A concerted international diplomatic effort prevented Israel and the Palestinians from sliding into what the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, termed "the abyss", following the killings of 19 Israeli teenagers outside a Tel Aviv nightclub by a Palestinian suicide bomber on Friday night. But as Israel yesterday buried its dead, the prospects for protracted calm seemed very slim. Palestinian militants are insisting that their intifada will continue, despite the first Arabic-language call for a cease-fire in eight months from the Palestinian Authority (PA) President, Mr Yasser Arafat.
And the Israeli government, while announcing that it would withhold a strong military reaction to the suicide bombing to see whether Mr Arafat's cease-fire pledge was serious, has now formally accused the PA of being "engaged in terrorist activity".
Many Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip stayed off the streets yesterday, and PA officials and security personnel kept clear of their offices and installations, in fear of Israeli retaliation. But the Israeli cabinet held fire, and issued a statement setting out the specific areas on which Mr Arafat's cease-fire call would be tested. There would have to be a "cessation of terror"; an end to "incitement" - including the broadcast on Palestinian TV and radio of statements and songs in favour of the suicide bombers; and the re-arrest of Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants.
Mr Arafat's pledge on Saturday to do his utmost to achieve an immediate and unconditional cease-fire was issued amid unprecedented diplomatic pressure from Europe and the United States. Mr Joschke Fischer, the German Foreign Minister, was in Tel Aviv on Friday night when the bomber attacked, heard the blast, and hurried off to see Mr Arafat in Ramallah the next morning.
President Bush, in a phone call to Mr Arafat, is reported to have told him flatly that, were he not to call for a cease-fire, the US would sever its relations with the PA.
But PA ministers indicated yesterday that there was no prospect for the cease-fire to be implemented along the lines desired by Israel. Although there were few shooting incidents yesterday, and a change in tone of some Palestinian TV and radio broadcasts, officials said there was no likelihood of a rash of arrests.