Despite the predictions, the Israeli left has been soundly beaten in Tuesday’s elections by its more honest “right wing”, whose commitment to the total eradication of the Palestinians as any kind of political entity is openly stated.

The defeat of the Zionist Union, ostensibly committed to negotiations and a two-state solution, should not, therefore, be read as the defeat of any genuine desire for peace, but as an increasing desire amongst Israelis to abandon the pretence that they seek anything other than permanent violent colonial domination of the indigenous Arabs.