These are interesting times in Israeli politics. A new voice has brought new hope, a possible political realignment and with it the potential of a new political dynamic.
Both Amir Peretz's surprise election as leader of the Labor Party last week, displacing the veteran Shimon Peres, and the general election it has precipitated, have come like a blast of fresh air to an Israeli political scene dominated both in the realm of the peace process and economy by a stultifying consensus. With Labor's quiescence in coalition it seemed that there was no alternative either to Ariel Sharon's unilateralism or Thatcherism.
Polls show that the election of the 53-year-old Mr Peretz, a popular trade union leader from a working class immigrant background, should give Labor a significant boost with the electorate, although not enough to oust Mr Sharon.
Mr Peretz has spoken of how corrosive Israel's continued occupation of the West Bank is to its own politics. "A moral road map is ending the occupation and signing a permanent agreement," he told a meeting at the weekend to commemorate Yitzhak Rabin, the former prime minister assassinated in 1995 for making peace with Yasser Arafat. And he has advocated a return to the "path of Oslo" - the path of dialogue with, and statehood for, the Palestinians eschewed by the Sharon coalition.
This may not be what the majority of an electorate still disillusioned with the peace process wants to hear just now, but it is crucial to the process that such views are represented by one of Israel's major parties.
What also adds spice to the political pot is that Mr Sharon must now decide quickly whether to break from his Likud party and the interminable war with his internal rival, the irredentist Benyamin Netanyahu, most recently about the Gaza withdrawal. Mr Sharon's associates say he is on the verge of a decision which could see the formation of a new centrist party that could siphon off votes from the two major parties and free his hands in a new coalition. His inclination to stay in Likud and fight the looming internal leadership contest, however, will have been strengthened by a poll among Likud supporters, commissioned by TV's Channel 10. It found that nearly 49 per cent would vote for him, while only 19.4 per cent would back Mr Netanyahu.
And there are positive straws in the wind in the Palestinian camp too. Despite the continuing violence, the important deal last week over the opening of Gaza checkpoints should help the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, in his battle with the extremists of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority elections in two months time.