Having narrowly survived a no confidence motion, and with his ruling coalition in tatters, a battered Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, headed off yesterday for the US for today's summit meeting with the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, at Camp David, Maryland.
The government lost the vote, 54-52, but Mr Barak did not fall, since a no confidence vote requires the opposition to muster an absolute majority in the 120-seat Knesset, Israel's parliament.
The Prime Minister survived thanks to the abstention of two opposition parties - the stridently secular Shinui and the ultra-religious United Torah Judaism.
Opposition leaders yesterday attacked Mr Barak, accusing him of travelling to the summit without the backing of the parliament or the people. Referring to the disintegration of the ruling coalition - three parties resigned from the government on Sunday in protest over the summit - the opposition Likud leader, Mr Ariel Sharon, criticised Mr Barak.
"For someone who wanted to be the Prime Minister of everyone," he declared, "within the space of one short year, you have become the Prime Minister of no one."
Mr Sharon also accused the Prime Minister of "amateurism" and "inexperience", and of conducting a process "that will endanger our children".
Mr Barak, who has been in a fighting mood in recent days, despite the fact he is potentially on the brink of political extinction, hit back at the opposition in a fiery parliamentary session yesterday, insisting that he did have the support of the majority of the nation and that he was headed for Camp David to make peace in their name.
"I am not travelling alone," he said. "I am going with [the support of] almost two million people," referring to the number of voters who supported him in last year's election. "The public wants to give peace a chance."
Mr Barak, who was frequently interrupted by incensed rightwing parliamentarians, said that his government had been elected "to bring about change, to bring about a better future for our children, not to maintain the status quo". He was going to the summit, he said, "to end the 100 years of conflict between us and the Palestinians".
In between exchanging barbs with the opposition and working to stave off the no confidence motion, Mr Barak paid a brief visit to President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt to discuss the summit.
While Mr Mubarak said he would be ready to fly to Camp David to help facilitate an agreement if necessary, he told Mr Barak that he did not believe all the substantive issues dividing the Israelis and the Palestinians - such as the future of Jerusalem and the fate of Palestinian refugees and of Jewish settlers in the West Bank - could be settled at a single summit. A series of meetings, he said, would be needed.
But Mr Barak, who now faces an increasingly confident and numerically boosted domestic political opposition, is running out of time and may not have the luxury of returning to the US for a follow-up summit. Three of the five parties in his ruling coalition, including his biggest partner, the 17-seat ultra-religious Shas party, all withdrew their support on Sunday, citing fears that the Prime Minister was ready to make overly generous concessions to the Palestinians, including ceding the vast majority of the West Bank and affording the Palestinians some form of control in East Jerusalem.
Right-wing demonstrators, most of them West Bank settlers, lined the main road from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv yesterday to protest at Mr Barak's departure. Some held placards which said "Barak Is Losing the Country.