WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said Sunday Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat could and should stop the violence gripping the West Bank and Gaza, and Israeli forces should step back from confrontation.
As Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak pressed an ultimatum to Yasser Arafat to rein in Palestinian rock-throwers by Monday night, Albright refused to assign blame to either side for the worst Palestinian-Israeli violence in four years.
''We need to look forward, we need to get them to step back from each other so there is no cycle of violence,'' she said.
Barak, on NBC's ''Meet the Press,'' insisted Arafat ''initiated this whole series of events, ... (and) we know he can stop it'' within 12 hours. If he does not, ''it means he deliberately decided to put an end to the peace process and go back into a conflict,'' the prime minister said from Israel.
Israel already has used armor, helicopters and live ammunition in confrontations with Palestinians, leaving more than 80 dead. Barak did not say what additional force he might use in any escalation. But on CBS' ''Face the Nation,'' Barak registered his determination to defend Israel.
''We are living in a place where there is no mercy for the weak and no second opportunity for those who do not defend themselves,'' he said.
As Barak and others made the rounds of the Sunday talk shows, Israel's army was building its force on another front, along the northern border with Lebanon. Iranian-backed Hezbollah Lebanese guerrillas captured three Israeli soldiers Saturday.
The White House was working to arrange a meeting soon between Clinton and the region's leaders, possibly in Egypt, a senior administration official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
On Sunday, President Clinton telephoned Barak, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, a major Arab figure in the troubled search for peace, and Syria's new president, Bashar Assad.
White House spokesman P.J. Crowley said the conversation with Assad was to ask Syria ''to use its influence both to restrain Hezbollah and to seek the release of the Israeli soldiers.'' Syria has had thousands of troops in Lebanon since the 1970s under an Arab League mandate and is the main power broker in the small neighboring state.
Asked whether Clinton's call to Mubarak dealt with the possibility of new meetings among regional leaders to try to salvage the peace process, Crowley quoted a comment by Barak that ''you can't negotiate in an atmosphere of violence.
''We've made no decision on how to get negotiations back on track,'' he said, ''but as we have indicated, that is something we want to do as quickly as possible.''
Albright and Sandy Berger, President Clinton's national security adviser, stressed the fighting between the Palestinians and Israelis had reached dangerous proportions, although Berger said there seemed to be some easing Sunday.
''I do not believe that either party here, either the Israelis or Palestinians, wants to see this escalate further beyond control,'' Berger said on ABC's ''This Week.'' ''But it is difficult to break this cycle.''
Albright said Arafat ''has been able to control things'' in the past, ''and we expect him to be able to control it (the violence).''
''He is the leader of the Palestinian people, and he has to do everything he can to get this rock-throwing and violence under control,'' she said.
Again, on CNN's ''Late Edition,'' Albright questioned Arafat's commitment to an accord with Israel and complimented Barak.
The Israeli leader ''is showing he really wants a peace partner,'' Albright said. ''He wants to have a peace process work.''
Arafat also says he wants peace, but ''I hate to begin to think that Yasser Arafat is not a partner. He has been a partner. He has to gain control of what is going on.''
At the same time, Albright urged Israeli restraint. ''The Israelis have to do everything they can to be able to respond in a way that does not create more violence,'' she told reporters.
Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian legislator, challenged Barak's assertion that Arafat could order the violence halted.
''I think Prime Minister Barak could give one order to his own army to withdraw from the Palestinian territories, to remove the tanks from our neighborhoods, ... to stop shooting live ammunition at our children,'' she said on ABC's ''This Week.''
Also on ABC, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., criticized the Clinton administration for not using its Security Council veto to block the United Nations from condemning Israel for using excessive force against the Palestinians.
The United States abstained from the Saturday night vote, which let the resolution pass. ''It was not an act of courage to abstain,'' McCain said.
Albright said on NBC that U.S. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke made known U.S. opposition to the resolution but abstained because ''vetoing it would have created ... further problems in the region for us as the honest broker and negotiator.''
Yehuda Lancry, Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, criticized the U.N. resolution as unbalanced. But he said, ''We would have faced worse resolutions'' without U.S. help.