The meeting in Jordan, which was also to have involved Jordan's King Abdullah II, was scrapped due to a scheduling glitch, a Jordanian official told AFP.

He said talks between Bush and Maliki on Iraq's sectarian bloodshed were scheduled to go ahead on Thursday morning.

The White House denied that the cancellation of Wednesday's meeting had anything to do with an administration memo leaked by the New York Times that cast doubt over Maliki's authority.

Bush arrived in Jordan on Wednesday as news came that the US military was beefed up its presence in Baghdad to help stem the violence.

Accompanied by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the president headed immediately for a working dinner with King Abdullah at Raghadan palace.

Over dinner, Bush and King Abdullah II discussed ways of quelling the sectarian violence in Iraq and the king urged Bush to help "reactivate the peace process through helping the Palestinian and the Israelis resume negotiations".

"The world realises now, more than ever, that any alternative to this would be a continuation of the cycle of violence in which both Israelis and Palestinians are the losers," the king said.

Solving the Palestinian crisis "will contribute to solving other problems in the region", including Iraq and political instability in Lebanon, the king added.

Foreign Minister Abdel Ilah Khatib described the meeting as "important and useful".

In Washington, a defence official said the US military was moving as many as three battalions from other parts of Iraq to Baghdad to beef up security in the violence-torn capital.

The move, which would involve some 1,600 to 2,400 troops, comes amid renewed concern in Baghdad and several Arab capitals that Iraq could plunge into civil war and result in dangerous repercussions for the region.

In Iraq, the powerful political bloc of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr suspended its participation in the national unity government, delivering a fresh blow to Maliki's tottering government.

"The Sadr group suspends its membership in the parliament and in the cabinet as a protest against the visit (to meet Bush), which is considered as a provocation to the Iraqi people," it said in a statement about Maliki's trip to Jordan.

More than 13,000 civilians have been killed in Iraq in the past four months, according to UN estimates.

Bush, who refuses to speak of civil war in Iraq, this week blamed Al-Qaeda for the violence and ruled out any withdrawal of Washington's 150,000 troops "before the mission is complete".

Earlier a senior official said King Abdullah would also tell Bush: "The danger of civil war in the Palestinian territories and Lebanon is not only as real as it is in Iraq, but is in fact more imminent."

Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates share Jordan's view, he told AFP, adding that these countries "fear a premature pullout of US troops" from Iraq before the Iraqi army and police can take over.

The New York Times reported on Wednesday that a White House memo by US national security adviser Stephen Hadley had cast doubt over Maliki's ability to halt the bloodshed in Iraq.

"The reality on the streets of Baghdad suggests Maliki is either ignorant of what is going on, misrepresenting his intentions, or that his capabilities are not yet sufficient to turn his good intentions into action," it said.

Arab officials also told AFP that most Sunni Arab governments believe Maliki tolerates Shiite militias and is unable to control security in the war-ravaged country.

In the run-up to the Bush visit, King Abdullah held talks with Maliki and told him that reconciliation was the only way out of the bloodshed.

The king also had separate talks with Iraqi Sunni and Shiite leaders, including the head of the powerful Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, Abdel Aziz Hakim, a pillar of Maliki's ruling coalition.

Hakim warned during the meeting that Iraq's Sunnis would be the "biggest losers" if the country was engulfed by civil war.

Rice meanwhile prepared to engage in a new diplomatic drive to help defuse the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and was due to meet separately on Thursday with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

On the streets of Amman, hundreds of Jordanians staged protests to vent their rage at Bush and his administration's policies in the Middle East.

Protestors burnt US and Israeli flags and brandished banners terming Bush the "butcher responsible for shedding Iraqi and Palestinian blood" and telling the "unwelcome guest" to go home.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also launched a scathing attack on Bush's foreign policy and urged a withdrawal of US forces from Iraq, in an unprecedented letter on Wednesday to the American people.