The strongest peace advocate in the Israeli government, the Justice Minister, Mr Yossi Beilin, last night urged Palestinian leaders to put aside their threats to declare statehood unilaterally, and instead enter intensive talks with Israel. That, he said, could produce a permanent peace agreement "within a month or two".
On Monday night in Gaza, the PLO's Central Committee voted to empower Mr Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian Authority (PA) President, to declare the establishment of Palestine on September 13th, should he choose to do so, whether or not agreement on statehood is reached with Israel by then. Mr Arafat has indicated in recent days that the Palestinians might start a new Intifada uprising if Israel blocks their moves towards full independence.
The Gaza vote prompted a furious response yesterday from the Israeli Foreign Minister, Mr David Levy, who told a Knesset committee that the Palestinian leaders were "poisoning" the minds of their people and inciting them against Israel, and asserted that the Palestinians were now deliberately heading down the road to confrontation with Israel. Israel's Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, who has been quoted as saying that Mr Arafat "is not ready for peace", is touring Europe this week, meeting the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair and the French President, Mr Jacques Chirac, among others, apparently to galvanise their support should peace hopes collapse.
Mr Sufian Abu Zeideh, a deputy minister in the PA, insisted last night that it was Israel that was gearing up for violence - "Israel is sending the tanks" to new positions in the West Bank, he said. "Israel is sending more and better-trained soldiers."
But Mr Beilin, in an Israel Television interview last night, attempted to adopt a much more positive tone. "We are very close to the moment of truth," said the minister, who was one of the architects of the seven-year-old Oslo peace process. "And it would be madness for both sides, instead of reaching out to each other, to start threatening each other."
Were the Palestinians to unilaterally declare statehood, he asserted, it would be "meaningless" - even if every country in the world except Israel recognised Palestine. "We are the ones who control the bridges" into Palestinian territory from Jordan and Egypt, he noted. "Without our support, an independent state can't function."
"Let's sit down together," Mr Beilin pleaded, referring to the summit talks in Washington that President Clinton is considering arranging at the end of this month. "If we do, I'm convinced we'll reach not the moment of truth, but the moment of peace."
The UN Middle East envoy and the chief cartographer will be in Israel today for discussions on the newly drawn UN border with Lebanon. Mr Terje Roed-Larsen, Mr Kofi Annan's special representative for the Middle East, and Mr Miklos Pinther, the cartographer responsible for the new "blue line", will hear Israel's complaints.