Israel is considering barring Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the Hamas spiritual leader who is currently on a fundraising trip through the Middle East, from returning to his home in Gaza. There are indications that Mr Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority might privately support such a ban.
Paraplegic, partially blind and deaf and suffering from a lung ailment, the sheikh was said to be at death's door last winter when Israel released him from jail. Two Israeli Mossad agents had been captured in Jordan after botching an assassination attempt on another Hamas leader, and King Hussein made their release conditional on Sheikh Yassin being given his freedom.
Evidently, that freedom has revitalised the 61-year-old leader. In February, he left Gaza, ostensibly for medical treatment. Three months on, he has paid visits to a long list of Arab countries including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, received a VIP welcome in many of them, and raised a reported $300 million for the coffers of his radical Islamic movement. Among the contributions: a reported $15 million a month from Iran to train Hamas fighters. Yassin is now planning visits to Sudan and Iraq.
News of the fast-flowing financial aid, pictures of the wheelchair-ridden Yassin being greeted by the likes of Syria's President Assad and Iran's President Khatami, and the screening of interviews in which the sheikh defends and praises Hamas suicide bombers, have set alarm bells ringing in Israel.
Politicians across the spectrum, including the Environment Minister, Mr Rafael Eitan, and the popular opposition Knesset member Mr Haim Ramon yesterday demanded that, in the interests of Israeli security, Sheikh Yassin be prevented from returning to Gaza. PA officials privately acknowledge concern at the growing prestige afforded to Hamas in the Arab world, and the threat that its leader now poses to Mr Arafat.
AFP adds: Mr Netanyahu's diplomatic adviser, Mr Uzi Arad, travels to Washington today in a new effort to find a compromise over long-delayed Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank, officials said.
Mr Arad, who was accompanying Mr Netanyahu on a visit to China, was scheduled to fly directly to the US capital for a new round of talks on US proposals for breaking the 14-month deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, the Prime Minister's office said.
Meanwhile, Jewish militants began to evacuate an illegal settlement they started building this week in the Muslim quarter of east Jerusalem's Old City, but vowed to return and build homes on the site. The settlers from the right-wing religious movement Ateret Cohanim said their decision to move from the site last night followed an agreement with Jerusalem's Israeli-controlled municipality.