Europe has condemned Israel's three-day-old siege of Yasser Arafat, with France demanding an immediate end to what it described as an "appalling" situation.
"The military operations under way against the offices of the president of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah are unacceptable. France demands that they cease immediately," the French foreign ministry said in a statement.
"We again appeal to the Israeli authorities, with whom we spoke overnight, to do nothing that could physically harm the president of the Palestinian Authority and the officials that surround him," it said.
The European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he had spoken to Israeli leaders "to convey my greatest concerns about the situation and particularly the siege of the Palestinian leadership".
"I deplore the recent escalation of violence...Israel's legitimate security concerns will only be assured through cooperation and dialogue," Solana said in a statement issued in Brussels.
The European Union criticised Israel on Friday for the renewed siege of Arafat's West Bank compound, saying it was "counter-productive". French President Jacques Chirac spoke to Arafat by telephone on Friday evening, on Arafat's initiative, and said peace could only be achieved through diplomacy, Chirac's spokeswoman said.
"The president said he was appalled at how the situation is evolving. As France has repeatedly said, isolating the Palestinian Authority cannot have positive effects," the spokeswoman said.
Attempts by the European Union, the biggest aid donor to the Palestinian Authority, to play a peace-making role in the region have had little obvious effect.
Israel has accused the EU of pro-Palestinian bias because of its criticism of the methods Israel has used to try to crush the two-year-old uprising against Israeli occupation.
Egypt's foreign minister, Ahmed Maher, called French Foreign Minister Dominique De Villepin on Saturday and asked France to intervene to stop the Israeli action in Ramallah, a foreign ministry source said in Cairo.
Maher told reporters that Israel's actions "violate all agreements and humanitarian principles and this proves that Israel is not working for peace".
"What happened in Tel Aviv (one of the suicide bombings) can only be dealt with via peace. Violence has not been a way to suppress the Palestinian people," Maher said.
Syria's state press said the siege of Arafat's headquarters was part of a wider plan by Sharon to use the world's preoccupation with Iraq to unleash an offensive that would drive Palestinians from the West Bank.
"Sharon has unleashed his bellicose instincts, taking advantage of the fact that the world is wrapped up with the case of Iraq," said an editorial in the official Tishreen daily.
Saudi Arabia's al-Watan newspaper said: "Sharon is taking advantage of the world's preoccupation with other matters such as terrorism and Iraq to continue his bloody war in a hopeless attempt to realise his dream of militarily terminating the Palestinians."
Senior U.S. officials told Israeli officials on Friday that Israel had the right to defend itself against suicide bombings but urged Jerusalem to keep in mind the consequences of its actions on the peace process and on efforts to reform the Palestinian Authority.