WASHINGTON Ñ The Bush administration plans to release principles of a Middle East peace plan over the next week.

Diplomatic sources said the plan is being drafted by the State Department and White House. The plan, they said, will call for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

The U.S. intention to release a peace plan has been relayed to both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, Middle East Newsline reported. U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell met both Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and PA Chairman Yasser Arafat in New York on Sunday.

Powell is expected to state the principles of the U.S. plan at the General Assembly over the next week. He said the administration is "moving more aggressively" toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Peres has confirmed the U.S. effort. But he said he did not know whether the Bush plan would be an affirmation of principles or a detailed program.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is expected to discuss the U.S. plan when he arrives in Washington in early December. Sharon is preparing Israeli ideas that would include a ceasefire and the establishment of a Palestinian state. Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher is scheduled to meet Powell this week to discuss an Egyptian peace plan.

The sources said President George Bush has also relayed a pledge to meet Arafat. Bush, in a move that angered Arab allies of the United States, refused to meet Arafat over the weekend. But the sources said Bush has agreed to meet Arafat later this year.

The U.S. peace plan is being completed as casualties mount in the Israeli-Palestinian war. Israeli commandos entered a PA-controlled area near the West Bank city of Nablus on Monday and killed a Fatah militant aligned with Arafat. The attack came hours after an Israeli security officer was killed in the Sharon region east of Tel Aviv.

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