AN ISRAELI Arab citizen was arrested yesterday for alleged involvement in Monday's suicide bombing in Tel Aviv, as Israel and the Palestinian Authority intensified their crackdown on Hamas.
But despite this and dozens of other arrests, and despite indications of deepening co operation between the Israeli government and Mr Yasser Arafat's forces, there is still considerable fear in Israel that further attacks may be imminent.
The Israeli Arab suspect was not named, but was said to be a 45 year old father of eight, from a village in the north of the country.
Israeli security sources allege that, in return for $1,000, he drove his lorry to an Israel Gaza border crossing on Monday, helped the bomber evade Israeli security at the border, and drove him to the Dizengoff Centre shopping arcade in Tel Aviv. Thirteen Israelis died in the explosion.
The suspect's family issued vehement denials yesterday, but the arrest of an Israeli Arab citizen is bound to fuel further right wing Israeli opposition to the peace process.
Many right wing critics have long argued that Mr Arafat's ultimate goal, after he has secured control of the West Bank and Gaza, is to win over the support of Israel's 800,000 Arab residents for a Palestinian state that would replace Israel altogether.
Several right wing politicians yesterday warned against demonising the entire Israeli Arab community; Israeli Arabs in Jaffa held a demonstration against the Hamas bombings; and three Arabs were among the four Israeli soldiers killed in a bombing on the Lebanon border earlier this week. But none of that is likely to impress those on the Israeli far right who doubt the Arab citizens' loyalty to Israel.
Throughout the day yesterday, the Israeli army continued arresting - alleged Hamas - activists, closed down further Hamas linked colleges, and sealed more homes of the bombers' relatives.
More than 400 Palestinian villages in the West Bank remain under curfew, and there are reports that the government is still considering a mass deportation of Hamas activists - a policy last bused four years ago, when the one year exile to South Lebanon of 400 alleged Islamic radicals proved a public relations disaster for Israel and a unifying experience for the deportees.
The government has also not ruled out pinpoint operations inside West Bank and Gaza areas controlled by Mr Arafat, but has refrained so far for fear of sparking a damaging confrontation with Mr Arafat.
Gratifyingly for Mr Shimon Peres's beleaguered government, Mr Arafat's forces are now demonstrably in action, yesterday morning raiding Gaza's Islamic University, a Hamas stronghold where the walls are decorated with paintings of the assassinated Hamas bombmaker, Yihya Ayash.
Intelligence co operation between Israel and the Palestinians is also paying dividends: it has been established that the bombers who carried out the two recent Jerusalem bus bombings, and another in Ashkelon, were recruited at a Ramallah Teachers' Training College by one of the students.
Sophisticated US equipment for detecting explosives arrived in Israel yesterday, a gesture of support from the Clinton administration. And the US is also said to be pressurising Jordan and Saudi Arabia to cut off sources of funding to Hamas.