WASHINGTON: Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas warned that lack of progress toward Middle East peace was eroding faith that a two-state solution could end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

A day after meeting with President Barack Obama at the White House, Abbas said the stagnation of the peace process had left some Palestinians unconvinced that a separate Palestinian state alongside Israel was even possible.

"I would like to express concern that the situation is very difficult," he said in remarks at a Washington think-tank. "The hope for a two-state solution. I fear, is beginning to erode and the world is starting not to believe, to distrust, that we are able to reach this situation."Abbas is in Washington hoping to advance fragile indirect peace talks that the United States spent months arranging but which have been imperiled by a deadly May 31 Israeli raid against an aid flotilla seeking to break the blockade on Gaza.