For many prominent Israeli politicians, high-ranking military officers, rabbis, commentators and intellectuals, the controversial decision – whether enforced or not -- not only would benefit Arafat by offering him the status of martyr, but also harm the image and position of Israel at a time that following the recent wave of suicide operations by Palestinian Islamist extremists in Israel that left some 250 killed and wounded, triggered a wave of much needed sympathy for Tel Aviv.

To assess both the logics behind Mr. Sharon’s "ill timed" decision, its repercussions on both Israel and international public opinion and consequences, here are two opinions offered by the liberal and influential Israeli daily Ha’aretz:

Eluding a monumental Israeli dragnet, the killers, members of the radical Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, have been at large since they gunned Ze'evi down in mid-October outside his Jerusalem hotel room. But a PFLP official claimed Monday that there was no way that Arafat could track down the gunmen, whose location, the official said, was unknown even to the PFLP.

In recent weeks, international revulsion at Palestinian terror attacks that killed dozens of Israelis has prompted unprecedented expressions of understanding for Israeli military policies in combating Palestinian militancy and in targeting symbols of Palestinian sovereignty - first among them the Palestinian Authority Chairman himself.

Many Israelis, though, including hard line Deputy Public Security Minister Gideon Ezra, questioned Sharon's judgment in banning Arafat's attendance at the midnight mass held at the traditional birthplace of Jesus. Ezra, a member of Sharon's Likud, said it was important for the region that "signs of joy issue from Bethlehem". He said that this would not happen if Arafat, a practicing Muslim, were kept from making the pilgrimage he has undertaken every year since 1995.

Sharon's office insisted that the security cabinet had taken the decision to keep Arafat from Bethlehem because his Palestinian Authority has failed to live up to its promises to jail militants and to curb terrorist attacks.

Analysts said, however, that Sharon could be granting Arafat an enormous victory - without the Palestinian leader moving a muscle - by appearing to curb religious freedom by disrupting the status quo of a Christmas ritual dating back to Ottoman Turkish rule. Every year, a representative of the ruling entity, whether it be British mandatory officials or IDF administrators, take part in the Christmas celebrations at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

"There has been a certain amount of harm done to the very sensitive religious status quo that existed between the religious groups that share the holy places in Bethlehem", said reserve IDF colonel, Yoni Figel, a former military governor of the West Bank towns of Ramallah and Jenin. "I'm not certain that the authorities that made this decision related to this element. It's possible that they viewed this as a tangential thing. I do not view it as tangential".

"Arafat has already profited from the corner in which we find ourselves", Figel said. He said that Israel had erred by linking the demand for arrest of the assassins to the Christmas issue.

"This incomprehensible connection (between the arrest demand) and Christmas is exactly the corner into which we entered, and I believe we will have trouble getting out of it".

Uzi Arad, an ex-Mossad intelligence service official and senior foreign policy adviser to former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, called the effort to keep Arafat from Bethlehem "a gross blunder... Christmas is not the time to wage our battles", he said. "This is unwise, and may well be counter-productive." "It can end badly in a number of ways," Arad said.

"One possibility is that under international pressure, Israel will be forced to cave in. Or, Arafat may just appear, out of nowhere, to embarrass us. Or, worse than that, there may be conflict somewhere along the way". Even if Israel gets its way and Arafat seizes the wanted men "under the extortion of the last minute, things are simply not done this way, and people who do not understand the character of international relations should consider this: during World War One, the warring sides ceased fire during Christmas".

A number of rabbis, including at least one ultra-Orthodox Knesset member, have reportedly appealed to Sharon to reconsider the decision, which has already stirred expressions of concern from Washington and from the European Union. Despite the opposition of many Labor ministers to the Arafat travel prohibition, Labor Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer ordered West Bank IDF commanders to take special care in inspecting vehicles leaving Ramallah, in an effort to prevent the cagey Palestinian leader from slipping out of the city and entering Bethlehem, either in secret or in a car bearing diplomatic license plates granting immunity from inspection.

Throughout, Arafat has maintained a defiant posture in the face of the Israeli ban. "No one will prevent me from travelling to Bethlehem", he said Sunday, vowing to traverse the 12 miles from his Ramallah office to the Church of the Nativity by foot, if necessary. Arafat's senior cabinet minister Yaser Abed Rabbo, meanwhile, denied that Israel had relayed to the Palestinians its terms for giving a green light to the Arafat visit. "It's only in the media, for public relations," Abed Rabbo said.

It quoted Israeli security authorities as saying that Israel was demanding not only the arrest of Hamdi Quran and Basel el-Asma, who it said were Ze'evi's assassins, but also PFLP General-Secretary Ahmad Saadat and his deputy Jihad Ghoulme, who the radio said had ordered the killing. All four were in the Ramallah area, in locations known to the PA, the authority was quoted as saying.

But Ali Jada, a PFLP official in Jerusalem's Old City, said that PA West Bank Preventive Security service chief Jibril Rajoub "is capable of doing many things, but even people in his own organisation cannot find this man. They don't know where he is." "I am 100 percent certain that if Arafat were able to arrest them, he would not hesitate for even a minute to do so", Jada said. "These people are underground ... and not even the members of the PFLP know where they are".

Jada told Army Radio that Israel had done itself harm by making a non-issue into a cause celebre. "This government is a fellowship of fools. They made a huge ado out of nothing. And they will truly pay for this. They are turning Arafat into the man of the year".

Ha'aretz commentator Danny Rubinstein suggested that the overall logic governing the government's actions in recent weeks is to say to Arafat, "If you're afraid of Hamas, of confronting Hamas, it's time you began being more afraid of us".

At the same time, details have been revealed of efforts by representatives of Shimon Peres and Arafat to reach some agreement. Hence the cumulative impression is that of some opportunity to bring the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to a new, positive turning point.

It is therefore disappointing and infuriating that the government has not responded in any positive way to the signs of calm coming from the Palestinian side. The prime minister belittles Palestinian efforts, he refuses to regard them as positive, and he repeats all his previous demands and rejects out of hand all the proposals attributed to Peres.

Sharon has found it easier to provoke the PA and its leadership, both through prohibiting Sari Nusseibeh from holding a reception in Jerusalem, and now in issuing orders to prevent Arafat from taking part in the Christmas Mass at Bethlehem.

Sharon's behaviour indicates bad judgment, if not downright irresponsibility. Even if we take into account the assessments that the most recent Palestinian measures are merely tactical and not a real turning point, an Israeli prime minister must not contemptuously reject an outstretched hand inviting dialogue. He has a duty to check if, perhaps, it might represent a real opportunity to return to the peace process. That principle is the legacy of every prime minister since the founding of the state. Some brought it to fruit with a readiness to sign peace agreements that involved painful ideological concessions. Sharon has yet to prove if he intends to keep his promise to the voters to bring peace and security, or if he just wants to perpetuate Israel's grip on the territories.

To a great extent the complex duel Israel is fighting with the Palestinians will be decided by the moral force of the reasons for which it is being fought. Standing opposite the Palestinians' demand for their national liberation is Israel's demand for Palestinian (and Arab) recognition of its right to national expression in part of the Land of Israel. Israel's moral force in its campaign against the terrorism that broke out last October has so far been derived from the Palestinian Authority's rejection of the Barak government's peace proposals, its blatant violations of the Oslo agreements, and its stubborn refusal to give up the right of return.