With the European Union summit in Nice still continuing as the continent's newspapers went to press, speculation about the outcome dominates many of Europe's opinion columns, while the future of democracy in Israel and the United States also comes under scrutiny.

Nice of the long nights

"With knives drawn", is how the headline of an editorial in Geneva's Le Temps describes difficult negotiations at the European Union summit meeting in Nice.

"One can of course raise the question of whether this row with knives drawn would not have been easier if it had taken place elsewhere," it says.

It adds that for several weeks the French leaders have been "obsessed" with preventing Germany from getting greater representation than itself within the European institutions.

"France finally won the case," it says. "But this exploit was only made possible by seriously alienating the small countries."

Europe cracks up in Nice

"Europe in pieces", is how the front page headline of Liberation in Paris describes its predicted outcome of the summit.

"The Nice summit was heading last night towards a minimal agreement on the reform of the institutions which was obtained by France at the cost of making concessions," it says.

"Why France gave in to Germany," is the lead headline in Le Figaro in Paris.

"During the day, France gave Germany more than its due, at the risk of upsetting the small countries," the paper says.

"The last plan circulated by the French in the summit corridors still gave 30 votes to the Germans and 30 to the French in the European Council of Ministers," it adds.

But it says that to do so France had to give Germany certain guarantees.

"Thus the Nice compromise...is also a reflection of the new post-Cold War reality: a Europe where Germany is the dominant power and in which enlargement towards the east enables it to return to the geographical, but also the political centre of the Union," it says.

Germany powers ahead

"Germany gains a greater share of power in the EU at Nice", says a headline on the front page of Madrid's El Pais.

"The Nice summit ... consolidates Germany as the country at its heart with the most power," the paper says.

It says that following an agreement by Europe's leaders, Germany could now block any decision if it joined forces with any two of the three big EU countries - France, the United Kingdom or Italy.

Spanish veto confusion

El Pais also adds that Spain has accepted that it will lose the ability to veto decisions that is enjoyed by the larger EU countries.

This is in stark contrast to a headline in another Madrid daily, ABC, which says: "Spain will enjoy a veto power similar to that of France, the United Kingdom and Italy in the EU".

ABC says that Spain has come out well from what it calls "the tough battle for power" in the EU.

"One can say," it says, "without risking to sound triumphalist, that our country has won in Nice."

French 'sabotage' eastern enlargement

Germany's Frankfurter Rundschau says the tortuous negotiations at the EU summit in Nice have revealed continued mistrust of Germany's role in Europe.

It explains that France sees the planned accession of eastern European countries to the EU as mainly in Germany's interest and is therefore trying to sabotage it.

The paper suggests that a solution to these problems can only be found on the basis of a debate by the EU about itself.

"In this way", it says, "it will be possible to resolve the German question to Berlin's and everybody else's satisfaction, that is to say as the Europeanization of Germany rather than the Germanification of Europe."

A headline in Hungary's Magyar Nemzet simply asks the question "Have they agreed in Nice?", while another Hungarian paper, Magyar Hirlap, describes the situation as "endless bargaining at the EU summit".

The latter says "reality has exceeded the most extreme scenario" because "on Sunday evening it cannot even be predicted when the heads of states and government, who have been in non-stop discussions for four days, will reach an agreement on the EU's institutional reforms".

Nice personal hygiene

Slovakia's Novy Cas says that in Nice "senior statesmen chaotically played their trump cards, threw in more and more figures and haggled over various ideas".

In the same country, Pravda took a different angle and worried about the confusion and upheaval in the politicians' travel arrangements, food provision and even personal hygiene caused by the unexpected extension of the event.

Sme adopted a factual attitude and having told its readers all about the rows and subsequent compromises, it noted that the summit discussions could not go on indefinitely because things were becoming "increasingly more and more complicated".

The European press review is compiled by BBC Monitoring from internet editions of the main European newspapers and some early printed editions.