WASHINGTON, March 20 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice leaves on Friday to visit Egypt, Israel, the West Bank and Jordan in an effort to make progress on Middle East peace, the U.S. State Department said on Tuesday.

The trip's timing appears less than ideal given Saturday's formation of a Hamas-led Palestinian unity government that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert plans to shun because it has not fully accepted three international conditions.

While the government pledged to respect past peace deals, it has not recognized Israel or renounced violence, the two other conditions set by the European Union, Russia, the United States and the United Nations for lifting a Western aid embargo imposed after Hamas won elections last year.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters Rice's trip would begin with a stop in the southern Egyptian city of Aswan, where she will meet ministers from the so-called Arab "quartet" of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as well as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

She will then travel to Jerusalem and Ramallah, to Amman for talks with Jordan's King Abdullah, and then back to Israel for more contacts with Israeli and Palestinian officials. The spokesman said she plans to return to Washington on March 27.

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