Whatever the outcome, Mr Powell's trip is far from a waste of time

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Almost every hopeful sign from Israel-Palestine in the past 18 months has been cancelled by an omen of despair, while the death toll continues to rise. So it was with Colin Powell's meeting with Yasser Arafat yesterday. The hopeful sign – apart from the fact that the meeting took place at all, and it was opposed by Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister – was that the Palestinian leader issued a statement condemning suicide bombers in order to make the meeting possible.

They were only words, of course, but all negotiations must begin with words, and they were words of some significance, not least because they were Arabic. "We strongly condemn violent operations that target Israeli citizens, especially the last operation in Jerusalem," read the English translation. They were the kind of words the president of the Palestinian Authority has been reluctant to utter in recent months, as, one after another, members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, affiliated to his own Fatah faction, have blown themselves up, taking the lives of many Israeli citizens with them.

Beyond the meaning of the words themselves, another hopeful sign is that they were produced under pressure from the US. The statement showed that US engagement in the crisis can push at least one of the parties where he did not want to be pushed. The pessimistic side of the same sign is that the statement exposed, yet again, Mr Arafat's weakness. Not merely that he is in a weak position but that he is a weak leader. The response of much Palestinian and wider Arab opinion was that Mr Arafat had yielded unnecessarily to partisan US pressure, which had failed to insist on equal concessions from Israel. He should have refused to see Mr Powell until the Israeli invasion had been reversed, according to commentators in Saudi Arabian, Jordanian and Syrian papers.

If only Mr Arafat had issued the statement immediately after the Jerusalem attack, in which six Israelis died. That can be added to the many, many if-onlys of the present tragedy. If only Mr Arafat had been clear in denouncing terrorism throughout. If only he had done something about it. If only he had been able to. If only there had been an alternative to Mr Sharon in last February's Israeli elections, someone who was as convincingly hard-line yet had some kind of end-point in mind...

There are two fixed points that offer the hope of an ultimate settlement, from which all parties have been retreating but which act as some kind of restraint against the situation descending into utter desolation.

One is that the shape of an eventual settlement is hardly in dispute. The Saudi peace plan and the German plan likely to be endorsed by European Union foreign ministers today are all versions with minor variations of the schemes discussed at Camp David and Taba. There should be an Israeli state and a Palestinian state in the Holy Land, their security guaranteed by each other and the international community. While the Israeli government felt justified in acting against Palestinian terrorism when Mr Arafat did not, even Mr Sharon must recognise that there must be a political solution, which cannot be imposed by force.

The other fixed point is that the US has to be engaged in the process. It is true that President Bush has not been even-handed, not least in his attitude to United Nations resolutions against Iraq and Israel. But he has now demanded Israel's withdrawal from Palestinian territories.

It will be as difficult to get Mr Sharon to do that as it will be to get Mr Arafat to act on his own words. Mr Powell can only persevere. At least he is trying.