The Israeli Cabinet’s endorsement of the road map, following yesterday’s vote, should have come as little surprise. The Middle East peace plan is the only initiative currently on the table and without the Cabinet’s green light, the plan would have hit a dead end and Israel would have been blamed for not wanting a settlement to be reached. In addition, the road map is the only initiative which the United States, a party that helped draft it, is willing to deal with — meaning that Israel would have risked being put in Washington’s doghouse had it not gone along with what its closest ally wants. The Cabinet approval not only gives new incentives for peace in the region but as a result, a summit meeting may now be held between President Bush, Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Egypt at Sharm El-Sheikh early next month. Sharon was expected to get the majority of his 23-member Cabinet to vote for the road map, believing it was better to support the plan and have reservations than to ignore it altogether.

Still, there was — and remains — serious opposition from far-right parties. The National Union, with two Cabinet members, released a statement ripping into the peace plan, saying it “endangers the mere existence of the state of Israel” and “encourages terror by giving a political prize to those who conduct the massacre and terror of innocent civilians.” But the National Union and the pro-settlement National Religious Party, both of which had threatened to leave the government over the road map, have relented and will remain in Sharon’s coalition.

The Israeli Cabinet’s approval of the road map does not mean, however, that it has been given the same blessing by Sharon. He had previously requested at least a dozen changes to the document. But armed with White House assurances that Israeli reservations will be addressed, Sharon announced on Friday his acceptance of the peace initiative. The Palestinians worry that by agreeing to consider Israel’s concerns, the administration was allowing Israel to change the road map even before its earliest benchmarks are implemented. They worry that Washington has opened the door to protracted negotiations on the “concerns” and will let Israel off the hook about following through as the peace plan is put into effect.

American officials who have been desperate to demonstrate movement in the peace process appear to have put themselves in a difficult situation. By bending to Israeli concerns, they may have, in effect, done exactly what Colin Powell had warned about a week earlier — that the US wanted to avoid a long period of negotiations on the road map and did not want the process to fall into “another endless loop of discussions and negotiations.”

The Palestinians, on the other hand, have accepted the road map without conditions. They have not presented any reservations, given that some of Israel’s concerns deal with undermining the very essence of the road map which is to have parallel obligations in place rather than Palestinian-first obligations. Israeli Cabinet acceptance of the road map will be welcomed in Washington as a way to move beyond an impasse that had developed over Israel’s reluctance. But America’s decision to take into account Israeli concerns as the parties try to move ahead may mean too much bending backward.