WASHINGTON – In a move partly designed to reward Prime Minister Blair for past support and to reach out to European leaders, President Bush will signal later this week his intention to renew American engagement in efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Briefing reporters yesterday ahead of Mr. Blair’s visit on Thursday and Friday to Washington, the British leader’s aides said a “clear signal of intent” designed to highlight the goal of providing new momentum to the stalled peace process will likely emerge from talks between Mr. Bush and the British leader.

They cautioned, though, against expecting rapid, dramatic developments and downplayed reports that Mr. Blair wants to invite Israeli and Palestinian Arab leaders for a summit in London early next year.

But the aides insisted there would be “a lot of depth” in what Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair are planning to say at a joint press conference in the White House, where Mr. Blair will be the first foreign leader to visit since Mr. Bush’s re-election.

The Downing Street briefings came as the president’s father said in an interview with British TV that Mr. Blair’s demand for action on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had been heard “loud and clear” in Washington.

While Mr. Blair’s aides refused to be drawn on whether Yasser Arafat’s illness would make it easier or harder to re-energize the peace process, George Bush was blunter about the opportunities that could be presented in the event the Palestinian Arab leader, who is in a coma in a Paris hospital, fails to recover.

Mr. Blair, he said, would “find the president a willing and able partner, particularly if there is a change in leadership in the PLO that we can deal with more openly and with more confidence.”

The British prime minister has been pressing the president hard in videoconferencing calls between them to make the Middle East peace process a foreign-policy priority in his second term. Mr. Blair has argued among other things that an American re-engagement could go some way to help bridge the American-European rift over the Iraq invasion, say British political sources.

Last Wednesday, a few hours after Senator Kerry conceded the election, Mr. Blair sought to nudge his ally forward by declaring that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the world’s “single most pressing political challenge.”

In his statement, Mr. Blair also urged European leaders to offer a quid pro quo by working with Mr. Bush on fighting terrorism and “resolving the conditions and causes on which the terrorists prey.”

White House officials said afterwards that they see possible opportunities for Middle East peace in Mr. Bush’s second term but the president, while responsive to Mr. Blair last week, avoided agreeing with the British leader that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was the most important issue on the world stage.

“I agree with him that the Middle East peace is a very important part of a peaceful world,” Mr. Bush said in a Thursday news conference.

Administration officials have also sought to caution against thinking that there is much Mr. Bush can do in the short term, arguing that serious progress toward any resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is going to take some time and will be contingent on who succeeds Mr. Arafat.

Mr. Blair is under considerable pressure from members of his Labour Party and Britain’s opposition parties to secure from the president a firm commitment to revitalize the Middle East peace process.

Labour politicians have told the prime minister that he must get some payback from Mr. Bush for Britain’s support of the American-led invasion of Iraq, if he is to avoid a rebellion within his party and to placate British public opinion, which has become increasingly disapproving of Mr. Blair’s closeness to the president. A symbolic visit whereby he is seen just as reaffirming his position as the American president’s closest overseas ally would not be enough, they have warned.

British Conservative politician Michael Ancram, said: “In the past, it has been clear that Tony Blair has consistently failed to put Britain’s case to President Bush and has merely followed his lead. Given President Bush’s clear majority and strengthened position, this must be the moment when the British prime minister ensures that Britain’s voice is not only heard loud and clear, but is also given good account.”

Mr. Blair’s critics are also arguing that Britain should be given a greater voice in determining what is happening on the ground in Iraq.

British newspapers, most of which greeted Mr. Bush’s re-election with fury, have been more outspoken, arguing that the prime minister has to shed the tag of being Mr. Bush’s poodle.

Previous efforts by Mr. Blair, who faces a tough re-election battle himself next spring, to gain Washington support for a revival of the “road map” to Middle East peace have produced few significant results, although they did receive Mr. Bush’s verbal backing.

But this time Senator Smith of Utah, a Republican, said he expected the meeting to produce a new “road map” for the Middle East “that will reflect very well on these two men in history.”

Bush administration officials are expressing concern about expectations being driven too high, too quickly. They argue that Prime Minister Sharon has only just convinced his Parliament to back a controversial plan to dismantle settlements in the Gaza Strip and an attempt to rush the Israelis into speedy negotiations with a new Palestinian Arab leadership could backfire.

Yesterday, White House spokesman Scott McClellan avoided commenting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He said of the Bush-Blair talks, that the president wanted to reach out to allies in Europe and NATO “to promote development and progress, to defeat the terrorists, and to encourage freedom and democracy as alternatives to tyranny and terror.”

He added: “The president looks forward to discussing with Prime Minister Blair how to strengthen further U.S. cooperation with the United Kingdom and all of Europe.”

As the president decides on the broad contours of the future of Middle East policy, his advisers are apparently split on how to deal with Mr. Arafat’s pending funeral. Administration officials told The New York Sun’s Eli Lake that National Security Council senior director Elliot Abrams has compared sending any American representative to Mr. Arafat’s funeral to sending a delegation to the funeral of Osama bin Laden.

Meanwhile, at the State Department there has been some talk of sending the assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, William Burns.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Qurei met with a deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, Elizabeth Dibble. One topic they discussed was an upcoming conference in Oslo, Norway, next month of the international donors to the Palestinian Authority. That meeting could kick-start a renewed commitment from America to more generously fund the Palestinian Arab regime that emerges from the ashes of Mr. Arafat’s demise.