Syria: As Syria closed down to mark Martyrs' Day and military jets flew sorties across the overcast skies of the capital, there was little sign the Palestinian organisations that have made a speciality of martyrdom will be slowing down their activities in the near future.
Syria's long commitment to the Palestinian cause is testing its willingness to adapt to a post-Saddam Hussein era in which the United States is attempting to shake up the frozen tundra of the Middle Eastern political landscape.
So far, however, the Syrian regime is employing its most valuable political instinct - to play both sides of the street at once - by promising more circumspect behaviour to Washington, while assuring its Palestinian allies that its support remains undiminished.
From the upmarket district of Mazra'a near the posh Military Sports Club, to the down-at-heel neighbourhood of Al-Yarmouk, Palestinian officials were busy in their offices this week, answering phones, serving tea to visitors and proclaiming their commitment to continuing resistance.
The defiance of the groups which Washington branded and outlawed as terrorist organisations extended beyond scoffing at exaggerated American claims that they had been forced out of Syria.
The major Palestinian groups have rejected the plan backed by the US, and known as a road map, which aims to lay the foundation for regional peace by mandating the creation of a Palestinian state and forging an Arab-Israeli peace within three years.
The groups claim the peace plan, which has been presented as the multilateral brainchild of a quartet comprising the US, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia, is aimed at securing Israel's security and, in the words of one Palestinian official in Damascus, "giving Israel more powers to kill, to massacre, to perpetrate crimes against the Palestinian people".
In Damascus, representatives of militant Palestinian groups said that, contrary to the claims of the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, that US pressure had been successfully brought to bear on the government of Syria and that Palestinian offices had closed down, most of the groups continued to function normally.
"It is not true. The offices have not been closed," said Mr Abu Ahmad Faod, a member of the politburo and head of the political department of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
The State Department named Mr Faod's organisation, along with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as three groups whose offices in Damascus had been shut at Washington's request.
They are among up to a dozen militant Palestinian organisations that maintain offices in the Syrian capital and which the US administration believes have been involved in militant missions in Israel. All say their presence is political and that military operations are run out of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
An Arab diplomat said the closure of the Damascus offices was as important to Washington as Syria's co-operation in handing over officials of the former Iraqi regime in demonstrating the willingness of President Bashar al-Assad's government to accept "the new geopolitical reality".
"It sends a message to both Washington and Israel that even though things will happen slowly, Syria is on board," he said.
Repeating rumours circulating in the Syrian capital that Ms Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash, nicknamed Mrs Anthrax for her alleged involvement in biological weapons programmes, was handed over to the new Iraqi authorities by the Syrian government, he said Syria's co-operation "will be stealthy, step by step, because they still need to keep everyone happy".
In contrast to the State Department's announcement, the Syrian government has been tight-lipped on the status of the Palestinian groups.
One official said only that the fate of the organisations that have enjoyed Syria's patronage for decades could not be regarded separately from overall efforts for regional peace.
Sitting in a shady courtyard behind the sprawling ground-floor apartment that serves as the Popular Front's Damascus headquarters, Mr Faod said the Syrian government had not asked the Palestinian groups to shut their offices.
Rather, the Syrian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Farouq al-Shara, had called the groups together days before Mr Powell's visit and reiterated the Syrian government's support for the Palestinian cause.
"He underscored Syria's willingness and determination to support the Palestinian people to regain their rights," Mr Faod said of the meeting with Mr al-Shara.
On issues ranging from Israel's occupation of the Golan Heights, claimed by Syria, and the Sheba Farms area that is claimed by Lebanon, and Syrian support for United Nations resolutions on the regional conflict, "we have not seen any change in the Syrian position", Mr Faod said.
While his colleague at Islamic Jihad, Mr Abu Jihad Talaat, called the American claims "a storm in a teacup", officials of Hamas were more wary, saying their leaders had left for Lebanon, and refused to be quoted.