As the scene of a summit with the most important emissary of the American superpower, the office of the new prime minister is certainly quite modest: Mahmud Abbas, 68, temporarily has only a rented floor in a plain, four-story residential building on the dusty road leading from Ramallah to Nablus in which to receive US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

To America's chief diplomat, the Spartan surroundings are more illustrative of the dilemma of the Palestinian head of state than words could ever be: Although Abbas has been in office for the past two weeks, he lacks both the trappings of government and sufficient authority. Nonetheless, Washington sees in this lawyer and historian, who spends his spare time studying Arabic poetry, the key to settling the apparently irreconcilable Middle East conflict. After more than two years of Intifada, the bitter enmity between the Israelis and the Palestinians has escalated to an almost daily barrage of bloody bomb attacks from one side and massive acts of military retribution from the other.

In addition to poisoning the relationship between the Jewish state and its neighbor, the murderous feud is also proving to be the principal obstacle to US President George W. Bush' vision of a peaceful Middle East. Encouraged by his swift military victory over Iraq, "George of Arabia," as he is called in Washington by his political detractors, now sees himself as the sponsor of a Middle Eastern free trade zone and as the man who will bring democracy and peace to the entire region - and the man in whom he places his hopes happens to be Abbas.

Of all things, the American president has applauded the Palestinian prime minister for his denunciation of terrorism as a political tool. But just how serious is the president of superpower America this time? After all, Bush himself has issued his fair share of statements of intent in the past - but generally with very little follow-through.

Now that the Iraq war has ended, the Bush strategists have a commitment to the Arab world. After all, Washington has long argued that the road to Jerusalem and to a peaceful resolution of the Middle Eastern problem leads through Baghdad.

From the perspective of the White House, however, the forcible overthrow of the regime of Saddam Hussein was also a means of preventively disciplining those states in the Middle East that control or support such terrorist organizations as Hamas or Hezbollah in their fight against Israel. According to the Bush doctrine, now Syria or Iran should also be taken to task for exactly the same reasons.

But the Middle East raises a difficult problem for the US president. In this explosive region, everything is intricately linked to everything else. It is impossible to reduce this muddled situation to one of the Texan's beloved conflicts between good and evil. Today, Syrian President Bashir al-Assad may still support terrorists. But by tomorrow, he could already be in talks with Ariel Sharon, as the Israeli prime minister himself suggested late last week.

Nowhere has Bush experienced this chaos more painfully than in Iraq. Although the war in Iraq has already been over almost as long as it lasted, it would be difficult to speak of tender roots of democracy and a normalized daily routine that holds promise for the future. It appears that there was an outbreak of cholera in Basra last week. Endless lines form at gas stations, and there are power failures every few hours. Towers of garbage are forming in the cities. "The chaos of the present is not as much a consequence of recent damage from the war," writes the "New York Times," "it is a consequence of the Bush administration's inability to find a replacement for a regime that issued orders to address every detail of daily life."

Now diplomat Paul Bremer is to travel to Baghdad to serve as temporary administrator, a position retired General Jay Garner has thus far failed to adequately fill. An Iraqi-led interim administration is not likely to materialize as quickly as anticipated, and it appears that US troops will be forced to remain in the country longer than Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld would like.

Meanwhile, the diplomatic debate on a post-war order is in full swing at the United Nations. By now, the US is even prepared to recognize the UN special envoy for Iraq. He is permitted to participate in political reconstruction and coordinate humanitarian efforts. Secretary of State of Colin Powell euphemistically calls this a "vital role" for the UN. France, Germany and Russia had demanded the same thing, although their understanding of a leading role for the United Nations was in its development of a post-Saddam Iraq, and not in an insignificant supporting function.

The UN's American detractors have managed to come up with such meager compromises to bring about a resolution in the Security Council, one that requires the approval of Russia and France. What is at issue is the procurement of goods - food, medication, and industrial products - valued at ten billion dollars.

Much more will be at stake very soon - the lifting of all sanctions on Iraq after June 3, when the oil-for-food program that had been imposed on Saddam Hussein is scheduled to expire.

