By STEVEN GUTKIN
The Associated Press
Tuesday, July 25, 2006; 5:14 PM

JERUSALEM -- Letting Arab leaders figure out what to do about Hezbollah's weapons and assembling a strong international peacekeeping force along Israel's border are among proposals to be discussed at a meeting of key Mideast players in Rome on Wednesday.

The Arab world wants an immediate cease-fire without conditions, but Israel won't stop its bloody offensive until its captured soldiers are released and a defanged Hezbollah is pushed back from its northern border.

Most of the participants at Wednesday's conference _ which include Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the United States, the European Union, Russia and others _ agree on the need for a cease-fire and a beefed-up multinational force on the Israel-Lebanon border.

Most also agree that something needs to be done about Hezbollah's armed "state within a state" in south Lebanon, from which it has launched nearly 1,300 rockets at Israel during the current crisis.

But Hezbollah, the Lebanese government and moderate Arab countries say discussion of those issues can only come after a cease-fire, not before _ a position rejected by Israel and the United States.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday all the pieces of a cease-fire package must be implemented at the same time to avoid the same fate as other failed Mideast peace plans that relied on the "sequential approach."

The international effort to broker a cease-fire will not succeed unless Israel feels it has achieved its main goals: removal of the threat of Hezbollah attacks and freedom for two Israeli soldiers whose July 12 capture by Hezbollah guerrillas precipitated the current crisis.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's calls for an "enduring" and "sustainable" peace during her visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories Tuesday reflected the Bush administration's support for Israel's aims.

It's more than just a matter of pride. Israel fears any perceived weakness in its current fight against Hezbollah will be a boost to all Islamic militants out to destroy it and to their main patron, Iran.

"From the Israeli point of view, to reach a cease-fire right now without reaching some or most of its strategic goals is not just counterproductive but dangerous," said Israeli counterterrorism expert Boaz Ganor.

Because of the near impossibility of beginning a negotiating process with either Hezbollah or Iran _ and considering the weakness of the Lebanese government _ Ganor argues the right address for negotiations is Syria, which like Iran, supports, arms and funds Hezbollah. However, Israel, Syria and Lebanon will not be at the conference.

Arab diplomats reported some progress over the weekend, saying Egypt and Saudi Arabia were working to entice Syria to end its support for Hezbollah.

However, the Bush administration has made it a policy not to speak with regimes it doesn't like. So it's hard to see how diplomacy with Syria could end the fighting.

During Rice's visit to Beirut on Sunday, Lebanese politicians reportedly proposed that the country's factions sit down together after a cease-fire to figure out how to implement the 1989 Taif accord, which calls for extending the central government's sovereignty throughout Lebanon, with a single army.

Having Arab leaders take charge of efforts to disarm Hezbollah is likely to be an option discussed in Rome, as is the creation of an international "stabilization" force that could help the Lebanese army take control of areas vacated by Hezbollah.

Assembling such a force is likely to prove difficult. Israel says it prefers a NATO-led coalition, but the alliance's member states are already stretched in missions elsewhere. And the traumatic history of peacekeeping in Lebanon works against nations committing themselves to another try.

The complexity of the negotiations makes a quick resolution of the crisis "almost unimaginable," said Aaron David Miller, a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

Miller suggested that Rice use her influence with Israel to win a promise from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to halt fire as soon as Washington decides that basic conditions have been met, such as a Hezbollah-free buffer zone in southern Lebanon, an international force and "maybe some sort of prisoner deal way out in the future."

"She can use that leverage with the Arabs to get them to lean on the Syrians. She can use that leverage with the Europeans to get them to commit forces," Miller said.

Each of the parties to the current conflict have different issues they'd like addressed in any cease-fire deal. Lebanon, for instance, says Israel must withdraw from a tiny border region called Chebaa Farms, in addition to handing over maps of mine fields Israel laid during its 18-year occupation of south Lebanon.

Hezbollah wants to swap Arab prisoners held in Israel for the two Israeli soldiers, and insists its future role in south Lebanon be worked out _ after a cease-fire _ in an internal Lebanese conference.

Mahdi Abdul-Hadi, the director of the Palestinian think tank Passia, argues that negotiations on the Lebanon fighting should not be handled separately from Israel's other crisis: a battle in the Gaza Strip with Hamas, which captured an Israeli soldier June 25.

"I don't see Hamas selling out Hezbollah for a separate deal," Abdul-Hadi said.

"People in Gaza as well as in Beirut are accepting the sacrifices, are accepting the pain and they are filled with steadfastness, with national pride and no surrender," he said.