And several liberal Israeli legislators said this afternoon that if the army was willing to deal with a nonviolent civil protest so harshly, it would only encourage Palestinians to use violence instead.

Uri Savir, an Israeli legislator who negotiated with the Palestinians in secret over 1,100 days at the landmark Oslo talks, said he was not surprised by the horrible hours.

"This was a major, major mistake, maybe a historic mistake," said Dedi Zucker, a liberal Israeli legislator.

Right-wing Israeli legislators and others have been issuing almost weekly calls for his arrest.

There is not total secrecy: Israeli legislators are briefed in detail about the nuclear program in closed-door classified committee meetings, and some tour the Dimona plant.

One Israeli legislator said Syria was in a weak position, and suggested that Israel might be able to win concessions if talks were held soon.

As Mr. Arafat's emphatic geniality toward the Israeli legislators suggested, the sands are shifting swiftly now.

Mr. Nosair is charged with the fatal shooting of Mr. Kahane, a militant former Israeli legislator and former head of the Jewish Defense League.

The key, says Natan Sharansky, the former Soviet dissident who is now an Israeli legislator, is to make sure that democratic forces bring order first.

This week a left-wing Israeli legislator, Yossi Sarid, called on the army to stop using plastic bullets, adding, "They say the bullet isn't lethal, but I'm not sure the bullet knows it."