Assured by Mr Yasser Arafat that much of the international community is ready to recognise an independent Palestine whenever they choose to formally declare its establishment, Palestinian leaders voted yesterday to delay such a declaration until after Israel's elections on May 17th.
The issue will be raised again in June, and Palestinian officials stressed yesterday that they still intend to declare statehood "very soon".
The decision, endorsed at a meeting in Gaza of the Palestine Central Council, was seized upon by the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, as vindication of his tough stance in negotiations with Mr Arafat.
"Our political struggle prevented the declaration of a state of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital," Mr Netanyahu has been telling supporters on the campaign trail. "The peace process has been saved."
But Palestinian officials insisted that, by postponing a unilateral declaration of statehood now, they were actually denying Mr Netanyahu the opportunity to make political capital out of the issue. Noting that the Israeli Prime Minister had threatened to annexe West Bank territory if the Palestinians moved unilaterally, Mr Saeb Erakat, the chief Palestinian peace negotiator, said that Mr Netanyahu had been "hoping for a confrontation" that had now been denied him. Mr Erakat urged Mr Netanyahu to "stop his provocations", and to recognise that "President Arafat is not running in these elections".
Even though he controls only disconnected patches of West Bank land and two-thirds of the Gaza Strip, Mr Arafat had been threatening for months to go it alone, and declare the establishment of Palestine, because the peace process with Israel has barely progressed since Mr Netanyahu took office three years ago. He had branded May 4th, when the original, five-year negotiating period expires, as a "sacred date".
But in recent weeks Mr Arafat has toured almost 60 countries and won pledges of support for the Palestinians' right to independence, together with advice that he try to achieve statehood in partnership with Israel. The Clinton administration has pledged to try to broker a permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace deal by next May. The EU has indicated it will recognise Palestine at that time.
In such a climate of international backing, Mr Arafat told his colleagues in Gaza that they had little to lose in postponing a declaration, and a great deal to gain. Yesterday's decision will come as a relief for Mr Netanyahu's main rival, the moderate "One Israel" alliance leader, Mr Ehud Barak, who wants to rebuild the peace partnership with Mr Arafat. Mr Netanyahu will doubtless continue to assert that Mr Arafat is "waiting for Barak".