PARIS, Jan 24: Much as it has done in the past when peace has come to a halt in the Middle East, France has once again brought the conflict to its soil in an attempt to restart negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

Although heavy wraps are being kept, for the moment, on what has been happening this week, diplomatic sources in Paris admit that they’re pleasantly surprised at what the French government has been able to bring about so far in terms of re-starting peace negotiations between representatives of Palestine and Israel.

Much of what has been happening has been taking place secretly in Paris and Strasbourg, where otherwise publicly-held manifestations have attracted some of the major actors in the conflict.

In Strasbourg, addressing the European Parliament, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said Wednesday that he still believed in the role to be played in negotiations by Chairman Yasser Arafat, but that the days of the Palestinian Authority’s titular head could be numbered. “If Mr Arafat doesn’t put an end to the terror,” Mr Peres was quoted as saying, then the terror could put an end to Mr Arafat.”

Mr Peres, who made it clear that he was speaking on his own authority and that his words did not necessarily have the support of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, noted that Chairman Arafat, “had better show more authority, for it’s the small terrorist groups that seem to decide for him.”

The Israeli Foreign Minister was making a veiled reference to threats that have been growing more pronounced in recent weeks against the life of Mr Arafat, who already last summer had informed French President Jacques Chirac, a close personal friend to whom he has turned over the years in such moments, that he’d been made to understand that his days were numbered.

Mr Peres also referred repeatedly to the “dark storm clouds” that were gathering over the Middle East, perhaps a reference, said diplomats privy with the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, to possible Israeli use of a nuclear device if the situation continues to worsen in their eyes. The possible use of nuclear arms by Israel as means of putting an end to the conflict has become, in their words, a “growing concern” of French diplomats, especially given the “virtual carte blanche” that Mr Sharon seems to have obtained from US President George W Bush.

The Israeli foreign minister was also reported to have made his way to Paris, after the address in Strasbourg, where he met with Ahmed Qorei [Abou Ala], president of the Palestinian legislative council, who was himself in Paris to take part in a special colloquium on the Middle East.

Earlier in the day Wednesday, Mr Qorei had publicly shaken hands with his Israeli counterpart, Avraham Burg, president of the Israeli Knesset, also in Paris to take part in the colloquium.