Operator definitions

I've got a big problem: I had an operator defined as follows:

CREATE OPERATOR ^ ( leftarg = bit1, rightarg = bit1, procedure = bit1xor
);

and this was fine until 6.5.1, but in 6.5.2 I get

ERROR:  parser: parse error at or near "^"


I've got the same problem with 

CREATE OPERATOR | ( leftarg = bit1, rightarg = bit1, procedure = bit1or, commutator = |
); 

but at least that didn't work under 6.5.1 either. Can anybody give me a
hint how to fix this? I know nothing about the parser, or lex or yacc so
I don't even know where to start. I need to fix this rather urgently ,
as I have tons of plpgsql functions that make use of the ^ operator. At
the moment I get a power for all of these which leads to pretty
disastrous consequences :-(.

If anybody can give me any hint at all, I'll have a go at fixing it.
Much appreciated!

Adriaan