In an ironic echo of a celebrated television film about the effects of a nuclear explosion, commentators have for some time been referring to the aftermath of the Israeli election as "The Day After". The news media love stark contrasts and, at least on the face of it, the differences between Ariel Sharon and his defeated rival, Ehud Barak, could not be greater.
Mr Barak went out of his way to make a peace deal with the Palestinians; Mr Sharon will apparently refuse to negotiate unless there is a halt to the intifada.
Mr Barak pulled Israeli troops out of Lebanon; it was Mr Sharon who masterminded the original invasion back in 1982.
Mr Barak once told a television interviewer: "If I were a Palestinian of the right age, I would eventually join one of the terrorist organisations"; Mr Sharon has the image, as he wryly acknowledged himself, of a person who "eats Arabs for breakfast".
Mr Barak's hobby is described as "taking apart clocks and locks"; Mr Sharon's other interest is farming, and he wants to lock the door on the Palestinians unless they play the game by another set of rules.
There are similarities. Both men were army generals with a formidable record in combat. For all his reputation as a "dove", Mr Barak was the most decorated soldier in Israeli history.
Mr Sharon is credited with saving the state of Israel during the Yom Kippur war in 1973, when he launched a counter-attack against Egyptian forces across the Suez Canal.
Mr Barak cracked down on Palestinian protesters and more than 300 have died at the hands of Israeli troops since the intifada began over four months ago. The outside world was appalled but Israeli public opinion felt he was too soft.
Feeling themselves under siege, many Israelis wanted more than containment, they wanted the iron fist. Now they have got one: nicknamed "The Bulldozer", Mr Sharon is possibly the most feared and hated Israeli leader of all among the Palestinians and in the Arab world generally.
Born Ariel Scheinerman, the son of Russian immigrants in British-ruled Palestine in 1928, he was involved as a youth in the struggle to set up an Israeli state. His undoubted bravery and occasional brilliance as a soldier were overshadowed at times by his involvement in controversial incidents.
In 1954 he commanded a retaliatory raid on an Arab village during which civilian homes were bombed with the inhabitants inside. A total of 69 people were killed, about half of them women and children, but Mr Sharon claimed he did not know they were there.
His achievements on the battlefield were again clouded in 1982 when an Israeli government commission found that he had not done enough to prevent the massacre of Palestinians by Christian militiamen at the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps in West Beirut, an area under Israeli control. He got a slap on the wrist for that when he was removed from the Defence Ministry, but was retained as minister without portfolio.
On the other hand he was also responsible for dismantling Jewish settlements in the Sinai peninsula as part of the historic peace deal with Egypt. More recently, he was the ostensible cause for the start of the current intifada when he outraged the Palestinians with a visit, under heavy security, to Jerusalem's Temple Mount.
Now he has emerged the winner in Israel's first election held exclusively for the post of prime minister. Commentators are divided on the significance.
Many would say it marks a clear turn to the right by the electorate: Mr Sharon would probably hit back even harder than Mr Barak at Palestinian stone-throwers and snipers, deploying overwhelming force to crush the revolt.
There is another school of thought which sees Mr Sharon as a transitory figure, so far to the right and so inflexible that he will be unable to maintain a stable administration.
In this scenario his predecessor as leader of the Likud Party, the former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, would probably replace him in the short to medium-term.
A biographer has written that Mr Sharon taught his soldiers that Jews must not remain passive but return Arab aggression tenfold. Whatever may be his personal instincts, the Bush administration will want the new prime minister to exercise some restraint.
Moderate Arab regimes will come under domestic pressure to take a more militant approach if Mr Sharon lives up to his hardline reputation. At the very least, the iron fist will have to be accompanied by some type of diplomatic activity.
If he forms a national unity government with, say, Mr Shimon Peres as foreign minister, some faint breath of life may remain in the peace process.
Mr Sharon said relatively little during the campaign and attempts were made to project a more mellow image of the old warhorse: the worst moment was when a 16-year-old schoolgirl accused him for the after-effects her father still suffered from the Lebanese invasion.
It is still less than two years since Mr Barak, standing on a peace platform, won a convincing electoral victory over Mr Netanyahu. Now a disillusioned public has chosen the ultimate "hard man". The dramatic swing suggests not a fickle but an insecure electorate.
While to the outsider the balance of forces might seem decisively on Israel's side, that is not the way it looks on the ground in Haifa or Tel Aviv. The enemy hordes are at the gate and, though poorly armed, their attacks are relentless.
Mr Barak is seen as a well-meaning but inept politician who was "taken for a sucker" by the wily Yasser Arafat. It was seen as time to change the fortress commander who, judging by past performance, would bring not peace, but a sword.