Analysis: New front in Mid-East conflict?

by Paul Reynolds BBC News Online World Affairs correspondent

If the attack on the US convoy in Gaza now means that Americans are targets in Israel and the Palestinian territories, the implications are grave.

The Americans would become drawn directly into the conflict and might lose the unique status they have of being a broker, even though their policy is clearly aligned with one side.

Why were Americans the targets?

It has been one of the curious phenomena in the area that there have not been such attacks until now.

Americans have taken precautions. Walls and barriers surround their buildings (and a high wall has been built round a school where American children go in Jerusalem) but on the whole they have gone about their business and daily lives.

Despite the support the US gives Israel, it has always been the Palestinian position that there is nothing to be gained from attacking US diplomats or interests.

That remains the case, certainly among the mainstream Palestinian groups. Yasser Arafat was quick to condemn the attack, for example. So was the Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei.

Palestinians seek US support

Indeed, most Palestinians have a fondness for the United States and many families have relatives there, some of whom are US citizens.

They desperately want the US Government to be more sympathetic to their cause. They cling to the hope that somehow the Americans will exert pressure on Israel and all will be well.

So is this a new front opening up in the war between the Islamic groups and Israel, exposing Israel's closest ally to targeting?

Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which might be the main suspects, have both denied responsibility. A senior Islamic Jihad figure is quoted as saying: "We view it as inappropriate to target Europeans, Americans or any nationality other than the occupation forces."

Is this a new front opening up in the war between the Islamic groups and Israel, exposing Israel's closest ally to targeting?

Whoever was behind this, it is true that the conflict has recently become more intense, with suicide bombers blowing up Israel buses and cafes, Israel directly targeting leading figures in Hamas and the road map being effectively trampled on the ground.

In such an atmosphere, it would not take much to push the most militant over the red line which has hitherto existed.

They might see it as a logical extension of their attacks on Israel and as a way of trying to wrench the agenda their way.

It was perhaps significant that US officials at the scene of the bomb were stoned by local Palestinians. The immunity granted to Americans might be ending.

Certainly, one effect is to present the Palestinian Authority with a direct challenge. This attack happened in Gaza which it controls. Israel of course has swiftly condemned the PA for the fact that it happened at all. In the Israeli view, it simply confirmed the inability or unwillingness of the Palestinian authorities to act.

Action expected

But others will expect action as well. The Americans will demand it; The UN has called for it; The Europeans would welcome it.

It is unlikely that Mr Arafat and Mr Qurei would tolerate a change of policy under which Americans are regularly attacked. Mr Arafat might be dismissed as a failed leader by the White House but he is a canny survivor and knows the value of avoiding a complete break with Washington, where administrations change.

But it is unclear whether Palestinian Authority reaction goes beyond an inquiry, perhaps some arrests of the usual suspects and an insistence that nothing like this happens again.

So far there has been little of the action required by the road map which speaks of "effective operations aimed at confronting all those engaged in terror and dismantlement of terrorist capabilities and infrastructure".