Palestinian President Yasser Arafat has given the clearest signal yet that he would not declare an independent Palestinian state on May 4th when peace deals with Israel expire,
"We don't have to consecrate our state because we are already practising it on the ground," the official Palestinian news agency WAFA quoted Mr Arafat as telling the opening session of Palestinian Central Council in Gaza.
Mr Arafat had faced strong international pressure to back away from a pledge to declare unilateral independence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on May 4th.
The United States and Arab and European states were worried that such a move would wreck any prospect of a renewed push for peace after Israel's general election on May 17th and boost Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's bid for re-election.
Meanwhile, in the first TV party political broadcast of Israel's election campaign, aired on Monday night, as a determinedly avuncular Mr Netanyahu gently addressed his citizens, strange lettering started moving across the screen: Russian subtitles.
A few minutes later, when Mr Netanyahu's main rival, Mr Ehud Barak, made his pitch, the screen showed footage of the Labour Party leader in his military days, leading a commando assault on a hijacked aircraft, and helping organise Israel's dramatic Entebbe Airport hostage rescue. The intended audience: new Russian arrivals, who might not be aware that Mr Barak was Israel's most decorated soldier.
In a tight election race, the immigrant community is emerging as the critical constituency. More than 700,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union have flooded into Israel in the past decade. Party strategists know that, on May 17th, ultra-Orthodox Jews will vote en masse for Mr Netanyahu, and that most Israeli Arabs will plump for Mr Barak. But the votes of the Russians, a similar 15 per cent or so of the electorate, are up for grabs.
In 1992, angered that Yitzhak Shamir was spending too much on West Bank settlers and too little on them, the first wave of Russian arrivals helped Yitzhak Rabin into power. But four years later, encouraged by a former "Prisoner of Zion" (a Jew refused permission to emigrate from the Soviet Union), Natan Sharansky, they switched sides and voted for Mr Netanyahu.
This time some pollsters believe a majority will choose Mr Netanyahu again, but Mr Sharansky is edging closer to Mr Barak, and many Russians may follow his lead.
A very public row between Mr Netanyahu and a key immigration official a few days ago has also highlighted the importance of the immigrant vote.