The Middle East peace process may not have altogether broken down following the latest failure by the United States's special mediator, Mr Dennis Ross, to convince Israel on a further withdrawal from Palestinian territory, but it is certainly at a very dangerous impasse. It is probably only the fear of more violent alternatives that prevents outside powers, the US included, from abandoning the process, as Arab states freeze their normalisation with Israel. It remains to be seen whether popular impatience among Palestinians or terrorist attacks by Islamic groups reappear to destabilise the region. Despite his comprehensive international isolation the Israeli prime minister, Mr Netanyahu, has made little secret of his distrust of the Palestinian leader, Mr Yasser Arafat, nor of his cordial dislike of the Oslo accords on which the peace process was constructed by his Labour Party predecessors. The longer he remains in office the more it can be seen that the land-for-peace formula on which the process is based is practically as well as rhetorically rejected by him, as he spelled out in his 1996 election campaign. The assumption that Israel would comply with the solemn legal undertakings made to withdraw from occupied territories according to the timetable agreed under the Oslo accords, despite Mr Netanyahu's opposition, now looks altogether threadbare. Mr Netanyahu, far from accepting withdrawal, has actively encouraged settlements on the West Bank and freely drawn support from their supporters. He insists that Israel will define the parameters of its own security, rather than draw it down from a land-for-peace agreement. He points all too convincingly to the suicide bomb attacks on Israeli civilians which have shattered the process in the years since he came to power. His insistence on reciprocity of Palestinian security measures for the minimalist withdrawals from the West Bank has vastly elongated the peace process and exhausted the patience of many of its players. But Mr Netanyahu has not suffered unduly in the opinion polls. His right-wing coalition now looks more secure despite its chronic factionalism and could well be re-elected if elections became necessary. Israelis themselves have become disenchanted with the Oslo accords; there is precious little evidence that the Labour and peace camps who support the land-for-peace formula enjoy the sway they had when it was put in place, partly because they have provided an ineffective opposition to the ruling right-wing coalition. A much more exclusivist psychology of territorial occupation and armed security is in the ascendant among the Israeli electorate, far removed from the trust and goodwill that would be necessary to accompany the emergence of a fully-fledged Palestinian state. Part of the diplomatic game in recent weeks has been to head off US pressure arising from these political facts. But once Mr Ross reports to President Clinton and the Secretary of State, Mrs Albright, the US administration will have to decide to bring it home much more decisively to the Israeli government that their effective rejection of the Oslo accords will have its costs. The same message has been forcefully conveyed by the European Union during Mr Robin Cook's recent visit, and has been been more delicately expressed by the United Nations Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan. Even if the peace holds and yet another effort is made to convince Mr Netanyahu that more land should be handed over to the Palestinian authority, the diplomatic gloves are likely to come off.