The condition imposed by both Jacques Chirac and Vladimir Putin is that Iraq must first be free of weapons of mass destruction - something that UN inspectors, as both presidents agree, must confirm in their roles as experts. Only then would the United Nations hold the "vital role" envisioned by the Russians and the French. And, according to their internal logic, this is a role that the global organization could also play once control over Iraqi oil has been regulated, a monopoly that the United States obviously does not wish to relinquish.

Condoleeza Rice has once again made it sufficiently clear just how deep the resentment remaining from the pre-war period is. The National Security Advisor is accusing France of taking NATO hostage to harm the United States, and of threatening the smaller member states that supported the Iraq war with retaliatory measures. "It was not the United States that split Europe," said the Bush advisor, placing the blame on France and Germany instead.

Rice also renewed threats against Syria, threats that had in fact appeared to have already abated. According to Rice, the United States will be forced to take action if it is revealed that Damascus permitted Saddam to conceal biological or chemical weapons in Syria. Secretary of State Powell's tone had been significantly more accommodating following his visit with President Assad.

As a sign of good will, Assad ordered the closing of the offices of three terrorist organizations in the Syrian capital. In return, he was praised by the White House: "I am confident that the Syrian government has understood us," said President Bush, "and I believe them when they way that they want to cooperate with us." Bush knows that diplomacy is now the order of the day - more Powell, less Rumsfeld. This is especially applicable to the ongoing Palestinian problem.

For Bush, however, this is also a sensitive issue on the domestic political front. The Christian groups, a key pillar of the Republican Party, see the new peace plan as the work of the devil. 87 senators and 297 congressmen also attracted attention when they signed appeals that placed the burden of proof for real progress on the Palestinians, while Israel was asked to exercise constraint with concessions, at least temporarily.

Secretary of State Powell intends to interpret the so-called roadmap to peace accordingly during his tour of the Middle East. Mahmud Abbas is being asked to bring the Palestinians' numerous competing security forces under his control, and to put a halt on acts of terrorism originating in the occupied territories.

In return, President Sharon would be required to give up the many checkpoints in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, as well as to put a halt to the construction of settlements. Powell will also ask Saudi Arabia and Egypt to exert pressure on Syria and Iran, with an eye toward forcing Hamas and Hezbollah to eventually give up their struggle.

But the President shies away from playing the role of the great mediator. This is something his father already attempted to do after the 1991 Gulf war. By the time Arafat and former Israeli Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin shook hands in the Rose Garden of the White House in 1993, Bush senior had already lost the election to Bill Clinton.

Bush junior doesn't have much time anyway to become involved in diplomatic efforts in the Middle East, a role to which he is not accustomed, since America is likely to be embroiled in the next presidential election by no later than early 2004. Israeli Prime Minister Sharon is also aware of this, and for this reason is playing for time. As a preliminary condition, he is demanding that Abbas first win the "war against terrorism" before Israel will be prepared to make concessions on its part. He intends to postpone, at least for the time being, the "painful concessions" he has promised and that his predecessor Ehud Barak is now demanding in the interest of Israel.

Abbas, on the other hand, is demanding that Israel, as the occupying power, finally improve conditions among his compatriots. The reformist prime minister, who is held in high regard in Europe and the United States, must also contend with the expectations of the Palestinians. He nominally presides over 24 ministers as their cabinet chief, and is in charge of more than 120,000 government employees. In fact, however, the offices of many of the Palestinian institutions have been reduced to rubble by Israeli bombardments, and many of the employees of the autonomous territories have not received their salaries in months.

Moreover, the security forces have been paralyzed ever since the recent occupation of the autonomous territories. And Yasser Arafat is preventing Prime Minister Abbas from bringing the various organizations - traffic police, armed associations, the presidential guard and the intelligence service - under the common control of the Interior Ministry: Without direct power to issue orders to military units, the aging president fears for his influence.

The power vacuum is benefiting Muslim fanatics from Hamas to Islamic Jihad, as well as the militant wings of Arafat's Fatah party. To these opponents of peace, even negotiations surrounding the roadmap represent "capitulation." "We will not lay down our weapons and will not be subjugated," they threatened, as they launched a series of attacks and assaults.