China can play a "special role" in the Middle East, a Palestinian envoy said Friday, following eight days of deadly conflict between Israel and militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.

Bassam al-Salhi, a representative of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, was speaking after talks in Beijing on efforts to upgrade his people's status at the United Nations and maintain calm in the region.

Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas hopes a Gaza truce will be announced Wednesday before U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ends a visit to the region, a senior official said.

"President Abbas told Clinton that Egypt was the key to everything," said Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat after a meeting in the West Bank town of Ramallah between Clinton and Abbas.

Israel's bombing campaign in Gaza will not derail a Palestinian bid to seek upgraded membership at the United Nations later this month, president Mahmud Abbas said on Friday.

"What is happening in Gaza is aimed at preventing our request to get the status of non-member state the United Nations, but we will vote on the resolution on November 29," he said in a televised address.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani warned that Israel's deadly raids on the Islamist-controlled Gaza Strip must not go unpunished, state news agency QNA reported on Thursday.

"This vicious attack must not pass unpunished," QNA quoted the premier as saying at a Wednesday meeting in Saudi Arabia of the six Gulf Arab nations and Russia.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Wednesday slammed a series of Israeli strikes on Gaza which killed a top Hamas commander and six others, demanding an immediate end to the bloodshed.

"President Mahmud Abbas condemned the Israeli aggression on Gaza," said a statement carried on the official WAFA news agency which was issued shortly after an Israeli strike hit a car in Gaza City, killing Hamas military chief Ahmed Jaabari.

Israel's foreign ministry has proposed in a policy paper "toppling" Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas if a Palestinian bid for state observer status at the United Nations is approved later this month.

"Toppling Abu Mazen's (Abbas's) regime would be the only option in this case," the position paper obtained by Agence France Presse says. "Any other option... would mean waving a white flag and admitting the failure of the Israeli leadership to deal with the challenge."

Saudi King Abdullah and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas met on Monday, SPA state news agency said, as the Palestinian Authority intensified efforts to bid for non-state membership of the U.N.

The two leaders discussed "developments in the Palestinian issue, as well as the obstacles facing peace in the region and the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories," the agency in a brief report.

U.S. President Barack Obama told Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday that his administration opposes a Palestinian bid for non-state membership of the U.N., the Palestinian leader's spokesman said.

"There was a long telephone conversation between president Mahmoud Abbas and Barack Obama," Nabil Abu Rudeina told Agence France Presse.

Palestinians are coordinating with Russia, as well as Swiss and French experts, on the exhumation of late President Yasser Arafat, Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas said Sunday.

Arafat died in a French military hospital near Paris on November 11, 2004 and French experts were unable to say what had killed him, with many Palestinians convinced he was poisoned by Israel.

Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill visited the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem on Saturday and met with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, on the second day of his Holy Land trip.

After his visit to the Bethlehem church, built over the site where Christians believe Mary gave birth to Jesus in a stable, Kirill met with the Palestinian president at his office in the West Bank city.