Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has placed advertisements in Israeli newspapers in an attempt to increase interest in an Arab peace plan for the region.

The full-page advertisements were published in Hebrew in four Israeli newspapers on Thursday.

The initiative, which offers Israel normal relations with Arab countries, was first proposed in 2002, but has not been acted on depite Israel's president saying in October that he was open to the plan.

The text of the advertisement read: "Fifty-seven Arab and Islamic countries will establish diplomatic ties and normal relations with Israel in return for a full peace agreement and an end to the occupation."

It also lays out the concessions that Israel would have to make for Arab states to put the plan into force, including full withdrawal to the 1967 borders and respect for UN Security Council resolution on the right of Palestinian refugees to return.

'Misinterpreted' 

Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior Abbas aide, said the campaign was meant to inform Israelis about the Arab peace, which until now has been "misinterpreted by the extreme Israeli right-wing as an Arab conspiracy against Israel and its future".

But it was unclear if it was a success with many Israelis spoken to by Al Jazeera on Thursday. They said they did not trust the Palestinians and were suspicious of the Arab initiative. 

"This is one of the rare times that the PA [Palestinian Authority] has done a political move that is constructive even if they had to pay for it," it wrote.

"Addressing the Israeli public directly will ... put pressure on Israeli politicians who have constantly refused the initiative and scared the public from it."

In October, Shimon Peres, Israel's president, told Hosni Mubarak, his Egyptian counterpart, that although he did not accept all of the plan it could form the basis for negotiations between the two sides.

Egypt, Jordan and Mauritania are the only countries in the 22-member Arab League to have full diplomatic relations with Israel.