With pressure rising at home and abroad for President Bush to lay out his Middle East policy, he was giving no word on whether he would deliver the much-anticipated speech Monday.

"You'll hear when I'm ready," Bush told reporters during a day trip to Newark, New Jersey. He was due back early in the afternoon, and it remained possible he would give the address on his return, aides said.

"He's ready," a U.S. official said, adding the timing of the speech had not yet been set. "It's really, really ... up to him."

U.S. officials said aides have proposed Bush deliver his address Monday afternoon.

The president plans to leave Tuesday afternoon for a meeting of the Group of Eight major nations in Canada -- where leaders are seen as eager for a U.S. policy declaration. There were also opportunities Tuesday for the president to present his views before leaving for Canada, aides said.

Bush's speech on the Middle East is expected to call for the early creation of a Palestinian state with provisional borders and a formation of a state with permanent borders within three years, providing that Palestinians end violence and reform institutions.

He also was expected to ask Israel to halt incursions into Palestinian areas, freeze settlement activity and be willing to enter political negotiations with Palestinians.

SHOW OF UNITY

American Arab and Jewish leaders, in a rare show of unity, joined Monday to send a letter to Bush urging he quickly declare his policy.

"The gravity of the situation and the hopelessness expressed by both sides motivates us to set aside our differences and encourage our government to focus its efforts on preventing any further deterioration of the situation in the Middle East," the leaders said in the letter.

Sunday, two potential Democratic presidential candidates, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, and Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman, made similar calls.

"They've got to announce a vision. They've got to put something on the table," Kerry said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

There had been a possibility Bush would deliver the speech last Tuesday, but that was ruled out the day before, aides said.

Subsequent resistance bombing attacks made the atmosphere unsuitable for an address, they said.

Bush was awaiting a period of relative calm, aides have said. One declined to say whether the current level of violence in the region met this criteria.

Israeli forces Monday killed six Palestinians in a helicopter missile strike on a car carrying Islamic militants in the Gaza Strip and surrounded Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in his headquarters in the West Bank.

Palestinian Authority Planning Minister Nabil Shaath said Sunday a Bush speech could unleash a "program of action" that would create a new climate and help ease violence in the region.

SHARON AGAINST ACTION NOW

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, while not ruling out a Palestinian state in some remote future, is dead set against any such notion now, arguing that it would simply reward terrorism. He accuses Arafat of being behind militants attacking Israel and will not deal with him.

Sen. Lieberman said the United States must step up involvement in the quest for Middle East peace, as the one country Israelis and Palestinians can trust.

He also raised questions about the idea of a provisional Palestinian state. "I don't know what a provisional state means. I'm for a permanent Palestinian state. And that will come only as a result of negotiations between both sides," he said Sunday on CBS television's "Face the Nation."

White House officials said timing of the speech would not be driven by the Group of Eight major-nation summit, which ends Thursday.

But one expert said the failure of the president to deliver the speech before the summit could spark concerns among European partners in the G8.

"I don't think they care much specifically what is done, they just want something to be done by the United States," former deputy U.S. national security adviser Jim Steinberg told reporters at a Brookings Institution forum last week.

"So if the president has not made the speech by the time of the meeting I think there will be a great deal of anxiety about this," Steinberg said.

PHOTO CAPTION

President George W. Bush pauses while speaking in front of a giant screen television at the Port Elizabeth facility in New Jersey , June 24, 2002. With pressure rising at home and abroad for Bush to lay out his Middle East policy, he was giving no word on whether he would deliver the much-anticipated speech. 'You'll hear when I'm ready,' Bush told reporters during his trip to New Jersey. (Larry Downing/Re