The Bush Administration today begins a new Middle East peace bid in deeply inauspicious circumstances: 13 Palestinians and an Israeli soldier have been killed in the past three days of violence, and Hamas is threatening bitter revenge for one of those deaths - the killing of its West Bank military commander, Mr Mahmoud Abu Hanoud, in an Israeli helicopter attack on Friday.
Last night Israel's top military commander escaped harm when two roadside bombs blasted his convoy south of Hebron, the army said. Gen Mofaz had just ended a visit to troops guarding the Jewish settlement of Beit Hagai, about 30 miles south of Jerusalem and on the southern edge of Hebron.
His convoy was shaken by two roadside bombs, possibly detonated by remote control. He was immediately evacuated by helicopter to an airstrip near Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile Gen Anthony Zinni and the State Department's Mr William Burns are due to begin two weeks of talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders today, with the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, having declared that they would stay on until they broker a ceasefire. But their prospects for success seem even dimmer than those that have attended several other failed US peace missions over the past 14 months.
Far from launching a concerted effort to ensure that weapons are laid down, both sides seem to be heading, knowingly, towards an escalation of the conflict. In the latest violence, in the Gaza Strip, Israeli helicopters and tanks raided several Palestinian Authority installations including a naval headquarters and an intelligence position, and targeted offices of Mr Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction of the PLO.
Those attacks came in response to an upsurge in Palestinian mortar fire on Jewish settlements and army outposts in occupied parts of Gaza, including a Hamas-fired salvo on Saturday in which an Israeli soldier was killed. In Bethlehem, Israeli troops shot dead a 13-year-old boy during clashes following a Hamas rally.
While the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ariel Sharon, said yesterday that his government would make "every effort" to reach a ceasefire during Gen Zinni's mission, the Israeli military establishment is preoccupied with a high security alert in response to a Hamas vow to avenge the killing of Mr Abu Hanoud.
At his funeral, a local Hamas leader, Mr Teissir Imran, declared that Mr Sharon had "opened the door to hell, for himself and his people".
Mr Abu Hanoud's mother, Fatma, yesterday demanded that 100 Israelis, including women and children, be killed to avenge him; his father said that he "felt like I'd won the lottery" when he learned of his son's death.
Palestinian leaders accused Israel of acting to sabotage the US peace mission. "Sharon is trying to drown these efforts in a sea of blood," said the Information Minister, Mr Yasser Abed Rabbo.
Meanwhile, Mr Salah Tarif, the only Arab minister in the Israeli cabinet, has called for a special commission of inquiry into Thursday's death in Gaza of five young boys who unwittingly triggered a bomb placed by the army.