Obama arrives in Israel, this time as president Red carpet treatment: Mr Obama with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (right) and President Shimon Peres. US President Barack Obama has begun his three-day visit to Israel and Palestine, reaffirming America's "unwavering commitment to Israel's security" and declaring "peace must come to the Holy Land." "I see this visit as an opportunity to reaffirm the unbreakable bond between our nations, to restate America's unwavering commitment to Israel's security and to speak directly to the people of Israel and to your neighbours," Mr Obama said at a welcoming ceremony at Tel Aviv airport. "We stand together because peace must come to the Holy Land," said. Even as we are clear eyed about the difficulties, we will never lose sight of the vision of an Israel at peace with its neighbours. But many commentators say there is little behind the extravagant ceremony of his visit, and warn there is next to no expectations that it will prompt any movement in the moribund Israel-Palestinian peace process. Designed mostly as a listening exercised aimed at winning over the Israeli public, President Obama's schedule includes talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres, and a brief trip to Ramallah to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad, as well as an address to Israeli students in Jerusalem. His first stop after landing was to inspect Israel's Iron Dome missile defence system - funded by the United States - before he flew by helicopter to Jerusalem for a five-hour meeting with Mr Netanyahu, at which Iran's nuclear program was expected to be the top agenda item. While White House officials have been downplaying expectations about Mr Obama's visit - his first to Israel as US President - there is a more positive buzz around the behind-the-scenes work done by newly appointed Secretary of State John Kerry, who is expected to return to Israel at the weekend to follow up Mr Obama's visit. Mr Kerry has reportedly convinced President Obama that it is worth trying to reinvigorate talks aimed at a two-state solution. But the US believes Mr Obama must first win back the trust of the Israeli people before their prime minister will agree to any meaningful steps in the peace process - and in that he faces an uphill battle. A poll published last week in the newspaper Ma'ariv found just 10 per cent of Israelis had a favourable attitude towards the US President, with 17 per cent describing their feelings toward Mr Obama as "hateful." Another poll, published on Tuesday in the Jerusalem Post, found only 11 per cent believed Mr Obama would succeed in finalising a peace agreement between Israel and Palestine over the next four years, 80 per cent believed he would not and nine per cent said they did not know. Palestinians are also deeply pessimistic about Mr Obama's visit, with many expressing disappointment that his strong words on Israeli settlements in 2009 did not materialise into any real pressure on Israel to curb construction. Israeli settlements - built in East Jerusalem and throughout the West Bank on occupied Palestinian territory - are considered illegal under international law and the United States and the European Union have consistently described them "damaging" to any prospect of a two-state solution. Mustafa Barghouti, head of the Palestinian National Initiative party, criticised US "passivity" on Israel's four-decade long military occupation of Palestine. "With such an Israeli government, with such an expansion of settlements where the whole of the two-state solution is under risk, passivity is unacceptable," Mr Barghouti said in a briefing in Ramallah on the eve of Mr Obama's visit. I was hoping that [Obama] would go to Hebron and see segregation system that is graphically very clear between [Israeli] settlers and Palestinians ... I was hoping that he would be able to see the segregation of buses and the segregation of roads. A World Bank report released last week found Israel-imposed restrictions and closures had "lasting and costly implications for economic competitiveness and social cohesion" in Palestine. "The reality is that after six years of institution building we have the fifth highest unemployment in the world and the unemployment rate of young people between the age of 18 and 26, especially among educated young people, is 70 - 75 per cent," Mr Barghouti said. "We are facing here a very clear crossroads - either we move towards a solution and Palestinian statehood . . . or we move toward building settlements," Mr Barghouti said. You can't have both of them at the same time. In the leadup to President Obama's visit there have been multiple demonstrations throughout Israel and Palestine. In Jerusalem around 2000 people demonstrated outside President Peres's residence calling for the release of Jonathan Pollard, an American who spied for Israel who is serving a life sentence in a US jail. Meanwhile students from Ariel University - the first university established on an Israeli settlement - demonstrated in front of the US Consul in Jerusalem to protest their exclusion from Mr Obama's speech to Israeli students. And there were protests in Bethlehem and Ramallah as Palestinians demonstrated against what they say is US pressure to forgo their campaign for statehood and human rights.