn’t meet with Mr. Abbas.

However even when he modified his thoughts, any transfer to begin negotiations towards statehood would doubtless convey down the federal government, a fragile coalition of numerous events with mutually unique positions on the problem.

That closed door has led to accusations that Mr. Abbas was forsaking Palestinian nationalism to simply accept what critics name an “financial peace.”

Islamist teams have lashed out at him for assembly with Mr. Gantz, whereas secular critics have accused him of collaborating with the Israeli occupation.

“It’s astonishing,” mentioned Nasser al-Qudwa, the previous Palestinian envoy to the United Nations and the nephew of the Palestinian chief Yasir Arafat. “They’re prepared to interact on this course of which is void of any recognition of Palestinian nationwide rights.”

Even because the Israeli authorities takes steps to enhance the Palestinian financial system and safety, it has pledged to proceed increasing settlements within the West Financial institution. It has additionally continued to demolish Palestinian houses constructed with out permits in areas the place permits are hardly ever issued, and to make use of a heavy hand towards Palestinians at protests and clashes.

A spokesman for Mr. Abbas didn’t reply to a request for remark, however Sabri Saidam, the deputy secretary normal of the Fatah Central Committee, mentioned that Mr. Abbas rejects the criticism that he’s promoting out the Palestinian dream of statehood for the sake of financial stability.

Individuals who have spoken to Mr. Abbas lately mentioned he understands the political limits of Israel’s present authorities and accepts these cooperative measures as an excellent place to begin for engagement.

He’s additionally following the steering of the Biden administration, which is selling the measures as a part of what it casts as a long-term course of to advance efforts to finish the battle and obtain a two-state answer.

In a prerecorded speech to the United Nations on Friday, Mr. Abbas appeared to confer with these steps, saying “we’ll try to achieve this endeavor in order to create situations conducive to shifting swiftly in direction of a ultimate political settlement that ends the Israeli occupation.”

However he additionally set a deadline for that settlement. Calling for a world peace convention to resolve the battle, he gave Israel an ultimatum of 1 12 months to withdraw from the occupied territories, together with East Jerusalem, or he would search a ruling from the Worldwide Courtroom of Justice on the legality of the occupation.

American officers acknowledge the present limits about “what could also be viable and what could also be on the desk,” because the State Division spokesman Ned Value put it final week, and are targeted on attempting to enhance situations for Palestinians and relations between the Israeli and Palestinian governments.

President Biden, talking on the United Nations on Tuesday, reaffirmed his help for a two-state answer, including, “We’re a good distance from that objective at this second, however we mustn’t ever enable ourselves to surrender on the opportunity of progress.”

Some analysts have argued that an strategy that begins with a concentrate on the financial system may pave the best way for the authority to realize extra autonomy.

Small financial initiatives may assist construct the belief wanted to open the door to extra consequential modifications like Israeli authorities allowing Palestinian tax officers to be current at ports or granting Palestinians better freedom of motion, mentioned Joel Braunold, the managing director of the S. Daniel Abraham Middle for Center East Peace in Washington.

“This course of may enable for the Palestinian Authority to lock in actual wins,” he mentioned. “It may result in modifications that make an actual distinction within the lives of common Palestinians.”