The honeymoon is well and truly over for Israel's new Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak.
Just six weeks after he took office, Mr Barak faces mounting evidence that Hamas Islamic extremists are bent on restarting their bombing campaign. His promising relationship with the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, meanwhile has soured because of his efforts to amend a deal on West Bank land handovers and an impatient US President is urging him to accelerate peace moves. The most pressing problem is the one that derailed peace efforts of his mentor Mr Yitzhak Rabin in the mid-1990s: the threat of extremist violence.
Palestinian police officials confirmed yesterday that an explosion in a Hebron garage on Sunday night was the premature detonation of a bomb intended for use against an Israeli target. The officials said the device that exploded was apparently a remote-controlled bomb, possibly to have been fitted to a child's tricycle.
In another development last night, Hizbullah leaders in Lebanon issued threats of violence against Israel after one of the pro-Iranian movement's commanders in south Lebanon was killed in his car. Hizbullah accused Israel of carrying out the killing, which they claimed was achieved using a pilotless drone to detonate explosives in the car; Israel declined to respond.
Amid the mounting tension, there is still precious little progress towards peace. Mr Arafat yesterday met President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, whose deputy, Mr Abu Mazen, met the Israeli Transport Minister, Mr Yitzhak Mordechai. Mr Saeb Erekat, his principal negotiator, today meets Mr Barak's envoy, Mr Gilad Sher.
But Mr Arafat is still baulking at Mr Barak's efforts to postpone the hand-over of some occupied West Bank land. A reluctant Mr Barak - pressed by President Clinton in a weekend communique to get moving with the land hand-overs, and restore some goodwill - is now saying that he will carry out the withdrawal in full if he must, between the beginning of October and the middle of November. Privately, he is said to fear that the withdrawal as agreed in last October's Wye River peace accord, will leave several West Bank Jewish settlements isolated - and thus vulnerable to extremist attack. Aides to Mr Arafat suggest they might have been more amenable to Mr Barak's concerns if he had expressed them behind closed doors, rather than putting the Palestinians in the impossible position of being asked publicly to accept even less from Mr Barak than Mr Netanyahu had promised to give them.
Although the peace process tops his agenda, Mr Barak is also having to pacify Shas and United Torah Judaism, two ultra-Orthodox parties crucial to his coalition, who are threatening to quit over the issue of the transportation of heavy equipment on the Sabbath.
Last Saturday, taking advantage of the light weekend traffic, part of a huge turbine was transported to the Ashkelon power station. "It was a slap in the face," said Mr Meir Porush of the United Torah Judaism party, ignoring the fact that several similar undertakings took place when Mr Netanyahu held power.
Jerusalem District Court yesterday acquitted a Jewish settler accused of killing an 11-year-old Palestinian, Hilmi Shusha, three years ago. The state had accused Nahum Korman of beating and kicking the boy to death after his car was stoned.
The US Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, will leave on September 1st for a visit to the Middle East, Vietnam and New Zealand, the State Department said yesterday. She is to hold talks with senior officials in Morocco, Egypt, Israel, the West Bank, Gaza, Syria and Jordan, promoting "all tracks of the (Middle East) peace process".