THEY sat together near the beach, side by side on their blue and-white deck chairs, like a pair of pensioners enjoying a day out at the seaside. They were, in fact, two presidents, chatting amiably in the early autumn breeze, smiling often, drinking fruit juice and cracking nuts.
As the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, made his first ever public visit to Israel yesterday, it was hard to believe that, just a year ago, his host, Israel's President Ezer Weizman, was urging the prime minister of the day, Yitzhak Rabin, to break off peace negotiations with the Palestinians, to "reassess" the Oslo accords.
And it was harder still to believe that, less than two weeks ago, Mr Arafat and the Israeli government were not on speaking terms at all each blaming the other for the gun battles that cost more than 60 Palestinian and 15 Israeli lives.
Mr Arafat was brought by helicopter to Mr Weizman's private residence, at Caesaria in northern Israel, by the Israeli air force, touching down on sovereign Israeli soil for the first time since his secretive condolence call on Mrs Leah Rabin a few days after her husband's assassination.
But behind the predictable rhetoric, there was something more subtle taking place. As he had done in criticising what he called Mr Rabin's over hasty approach to peacemaking, Mr Weizman, supposedly a symbolic president with no real power, was re-establishing himself as the champion of the ordinary Israeli".
While Mr Weizman took pains to refer often to "my dear friend", the Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, his very invitation to Mr Arafat suggests that he, and thus by extension the average Israeli, is not too happy with the way Mr Netanyahu is handling relations with the Palestinians.
Yesterday's visit was actually arranged more than a month ago, Mr Weizman public sing it well in advance in a bid to force Mr Netanyahu to break his own taboo on meeting Mr Arafat. The ploy worked Mr Netanyahu did meet Mr Arafat on September 4th.
But nothing concrete emerged Palestinian frustration grew over the deadlocked peace process, the Jerusalem tunnel affair sparked the violence of a fortnight ago and the two sides are still scrambling to pick up the pieces.
Mr Netanyahu praised yesterday's meeting as very important". He had little alternative. But the signs are that other Arab leaders too may try to undermine or even subvert the Prime Minister by talking instead to Mr Weizman. The Israeli President has already agreed to a reciprocal trip to Gaza and will next week fly to Cairo at President Hosni Mubarak's invitation. Mr Netanyahu, by contrast, is not exactly welcome in Egypt at present.
A trip to Jordan for Mr Weizman may not be out of the question either. King Hussein is becoming an ever more vociferous critic of Mr Netanyahu, recalling images of the Gulf War in an interview yesterday with the warning that the Prime Minister might have to don his gas mask" again if he did not move peace efforts forward.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry is today holding an emergency meeting on the deteriorating relations with Jordan, and Mr Netanyahu is keen to send his aide, Mr Dore Gold, to Amman to smooth things over.
But the king is not too happy with Mr Gold, who last visited his kingdom on September 22nd. On that occasion he neglected to warn the monarch that, the very next day, the Israeli government was blasting open the new exit in the Jerusalem tunnel.