Right at the outset yesterday of what appears to be another Middle East mission impossible, the US peace envoy, Mr Dennis Ross, faced flak - from Palestinian leaders angry at the heavy emphasis he was placing on Israeli security concerns.
Mr Ross, who yesterday met the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, and the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mr Yasser Arafat, as part of the latest US bid to jump-start the deadlocked peace talks, said he had a clear mandate from President Clinton and the US Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, to "focus on security questions".
The US envoy is trying to re-establish Israeli-Palestinian security co-operation, which broke down in March when Israel began to build a Jewish housing project in an area of Jerusalem the Palestinians view as their future capital. Mr Ross said that there was an "essential security underpinning to the process, and that security underpinning has to be put back in place".
But Palestinian leaders fear Mr Ross will concentrate only on Israeli demands that they clamp down on Islamic militants in the wake of the recent twin suicide bombing in a Jerusalem marketplace.
They insisted yesterday that their demands for a freeze to Jewish building in the West Bank and an easing of the stringent closure imposed by Israel after the bombing also be addressed.
Yet another point of friction emerged yesterday over a Palestinian plan to institute a compulsory form of national service, whereby all university graduates would undergo six months to a year of training, including instruction in the use of guns.
Angry Israeli officials said the creation of a Palestinian army would be tantamount to a "declaration of war" on the Oslo Accords, which forbid such a move. But the initiator of the draft proposal in the Palestinian legislative council, Dr Azmi Shueibi, said his bill was not aimed at instituting a system of full military conscription but at preventing the creation of Palestinian militias.
Mr Ross, who babysat the two sides through several months of painstaking but ultimately successful negotiation over Israeli withdrawal from most of Hebron, is attempting to lay the groundwork for a visit later this month by Ms Albright, who has conditioned her arrival on improved security co-operation.
If Mr Arafat fulfills that demand, then the US is expected to turn to Mr Netanyahu with a proposal to freeze building at Jewish settlements in the West Bank - at least temporarily - and a suggestion to go directly to accelerated negotiations over a final settlement between the two sides.
A three-way meeting on security co-operation between Israeli, Palestinian and US security officials took place last night in Tel Aviv. The meeting, at which the Palestinians were represented by general security chief Amin al Hindi, was the first time Palestinian and Israeli security officials had met in two months.
Israel eased its blockade of Palestinian-controlled areas on Saturday, allowing residents to travel out of the West Bank cities of Jenin, Qalqilya and Tulkarem, and announcing it would reopen the Gaza-Egypt border crossing at Rafah. On Friday, Israel lifted its closure on Nablus and Jericho.
Following a meeting last week between Mr Netanyahu and Crown Prince Hassan of Jordan, in which the prince tried unsuccessfully to persuade the Israeli prime minister to ease the embargo on the Palestinians, it was announced yesterday that Mr Netanyahu would meet King Hussein for talks on Wednesday.
Peter Hirschberg is a senior writer at the Jerusalem Report