During yesterday's funeral in Gaza of Munir Abu Moussa, an activist from the dead man's Islamic Jihad group declared that revenge was imminent.
"The 'Jerusalem Brigades' are coming," he vowed, "all ready to blow themselves up and avenge the blood of martyrs." However, there are now growing signs that this pledge will be resisted by the security forces of Mr Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.
Israel protested to the US on Thursday that Mr Arafat was "not doing enough" to enforce a truce he declared on Tuesday. But overnight, Israeli ministers meeting in emergency session decided not to abrogate the fragile ceasefire - in major part, for fear of angering the US, which has been urging Israel to do nothing that would interfere with the war on terror.
With that ceasefire still in place and Mr Arafat assuring Israeli officials that he was doing his best to enforce it, there had been no reports by either side of heavy clashes by yesterday evening. If relative calm prevails, the Israeli Foreign Minister, Mr Shimon Peres, may meet Mr Arafat as early as tomorrow, with the aim of formalising the ceasefire. Mr Sharon said he hoped the meeting would take place "next week". Mr Peres spoke of "two days".
Some Israeli government sources have indicated that the Prime Minister, who has postponed the Peres-Arafat meeting several times because of outbursts of violence, would not now cancel such talks over "minor" incidents.
They cited intermittent grenade and gunfire attacks on Israeli army positions at Rafah, at the southern foot of the Gaza Strip, where Mr Arafat's forces are having difficulties enforcing the truce.
The US has been pushing hard for the Arafat-Peres meeting; Mr Peres has called it "one small request" by the US that Israel ought to honour.
Mr Peres has been holding preparatory meetings with two of Mr Arafat's most trusted colleagues, Mr Abu Ala and Mr Saeb Erekat.
Israeli tanks and machine gunners traded heavy fire early this morning with Palestinian gunmen in the area around the West Bank town of Beit Jala.