And the reason for Rice’s trip — President Mahmoud Abbas’ suspension of the talks in protest at an Israeli air and ground offensive in the Gaza Strip in response to an intensification of rocket fire on adjacent Israeli communities — proved once again how fragile the peace process is and how easily it can be derailed.

The latest violence broke out one week ago, on February 27, when Israel killed five Hamas militants it said were on their way to carry out an attack.

Hamas responded by intensifying its missile strikes on towns and villages adjacent to the Gaza Strip, leading Israel to respond with airstrikes, leading in turn to more missiles, and to Israel sending a large ground force into the northern Gaza Strip, where heavy fighting broke out.

By the time the Israeli troops pulled back, over 120 Palestinians had been killed, as well as two Israeli soldiers, and Hamas and other militant groups had launched 258 projectiles, including 122-mm long-range Garad-type Katyushas at the coastal city of Ashqelon, until the fighting only a sporadic missile target.

If Hamas — by showering southern Israel with missiles and by targeting Ashqelon, with its population of 120,000 — hoped to provoke the Israelis into a response which would cause a major crisis in the the peace talks, it succeeded.

But if the Islamist organization — which rejects peace talks with Israel, which it wants replaced by an Islamic state in all Palestine — hoped to cause a permanent rupture between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, it failed, at least this time.

While President Mahmoud Abbas slamed the Israeli actions in unusually harsh language, he also backed down Wednesday on a pledge not to resume the talks until there was calm in the Gaza Strip.

In effect, Abbas found himself pushed into a corner by the Israeli actions. He has no love for Hamas, which routed his forces in the Gaza Strip in June to take control of the salient, and he has in the past condemned the rocket attacks as not being in the Palestinian interest.

But at the same time, silence over the Israeli actions, which caused dozens of Palestinian civilian casualties, in addition to the militants killed in the fighting, and which elicited outrage in the Palestinian and Arab street, would have left him open to the oft-repeated Hamas charge that he acts in collusion with the Israelis and the Americans.

The Palestinian president’s dilemma is how to show solidarity with Palestinians under attack in the Gaza Strip and at the same time proceed with a peace process which might achieve its stated goal of a Palestinian state.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has a Gaza dilemma of his own.

Anger is growing in Israel over the almost-daily rocket attacks, from the Strip. According to the Israeli police, by Tuesday some 671 projectiles had landed in Israel this year, as compared to 1,125 for all of 2007.

The premier and his cabinet are coming under growing pressure to launch a massive ground offensive in the salient to put an end to the rocket fire, although it is far from certain that military action alone would persuade the militants to cease launching the projectiles.

Olmert also knows that a massive Israeli ground offensive, which results in far more Palestinian fatalities than the 125 from the latest round of fighting, could end the peace process.

But doing nothing only provides ammunition to his many critics.

One option is to enter into a long-term truce with Hamas, which has in the past said it is interested in one.

But the Islamist organization has also attached demands to any ceasefire, including some Israel is unlikely to accept, at least until the peace negotiations are concluded.

In addition, Israel thinks a truce with Hamas would give the organization legitimacy, ending the isolation imposed on its after it refused to renounce violence and recognise the Jewish state when it won the 2006 Palestinian elections.

A deal with Hamas would also reduce Abbas’ standing as the Palestinian leader who can bring about a solution through negotiations.

And Israel fears that Hamas would use any ceasefire to rearm and reorganize itself in preparation for the next round of fighting.