Speaking to reporters after talks at the White House, Prince Saud blamed Sharon’s attitudes for holding up Middle East peace and said he would be much more optimistic about the prospects if the right-wing leader was "not there".

Prince Saud said he recognized that Sharon had majority support among Israelis but noted that an even larger proportion of Israelis favors a peace settlement with the Palestinians. "It must be change by the Israelis themselves, those who want peace ... If the Israelis can stand firm for this peace, then they will achieve the security they need.

"If they leave it to Sharon, he will lead the Middle East only to tragedy and conflict," the prince added.

"He is a man who thinks still on the lines of Fortress Israel, that the only good Arab is a dead Arab, that Israel is facing enemies on all sides of its borders.

"(He thinks) that an Arab when he says peace he means peace that will finally end in driving all Israelis into the sea, that the only security for Israel is to rely on its arms and the relationship with the United States," he said.

"He is a man of the 50s and 60s. Unfortunately he is determining the fate of the Israelis in the new decade."

Prince Saud, who was briefing reporters on his talks with President George W. Bush, said that all Palestinian factions, including the Hamas and Islamic Jihad, were working on a cease-fire in their conflict with Israelis.

"They are all working on a paper that has all the conditions that they will subscribe to for stopping the fighting," he said, without much elaboration.

The cease-fire would initially enable the Palestinians to hold elections next year but would then continue, he added.

Prince Saud said President George W. Bush during his meeting with Arab foreign ministers agreed to influence Israel to pull its troops out of Palestinian territories once Palestinians agree to a cease-fire.

"In all fairness to the president, we didn’t ask him to use his influence with Israel. He volunteered to do that," the prince said after meeting with Bush at the White House.

Prince Saud, along with his Egyptian and Jordanian counterparts, outlined the elements of a plan for a Palestinian state to Bush and to Secretary of State Colin Powell in an earlier meeting.

Foreign ministers Marwan Moasher of Jordan, Ahmed Maher of Egypt and Prince Saud were upbeat after the meetings.

"The Palestinians themselves are right now sitting and negotiating together and between them, and rationalizing, ‘Hey, do we want a state or not?’," said Prince Bandar ibn Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to Washington, who attended the meeting with Bush.

"A cease-fire is a necessary element in order to have the withdrawal, in order to have the elections, in order for the Palestinian state to be created," Prince Saud said.

"We talked more on these details with (Powell), but we mentioned the main elements to the president and he was very pleased with it," Saud said, adding that an oversight committee for the peace process was formed in talks Tuesday with the "quartet" of officials from the European Union, the United Nations, Russia and the United States.

Jordan and Egypt will be part of the oversight committee, but not Saudi Arabia, Prince Saud said.

"For the first time the Palestinian people will have a say in what their future is," he said.

In Geneva, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd held talks yesterday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on the latest situation in Palestine. The two leaders reiterated their support for the Palestinian cause and urged the international community to stop the Israeli violence and help revive the Middle East peace talks.

In Washington, speaking at a breakfast press briefing organized by the Middle East Institute, Jordanian Foreign Minister Marwan Moasher outlined details of his meeting with President Bush, and said that for the first time, the administration said they understand that progress in the Middle East cannot be made without Israeli troop withdrawal from the Palestinian territories. "We came out with a plan for an endgame in three years," and said the US Administration’s support "is more solid that we thought."

Bush, he said, stressed his commitment to simultaneous movement on the security, political and economic fronts and meeting the three-year deadline the president set last month for full Palestinian statehood.

The Palestinians fully support the talks taking place in New York and Washington, Moasher said. Regarding the specifics of their talk with Bush, Moasher said the president’s "vision are two states living side by side in three years, and he understands settlements must stop, and Israel must withdraw."

Bush asked the three foreign ministers to continue to working closely with Powell, whom he called his "point man." Moasher said Powell "understands the issues very well. We have full trust in him."