Nobody is entirely certain yet who is going to contest Israel's next general elections, expected next spring following Tuesday's collapse of Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak's government. But it is clear who will determine the victor: the Palestinian Authority President, Mr Yasser Arafat. And the early omens hardly point to Mr Barak's re-election.
Eighteen months ago, in good part thanks to Mr Arafat, Mr Barak defeated the hardline Likud head, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, to win the prime ministership. Frustrated by Mr Netanyahu's disinclination to authorise further land handovers in the West Bank to Palestinian control, Mr Arafat urged Israel's million-strong Arab majority to support Mr Barak, which they did.
Since then, however, Mr Barak's attempts at peacemaking with the Palestinians have failed so abysmally he had to agree reluctantly to hold fresh elections. He now faces possible challenges from within his own One Israel party for the right even to contest a second term as Prime Minister. One long-time internal critic, the Knesset's Speaker, Mr Avraham Burg, may well challenge Mr Barak for the party's prime ministerial nomination. And the former prime minister, Mr Shimon Peres, though 77, might also contemplate a challenge.
Mr Netanyahu - forced to cancel a lecture in Berkeley, California on Tuesday because of protests in support of the Palestinians - is the near-automatic right-wing candidate, even though his successor as Likud party leader, Gen Ariel Sharon, is vowing to battle him hard. There are at least three more potential candidates in the wings.
Mr Barak's only realistic hope for re-election lies in reaching an accord with Mr Arafat. But the omens are not good. Mr Barak has been meeting top aides to formulate a new peace strategy - something he is confusingly describing as a "staged permanent deal". The idea is apparently to push hard for a fast agreement with Mr Arafat on the borders of a Palestinian state and the fate of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and then, more gradually, to wrap up the most complex issues, concerning the status of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugee rights, on a state-to-state basis.
Mr Barak's problem is that aides to Mr Arafat are already rejecting all talk of further phased peace deals. And while some Palestinian officials privately believe their interests would be better served by a Barak-led government than a Netanyahu-headed one, leaders of Mr Arafat's Fatah movement, who are at the heart of the ongoing Intifada uprising, are delightedly congratulating themselves for having engineered Mr Barak's downfall.
In the latest violence yesterday, four Palestinians cutting through a border fence were killed in a gun battle with Israeli troops in Gaza, and an Israeli was badly injured in a shooting in the West Bank.