The Israeli prime minister, Mr Ehud Barak, managed to win a vote of confidence on the Middle East peace process in the Knesset this week, but at the cost of losing the election to choose the country's new president. Yesterday his foreign minister, Mr David Levy, resigned and voted with the opposition to initiate fresh elections.
Nonetheless, Mr Barak's survival gives him an opportunity to pick up the pieces from last week's failure to reach agreement with the Palestinians at Camp David. If he can revive the negotiations and strike a deal with Mr Yasser Arafat, he would retrieve his political position and expect to win support from the Israeli public. But a readiness to compromise will be necessary on both sides if that outcome is to be achieved by September 13th, when Mr Arafat has pledged to declare an independent Palestinian state.
Mr Barak's political vulnerability is starkly underlined by these events. During the Camp David negotiations he was left isolated by several highly visible and publicised defections within the ranks of his coalition and cabinet. He was sustained in the talks by the belief that the Israeli public is more willing than members of the Knesset to make the concessions and take the risks needed to reach an agreement. Jerusalem's legal and political status and the right to return of Palestinian refugees were certainly the most difficult and contentious issues; the talks broke down following the failure to reach compromises on sharing sovereignty over the city. But it has been widely recognised that to negotiate seriously on the subject at all represents an historic breakthrough in this conflict. And both Mr Barak and Mr Arafat have underlined subsequently that a great deal was achieved at Camp David and that the negotiations have definitely not broken down irretrievably.
The question now is whether they can find the will to retrieve the momentum and the courage to compromise in the interests of achieving a wider peace settlement. In politics, timing is all important. The votes of the Knesset and the September 13th deadline frame the opportunities available in stark and unambiguous terms. These events have narrowed Mr Barak's scope for further movement, surrounded as he is by political opponents entirely hostile to his endeavour and determined to find ways of undermining it. Mr Arafat's refusal to entertain compromises on Jerusalem's sovereignty infuriated his US hosts, and is apparently driven by a fear that he cannot carry Palestinian opinion with him. If that is indeed the case the outlook is bleak for the peace process.
It is to be hoped Mr Arafat's testing of Arab and Palestinian attitudes towards compromise on Jerusalem will encourage him to be more flexible in his approach. All depends on whether he accepts the urgent need to find agreement with an Israeli partner who is willing to deliver on it, rather than those opposed in principle who might easily replace Mr Barak if the project fails.
That would be risky indeed and the potential for violent clashes is certainly there. Unlike during the Intifada of 1987-9, there are now thousands of armed police controlled by the Palestinian Authority who could be drawn into such a conflict. Avoiding such an outcome should be made a priority issue among all concerned with the Middle East peace process in the weeks to come.