HIS victory in the Israeli elections virtually assured, the hard line Likud leader, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, moved quickly last night to reassure Arab and Western states dismayed by his success that he was committed to the outgoing government's peace process with the Palestinians.
With only some 180,000 soldiers' and other absentees' ballots still to be counted today, Mr Netanyahu holds a 0.7 per cent lead over the incumbent, the Labour leader, Mr Shimon Peres. Pollsters note that most of the soldiers involved are young conscripts, and a majority of young Israelis tend to vote for right of centre candidates.
Although his Likud party fared poorly in the elections, winning just 31 seats compared to 40 in the outgoing Knesset, Mr Netanyahu can easily put together a coalition.
Mr Netanyahu's victory represents a stunning comeback, overhauling Mr Peres in the final days of the campaign. As of last night, his lead over Mr Peres stood at a mere 21,300 votes and while Mr Netanyahu's campaign was so well organised as to ensure the maximum possible support, Labour's was not.
Before the worst was known, Ms Leah Rabin had expressed bewilderment at what she still thought was the slim majority Israel is had given Mr Peres to complete the peacemaking her husband had begun. But when the true scale of the repudiation became clear her dismay turned to rage. "I feel like packing my bags and getting out of here," she blurted out.
It is easy to understand Ms Rabin's sense of betrayal. Barely six months ago her husband was murdered as he strode jauntily to his car at the end of a rejuvenating peace rally. Horrified that Jewish right wing opposition to the peace process had culminated in murder, the great mass of the Israeli public put aside its scepticism over the accords with the Palestinians, and resolved to back the agreements to their conclusion . . . or so they told the pollsters.
So encouraged was she by this growth in support for her husband's policies, that Ms Rabin told a memorial rally eight days after the assassination that her only comfort in grief was the knowledge that Yitzhak had not died in vain that a "silent majority" had now coalesced to safeguard his legacy.
Wednesday's vote showed that "silent majority" to have dissipated as swiftly as it had formed. Asked to back him in what he described as a referendum on the peace process, most Israeli Jews declined Mr Peres's invitation.
Mr Netanyahu triumphed thanks to his own remarkable political powers, the startling ineffectuality of Labour's campaign, and the brutal intervention of the Hamas extremists. Had Mr Peres called elections immediately after Mr Rabin's death as he certainly could have done, noting that he had no mandate to govern he would have won easily. But he decided his first priority was to heal the wounded Israeli psyche, and by the time he did get around to naming the day, four Hamas bombings had rekindled old Israeli fears.
In 1993 Mr Netanyahu all ex-furniture salesman, turned Israeli UN representative, turned deputy minister came from the back of the pack to seize the Likud leadership, winning on the strength of non stop personal campaigning, never ending bus tours taking in every last knot of potential support nationwide. Now he has turned on the acute personal charm again, pressing the flesh in vegetable markets and hi-tech firms, entering even the staunchest Labour strongholds in the search for votes.
The Palestinians, Jordanians and other Arab states committed to peace with Israel view Mr Netanyahu's triumph with well founded trepidation. He is a pragmatic, man, but he has his principles he believes Jews should be allowed to live with security anywhere in the West Bank, he respects the tiny Jewish presence in the city of Hebron, he will not sanction Palestinian statehood, and he will not tolerate PLO activity in East Jerusalem.
None of this bodes well for the Israeli Palestinian accords. And if they fail, an armed Intifada up rising is in prospect. It is all too realistic to envisage Israel's ties with Jordan straining and then snapping, as Mr Netanyahu's resistance to compromise pushes the region towards more conflict.
Reuter adds. Israeli fighter jets rocketed suspected guerrilla targets in eastern Lebanon before dawn this morning. The attack appeared to be in retaliation for the killing of four Israeli soldiers in a bomb blast yesterday, security sources said.
The four soldiers were killed and seven wounded in a guerrilla attack yesterday, which Hizbullah claimed was retaliation of Israel's killing of women and children in last month's bombardment of Lebanon.