In the last 48 hours in Israel, we have had five suicide bombings. Clearly we see a concentration of efforts trying to derail any progress towards peace talks.

Prime Minister Sharon was supposed to be here today in Washington. We conveyed to the administration that he couldn't come. This message was received with great understanding. The Prime Minister needs to be in the country to console the victims' families, and also to be at the helm as we are struggling against a wave of terror.

Today, President Bush said those in the Palestinian Authority that care about peace must first fight against terror.

We ask: where do we go from here? There was a meeting between PM Sharon and Mahmmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). It was the first meeting, and there is a willingness to meet again, albeit the results of first meeting were not very promising, so far.

We introduced a list of measures that we were ready to take; first, on the humanitarian and economic side.

Also, we told the Palestinians that we were ready to take concrete steps, whereby they assume security responsibilities sector by sector. In the first stage, it would be in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip, where it's easier to control. But, the response from the Palestinians was not a serious one.

We want to see a Palestinian "work plan." So far they haven't taken any serious steps; in absence of concrete steps, it is impossible to move forward.

We won't be in a situation whereby we are negotiating during the day and getting killed at night.

Another factor that everybody recognizes is Arafat, who does everything to undermine the rule of the Palestinian Authority and of PM Abu Mazen, and to increase the terror activities.

For Arafat, it's not just a matter of survival and exerting his own authority, but also fighting for his legacy and history. He will not let Abu Mazen succeed because then fingers will be pointed at him, and questions will be raised: what has he done for the national cause and the Palestinian movement for past 40 years?

We will have to work hard to contain and isolate Arafat. There is no plan to remove him or take other steps, but we would like to see that he is rendered useless by isolation. We would like to see a number of steps, namely from foreign leaders, especially European leaders who frequent our areas and go to see him. When Secretary Powell was in our area and they demanded he see Arafat, he rebuffed this demand and showed a resolute and consistent stance, still managing to do everything, including meet with Abu Mazen without seeing Arafat. We'd like to see more of this because we believe the only way to prevail with the Palestinians-and so that Arafat is not a factor-is to form a unified position of the international community.

We had a cabinet meeting last night. There were two concrete decisions taken: first, to suspend all the measures we were willing to make. Now, the first priority is self-defense, defending Jewish life and Israeli life. The second-more of political nature-is that we will not grant any meetings with any foreign leader who comes to see Arafat; anyone who sees Arafat will not be an interlocutor for us.

We hope that with this consistent approach and the help of the American administration, we can make some progress and sideline Arafat.

Meanwhile, we will have to keep fighting the terror ourselves. We don't see any action from the Palestinians. We'll have to keep doing what we do now. We have the support and solidarity of the US Administration and of Congress.

This is where we are, it's unfortunately a game of endurance; but we are determined to prevail.