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The hot dispute between John McCain and Barack Obama about the wisdom of talking to Iran appears likely to retain its heat through the presidential campaign and enliven it.

The importance of Iran to the future of the Middle East and to U.S. and Israeli security is the big reason.

Whether or not Iran is trying to build nuclear weapons, there is no question it is developing the capacity.

The fiery rhetoric of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad carries the fearsome suggestion he is preparing to blast Israel off the map.

Would it help to negotiate with Iran? That is the issue in question.

Obama is advancing the possibility of "tough and principled" diplomacy with Iranian leaders if, as president, he concluded that talks were in the security interests of the United States and Israel.

At the same time, he told the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC at its annual conference here Wednesday: "I will always keep the threat of military action on the table to defend our security and our ally, Israel."

Speaking on the day after he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination, Obama was positioning himself in line with the traditional diplomatic view that you make peace talking to your enemies, not your friends.

McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, speaking before the same American Israel Public Affairs Committee on Monday, scoffed at the suggestion, which Obama had offered earlier during the primary campaign.

"It's hard to see what such a summit with President Ahmadinejad would actually gain, except an earful of anti-Semitic rants and a worldwide audience for a man who denies one Holocaust and talks before friendly crowds about starting another," he said.

While Iran's importance in world affairs gives the debate resonance, there are probably other reasons, as well, that it might echo until Election Day, Nov. 4.

McCain is positioning himself as the experienced former U.S. Navy officer and war prisoner who is motivated by hard reasoning. Experience is a strength he intends to help carry him into the White House.

Obama, by contrast, is decades younger and inexperienced in foreign affairs. His political success until now is powered to a large extent by his youthful optimism for "change." While that may ignite enthusiasm it also could inspire allegations of naivete.

Both candidates, then, would seem to have an incentive for prolonging the debate over talking to Iran.

Would a high-level exchange, one for instance between the American and Iranian presidents, accomplish anything?

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a key player for eight years in the Bush administration's strategy to try to isolate Iran, told AIPAC on Tuesday that there is no point engaging Iran "while they continue to inch closer to a nuclear weapon under the cover of talks."

On the other hand, Madeleine Albright, secretary of state in the Clinton administration, said two years ago that the stakes are too high to avoid contact with Iran. "Engagement is not appeasement," she said in criticizing Bush administration policy. "Diplomacy is a mechanism for the U.S. to send a tough message."

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EDITOR'S NOTE — Barry Schweid has covered diplomacy for The Associated Press since 1973.