In a move that belies Israeli assurances about imminent advances in peace moves with the Palestinians, the Israeli Justice Minister said yesterday he would urge the Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, to hold a nationwide referendum before relinquishing any further occupied territory to the control of Mr Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.
Compounding the sense of deliberate time-wasting on the part of the government, the minister, Mr Tsachi Hangebi, said that the kind of referendum he had in mind would be "non-binding" - a kind of "advisory" vote. Palestinian officials immediately condemned the idea, describing it as a violation of the peace accords.
Many leading Palestinian officials have long since concluded that Mr Netanyahu has no intention of withdrawing from any more West Bank territory, and they are thus advocating that the Palestinian Authority unilaterally declares independent Palestinian statehood next May, at the end of the five-year "interim" period provided by the Oslo peace accords.
The new talk of a referendum, coming on the heels of Sunday's cabinet decision to extend some of the authority of the Jerusalem City Council into occupied West Bank territory, can only confirm the mood of pessimism. That pessimism could play into the hands of the radical Hamas Islamic movement, whose leader, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, is expected to return to Gaza today from a four-month tour of Middle East capitals, during which he is said to have raised tens of millions of dollars for Hamas coffers.
Although the next Israeli troop withdrawal from West Bank land is more than a year overdue, Mr Netanyahu and his aides had been insisting in recent weeks that an agreement was close at hand. However, it is Mr Netanyahu who has himself been pushing the time-consuming referendum idea, and who asked Mr Hangebi to investigate it further.
Israel has never held a referendum in its 50-year history.
Several cabinet ministers said last night that, while a referendum might be appropriate over the terms of a permanent peace accord with the Palestinians, they could not see the point of holding one over an interim troop withdrawal. "I just don't know what purpose it would serve," said Mr Yitzhak Mordechai, the minister of defence.
One purpose, of course, would be to keep Mr Netanyahu's bickering government together a little bit longer. Right-wingers have been threatening to bolt if there is a further withdrawal, while relative moderates have warned they will defect if there isn't one.