The dust is rapidly settling here following Pope John Paul's visit, and already the grim politics of this region has sunk its teeth into whatever hopes of peace he may have generated with the failure of the Assad-Clinton summit in Geneva and its implications for reaching a peace accord between Israel and Syria.
Nevertheless, the visit was a tremendous success from the Pope's point of view. It may have begun last Tuesday with a strained formality, but by his departure on Sunday evening it was awash with goodwill. With great skill, the Pope had successfully negotiated the political and religious minefield that is Israel, leaving everyone believing he is on their side.
And he did so not just with fine words but as much by deed - by visiting the Deheisha Palestinian refugee camp on Wednesday and the Yad Ashem Holocaust memorial on Thursday, and by praying at the Western (Wailing) Wall on Sunday.
But the dominant image was of an indomitable, suffering old man shuffling along in pursuit of peace and justice for all. "A saint" was how a colleague based in Rome described him. It is how he has come to be seen in Israel too, where previously they had known little about John Paul II but a lot about Pius XII.
Few outside Israel realise the bitterness felt among Jews towards the Catholic Church because of its silence during the Holocaust, and because of the Inquisition and what they remember as its persecution of the Jews over the past two millenniums.
Pope John Paul has had equally successful visits to Jordan and Egypt in recent weeks. But few outside the Muslim world realise how deeply Muslims feel too about the Crusades and the slaughter perpetrated on their peoples by Christians in the name of Christ.
It is a measure of Pope John Paul's achievement on his latest visit that on Sunday evening, after he placed his prayer asking God's forgiveness for "the behaviour of those who in the course of history have caused these children of yours to suffer" in a crevice in the Western Wall, Jewish-style, members of the Israeli government could respond so positively.
"A 2,000-year-old account is now closed," said the Minister for Communications, Mr Benjamin Ben-Eliezer. "It was beyond history, beyond memory. I was very moved," said Rabbi Michael Melchior, Minister for Social Affairs and the Diaspora.
Disappointment that the Pope had not condemned the silence of Pius XII during the Holocaust, at the ceremony in the Yad Vashem memorial hall on Thursday, may have been blunted by his own obvious distress there and the stories of his pro-Jewish experiences in Poland at the time. But there was still disappointment.
Criticism of Pius XII was subtly expressed even by the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, in his speech at the ceremony. He quoted two lines from a poem by Nathan Alterman: "As our children cried underneath the gallows/the wrath of the world we did not hear . . ."
The poem, Of all the People, continued: "And the Holy Christian Father in the city of Rome/did not leave the palace . . . to experience the pogrom". It was written in 1942 after the Allies attacked Pius XII for publicly criticising the bombing of Rome while remaining silent on the bombing of London and Coventry.
But Pope John Paul's actions on Sunday swept away any lingering reservations about his refusal to condemn Pius XII. A commentator on national television that night described it as "a momentous gesture for Israel".
There is no doubt in Israel that "this special Pope", as the Minister for Jerusalem Affairs, Mr Haim Ramon, described him, has effected a revolution in Catholic attitudes towards the Jews and now in Jewish and Muslim attitudes to the Catholic Church. "Today begins a new era . . . that will bring peace to all religions and all believers," said Rabbi Melchior on Sunday.
On Wednesday, the Pope left the Palestinians in no doubt where he stood in regard to them. He unequivocally backed their "natural right" to a homeland and told them: "Your torment is before the eyes of the world. And it has gone on too long."
Mr Nabil Abu Rudaineh, a spokesman for the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, described the visit as "an excellent one" which "strengthened PLO-Vatican relations . . . the reconciliation mood between Christians and Muslims . . . and proved that despite a lot of difficulties, Palestinians and Jews can work together" (as they had to on security for the visit).
With his fellow Christians the Pope also achieved considerable success. They all co-operated with preparations for his Mass at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on Sunday and attended it, something only the Catholic Christian Churches did in Egypt, for instance.
It remains to be seen whether his admonitions, at various ecumenical meetings in Jerusalem, about dissension among Christians being "scandalous" will bear fruit.
The Pope completed his pilgrimage "in the footsteps of God", something he had aspired to since his papacy began in 1978. Doing so in this most significant of years has to be a source of tremendous fulfilment for him. That he has been able to do so borders on the miraculous. He would probably attribute it to the will of God.
"He is unsteady on his feet and he appears weak, but this has probably been the strongest moment of his pontificate," said Cardinal Maida of Detroit.