No sooner has the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, injected faint hopes of progress into the moribund Middle East peace process, than Israel's Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, appears to be dashing them. He did this by inviting the most extreme right-wing party in parliament to join his governing coalition.
Hours after he had assured Mr Blair, in a farewell press conference for the visiting prime minister, of his desire to make "significant progress" towards peace with the Palestinians at the planned London summit on May 4th, Mr Netanyahu was to hold negotiations yesterday with Mr Rehavam Ze'evi, the retired general who heads the two-man Moledet party in the Knesset. Moledet vehemently opposes any withdrawal from occupied territory, voted against the Oslo peace accords with the Palestinians, and believes in encouraging the "transfer" of all the Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip into neighbouring Arab countries. The "joke" doing the coalition rounds yesterday was that Mr Ze'evi might now seek to become minister of transport, so that he could personally implement the "transfer" policy.
Moledet has sat in government before, in the early 1990s, when Yitzhak Shamir headed a coalition that resolutely defied international pressure to enter land-for-peace negotiations with the Palestinians and devoted massive funding to expanding West Bank settlements.
Mr Netanyahu's courting of Mr Ze'evi, a man who has threatened to kill any Palestinian policemen who tries to limit his movements in the West Bank, has surprised even coalition members. Some of them, though hardliners themselves, find Moledet's overt anti-Arab policies offensive. Mr Meir Shetreet, the coalition chairman, said yesterday that he opposed co-opting Moledet, unless it moderated its policies.
The prime minister insisted that Moledet's presence would "strengthen" his government, but would not prevent it proceeding with the peace accords. Mr Ze'evi, characteristically blunt, said he hoped those accords were dead. Mr Netanyahu's aides said the prime minister was planning to hand over 11 per cent of West Bank land to the Palestinians in the near future. Mr Ze'evi's party colleague, Mr Beni Elon, said he would try to bring down the government if it gave up any land at all.
In negotiating with Moledet, Mr Netanyahu appears to be playing a dangerous game. Two more votes would boost his slim parliamentary majority. But, equally, the more moderate coalition members might be pushed into defecting, if they became convinced that the prime minister was effectively abandoning all pretence at pursuing the peace process.
It is understood that tentative talks with Moledet have been going on secretly for some weeks. By publicising the issue now, Mr Netanyahu appears to be confirming Palestinian fears that he is deliberately stalling peace moves, and has no real intention of moving forward, at the London summit or anywhere else. Indeed, with both the Israelis and the Palestinians acknowledging yesterday that no direct talks are yet planned in London between Mr Netanyahu and Mr Yasser Arafat, there can now be few expectations from the summit. The new move towards Moledet appears to make something of a mockery of Mr Blair's energetic peace efforts.