US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, her credibility at stake, urged Israelis and Palestinians to quickly resume US-sponsored peace talks suspended over Israel's offensive in Hamas-run Gaza.
"Negotiations ought to resume as soon as possible," Rice told reporters travelling with her to Cairo, the first leg of a brief Middle East trip aimed at salvaging the US-brokered peace process. She will also visit Jerusalem and the West Bank. "I will be talking about how we can get the negotiations back on track," she added, before a refuelling stop in Brussels.
While calling for an end to violence that has killed almost 120 Palestinians - around half of them civilians - Rice did not specifically demand a cease-fire.
The omission may anger some Arab allies who could see it as giving Israel a green light for more military action in Gaza.
Israeli troops pulled out of the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip yesterday after international appeals, but a senior official said it was a "two-day interval" during Rice's visit and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel would not tolerate attacks.
Washington's role as an honest broker is under the spotlight in the current Gaza conflict because of its close ties to Israel. Rice came under heavy criticism during the 2006 Israeli-Lebanon war for not demanding a cease-fire. She strongly rejected parallels with the Lebanon conflict and said she would discuss with Egypt's foreign minister and president how best to reduce the violence, as well as ways to secure Egypt's border with Gaza, briefly breached in January.
Rice said there was merit to the idea of giving the Palestinian Authority control at the sensitive border crossing at Rafah and having European monitors return. Hamas, however, has demanded a role at the border, largely closed since June.
"I will certainly be discussing how we make the Rafah situation sustainable and what would mean for a role for the PA, for European monitors on that border," Rice said. She also voiced concern about the loss of innocent life in Gaza and the humanitarian situation there, which she said would be brought up in all her discussions.
Egypt has been looking at how to get a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel but Rice declined to use the word cease-fire, which would involve directly negotiating with Hamas, a group Washington brands as terrorist and refuses to deal with.
"Call it what you will; we want the violence to stop. But first and foremost you have to get Hamas to stop firing rockets into Israeli cities," Rice said.