Mr Ehud Barak's insistence on standing firm and his refusal to make way for Mr Shimon Peres has ensured Gen Ariel Sharon's victory in tomorrow's election in Israel. If the opinion polls are right, Mr Barak faces the most resounding election defeat in Israeli history, only 21 months after winning the biggest victory.
Until the very end, Mr Barak appeared to be clinging to the dim hope that he had some chance of working towards peace with the Palestinians. With these hopes, he appeared to believe he could recover the possibility of a victory. But realists knew no agreement was on the cards, and that there was no hope of outside intervention either from Mr Clinton in the dying days of his presidency, or from Mr Bush as he put together a new administration in Washington.
In the last election, Israelis threw out Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, entrusting Mr Barak with all their hopes of reaching peace with their nearest and closest neighbours. Now, in a twist of irony, they are on the brink of rejecting Mr Barak in favour of Gen Sharon, the man who, if anyone is to blame, must bear responsibility for the present scale of violence, stirred by his controversial visit to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Gen Sharon was the architect of the invasion of Lebanon in 1982 and is a champion of illegal settlements.
For weeks, the opinion polls have been predicting a heavy trouncing for Mr Barak. His insistence on staying on as candidate appears to be the height of folly. Why did he not give way to Mr Peres who, despite his age, remains the one Israeli politician with any hope of rebuilding Israeli unity and any certain confidence of regaining the trust of Palestinians and Arabs?
But perhaps, as he faced defeat, Mr Barak knew that holding on as his party's candidate was the only hope of guaranteeing his own future political survival. No matter how great his margin of victory, Gen Sharon will find it difficult if not impossible, to forge a manageable and sustainable coalition in the Knesset, and Mr Barak may hope he can still have a role in forming a government of national unity.
Gen Sharon knows he has no standing or credibility among Arabs and Palestinians. And a government that depends for its survival on a rag-bag of right-wing and religious fanatics has no hope of winning support in the Knesset for any compromises needed for peacemaking. Gen Sharon may need Mr Barak by his side and the support of his Labour Party, while Mr Barak may be hoping that a role in a new unity government would guarantee his own political survival.
Despite his short time in office, Mr Barak will be remembered as the Prime Minister who broke many Israeli taboos on peacemaking and reshaped his country's political debate, proposing to share sovereignty in Jerusalem and to hand over up to 95 per cent of the West Bank and Gaza, and ending Israel's 22-year occupation of south Lebanon. In the end, he has become the victim of voter apathy, the loss of support among Israeli-Arab voters, and of the consequences of Gen Sharon's folly on the Temple Mount.
But Mr Barak will not be the only loser tomorrow. Israelis and their Arab and Palestinian neighbours may have to wait until another election before their hopes for peace can be rekindled.