Missing Desktop

[stretchjn]

Here's a problem I thought I would never have with Linux. I was opening a window in Gnome when it froze up. I logged-out and relogged- back in , but now I only have a desktop without icons. I still have my panel along the bottom of the screen. If I log-in as root or another user I get my full desktop.

How do I fix this?

I'm running Gnome with sawfish on Redhat 7.1

Stretch

[fateswarm]

Open your home directory and look in Desktop. What do you see?

[stretchjn]

/home/user1/Desktop/ contains the following

Autostart
.directory
kontrol-panel
Linux Documentation
Printer www.redhat.com (http://www.redhat.com)

/home/user1/Desktop/.directory contains the basic icons, it doesnt't have the ones I created listed.

These are the same directories/files as i my other user's home directory

the bottom panel icons don't work either If I try to run apps that use x-windows from the command line e.g /usr/local/netscape/netscape I get a server refused error.

Would it help to see /home/user1/.xsession-errors?

Any ideas?