The continued tenure of Mr Ezer Weizman as President of Israel is under threat from a potent and unexpected direction: the widow and son of the assassinated prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, have publicly called for Mr Weizman to be replaced by, of all people, a Knesset member from the governing right-wing Likud party.
Mr Weizman, endorsed by Mr Rabin when he won the largely ceremonial but extremely prestigious post of president five years ago, is up for re-election in a Knesset vote, next month. Given his popularity in the Knesset and among the public, Mr Weizman, a former air force commander who was one of the first Israeli politicans to call for recognition of the PLO, was certain of a second term. Until yesterday.
In interviews in the Hebrew media, Mrs Leah Rabin and her son, Yuval, issued a ringing endorsement of Mr Shaul Amor, the dark-horse Likud candidate. A small-town mayor of Moroccan origins, who trained as social worker, Mr Amor, according to Mrs Rabin, "is a good man, who was never involved in incitement against Yitzhak". She said that "he could serve as a unifying factor in our society."
Mrs Rabin appeared to be implying that Mr Weizman, by contrast, had been involved in the vicious criticism of Mr Rabin and his peace policies that presaged his assassination in November 1995. And, indeed, Mrs Rabin went on to confirm this.
She was backing Mr Amor, she said, "as a protest against Weizman, who harmed Yitzhak whenever he could, including after his death".
Mrs Rabin set out a list of Mr Weizman's perceived offences against her husband. She alluded to the allegation that it was Mr Weizman who once leaked claims that Mr Rabin, as chief of staff of the army in the 1967 war, suffered a nervous breakdown.
She said Mr Weizman had undermined Mr Rabin's peace efforts with the Palestinians - apparently because he repeatedly called for a suspension of negotiations with Mr Yasser Arafat in 1994 and 1995, amid the Hamas suicide bombings.
And her reference to Mr Weizman harming Mr Rabin "after his death" presumably related to the half-hearted eulogy delivered by the president at the prime minister's funeral, and to his failure to mention the assassination when he formally inaugurated the first Knesset session after the 1996 elections.
The president's office was maintaining a seething silence yesterday. The Rabin family's word carries considerable weight in the Labour party, and Mr Weizman will know that his hitherto smooth path to re-election has suddenly become immensely bumpy.