ISRAEL YESTERDAY staged a 60th birthday bash with fireworks, air force flyovers and a great sense of pride, but also with uncertainty about its future and doubts about prospects for peace with the Palestinians.

For the past eight years United States President George Bush has promised that there will be a peace settlement in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians, with a commitment to a separate state of Palestine.

He had ambitiously unveiled a roadmap for Middle East peace during his first term, promising an independent Palestine by 2005. Having got the necessary support from Arab and Muslim countries for the invasion of Afghanistan, the impetus was subsequently lost.

Now at the end of his presidency, there seems a desperate attempt by the Bush administration to salvage his political legacy in essentially a lost cause of failed diplomacy.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is back in the Middle East on yet another whirlwind tour. She has been the most frequent visitor to that region from any United States administration in recent history, but has achieved very little in terms of success. Mr Bush will follow shortly.

The Daily Star newspaper in its Tuesday editorial said it was a "cruel coincidence" that Rice was in the region to pursue a quest for peace at a time when the United Nations Relief and Works Agency had suspended food aid to Palestinians because of a lack of fuel.

There is enough blame to share, but what matters is that about 1.5 million people are living in what is called "a state of internationally sanctioned peril". For nearly a year a blockade has been imposed on Gaza, and is causing untold suffering to the population.

This apparent indifference to the situation in Gaza stems from the fact that it is ruled by Hamas, considered a terrorist organisation.

It was at the Annapolis summit last year that President Bush unveiled the idea that a peace deal and a state of Palestine could be a reality before he leaves the office.

Unfortunately, little attention was paid to the issue as his administration was obsessed with his so-called war on terror and the disastrous invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Despite repeated calls by the Palestinians and its own Arab and Muslim allies, the Bush administration basically ignored the conflict that has been at the heart of the problems it faces in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Given the complex nature of this conflict, it is unlikely Bush will leave the White House with an independent Palestine state a reality and peace within the region.