RAMALLAH, West Bank, July 14 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Locked up by Israeli forces occupying their towns, assassinating them, and destroying their homes, with no prospect of serious peace talks in sight and the international community largely silent, Palestinians feel increasingly isolated on the world stage.

"Everybody agrees with the U.S. administration [on its pro-Israel policy] even if some disagree on the means to carry it out, particularly the Europeans," a senior Palestinian official told Agence France Presse (AFP), on condition of anonymity.

Palestinians expect nothing from this week's meeting in New York, some even fear the quartet of the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations will endorse the U.S. pro-Israel vision for the Middle East by demanding more pressure on the Palestinian leadership.

For his part, Ziad Abu Amr, a member of the National Legislative Council, or Parliament, from Gaza, said the Palestinian leadership is caught between a rock and a hard place.

"I believe that the pressure will grow on the Palestinians and if President Yasser Arafat shows he is little inclined to make new concessions, he will be exposed to new U.S. threats to remove him," he said.

Amr, heading the Council's political committee, said he was skeptical about the ability of Arab Foreign Ministers to influence the U.S. position at the meeting of the quartet.

"It would be naive to believe the Arab representatives will have the possibility to weigh on the decisions of the quartet in a way that helps the Palestinians," he said.

"On the contrary, they will be asked to add to the pressure exerted on the Palestinians to accept the American ideas," he added.

Foreign Ministers Ahmed Maher of Egypt, Marwan Moasher of Jordan, and Prince Saud al-Faisal of Saudi Arabia will meet with the quartet in New York. The three top diplomats are to hold talks later with U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington.

"It is clear that the position of the Arabs is weak, that the Europeans are increasingly tempted to align themselves with the United States which defends Israeli policy," Amr said.

On Saturday, Palestinian Minister of international cooperation Nabil Shaath, said without conviction that the Palestinian leadership would try to persuade the United States to recognize it as a negotiating partner.

"The Palestinians hope to cooperate with the United States by way of convincing it, and convincing the whole world, that the Palestinian leadership is responsible and it is the only one that can achieve real peace," Shaath said in Cairo.

But prospects were not bright for Arafat after U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell declared the Palestinian leader persona non grata and shot down a dramatic appeal from him for an end to Israel's three-week-old reoccupation of West Bank areas.

In revealing his vision for peace in the Middle East, Bush urged the Palestinians to change leaders and replace Arafat in return for U.S. support for the creation of a Palestinian state in three years.

The diplomatic isolation of the Palestinian leadership has been accented even further by the almost four-week reoccupation of most of the West Bank by the Israeli army, triggered by a flare-up of resistance bombing operations.

Arafat, once again penned up in his Ramallah headquarters, rarely has access to foreign delegations or officials.

The undersecretary for international cooperation, Samih al Abed, stressed the occupation was limiting his Ministry's ability to fulfill its duties, and said the world appeared not to be interested in the plight of Palestinians living under prolonged reoccupation.

"We are trying to inform the world of the reality of what is going on in the territories but the world seems indifferent," he said.

On the ground, a Palestinian man was shot dead Sunday as he tried to stab an Israeli soldier in an army jeep in the Balata refugee camp in the northern West Bank town of Nablus, Palestinian medics and witnesses said.

Ghazi Abu Ebejah, a 24-year-old father of two, tried to open the door of the jeep and stab one of the soldiers inside, witnesses said. The Israeli soldier shot him dead, they added.

Meanwhile, Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer again condemned Sunday the closure of the Al-Quds university offices of leading Palestinian moderate Sari Nusseibeh, AFP reported.

Speaking at the weekly cabinet meeting Sunday morning, Ben Eliezer said Public Security Minister Uzi Landau made a "strategic mistake" in targeting one of the leading Palestinian moderates.

Israeli police Wednesday closed the administrative offices of the Al-Quds university in occupied East Jerusalem on orders from Landau, who argued they were illegally used as the Jerusalem offices of the Palestinian Authority.

The closure provoked international outcry, notably from the White House, which rebuked the move as unproductive in helping to end the 21-month Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Immediately following the closure, Ben Eliezer criticized the move and demanded an explanation from Landau.

"I don't understand why we target someone who supports a demilitarized state, the renunciation of applying the right of return [for Palestinian refugees] and a dialogue with Israel," the Labor Party leader said on public television.