JERUSALEM  Palestinian and Israeli leaders expressed satisfaction and hope on Sunday in their first public utterances after the opening round of Middle East peace talks in Washington last week.

“The structure that has been agreed to is a good one,” the chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, said in a telephone interview. Mr. Erekat, who has accused the Israelis of bad faith in the past, said the two sides had agreed to build a framework within a year for a comprehensive deal. “We have started a process and have every hope that it will succeed. This is the time for decisions.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said that his country was ready for a historic compromise with the Palestinians and that he thought the Arab world would follow.

In his regular televised appearance before his weekly cabinet meeting, Mr. Netanyahu said the fact that King Abdullah II of Jordan and President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt went to Washington for the start of the negotiations “reflects a sense of readiness that exists in the Arab world, that this is the time to try and complete a peace settlement between us and the Palestinians and to expand it into a broader circle of peace.”