... so that he will simply attack Hamas like Fatah is supposed to do since it's on the leash of the US and Israel.

That's more in the annals of 21st century colonialism for you. "What good are our askaris if they don't clean up the bloody natives like they are supposed to?"

Meanwhile, the "meddling Arafat" Rosner refers to was the democratically elected president of the Palestinian people when the US/Israel rejected that result and demanded that a new leader be chosen instead. (Of course, Palestinians were required to find war criminal and self-described "judeo-nazi" Sharon a perfect partner for peace.)

Similarly, Hamas was democratically elected, and similarly rejected by the US/Israel, leading, again, to a US/Israel boycott. So the cry is, send us any man you choose, as long as it's just the right one for us.

And Rosner wonders why Abbas walks on eggshells.

Why did we even open up a dialog with Arafat and Fatah in th efirst place? They had been killing Israelis for years! Now that he's gone, we have to dreal with Hamas and Hezbollah!?? What ever happened to the "we do not negotiate with terrorists" attitude.

Just because the Palestinians elect someone, doesn't obligate Israel or the US to deal with them on their terms. Hamas wants to destroy Israel? Good now, they have Gaza, and they can attack Israel anytime they want and face the consequences. The problem is most of the people in Gaza are hostages. They may not have wanted Fatah useless crooks that they were, but the situation has gotten worse since Israel left, and that is Hamas' fault.

Arafat was an elected leader, but he was also a crook and the wealthiest man in the West Bank. He had siphoned off millions in aid money and put it into his own pocket. Truly a great leader.

The Palestinians have been a political football for 49 years. Never any stability, never any peace, never any progress. Fatah never wanted progress, they just wanted the money! Until the Palestinians choose good leaders- ones who seek a solution that allows the people dignity and a secure future - the rest of the world will have to deal with them the best they can.

The only reason this dispute has gone on this long is because the Palestinians can't agree among themselves what they want. They don't even allow discussion. If you say you want peace with Israel you are shunned. Either the Palestinians want war or peace. If Hamas is the real leader of the Gaza, they will start a war sooner or later.

This can only end in peace, either with a war first, or a peace that lasts. Hamas wants to fight the war, but do the Palestinians? Do the people in Gaza? Fatah and the West Bank might look pretty good by comparison.

Most Palestinians know they can't win a war against Israel. The pragmatic solution is to gain control over your own territory and make it work. The rest of the world is sick of this and rightly so.

The Palestinians only have themselves to blame for not dealing with Israel successfully.

Rosner is a wonderful addition to Slate and one of the very few writers who speak truth to power on Middle East issues.In this post, he didn't even say anything controversial, just that trusting Abbas to be the leader Bush and Olmert expect him to be is very unlikely to happen.

What were the terms that Hamas proposed that justified the US/Israel/UN boycott of that democratically elected government? In fact, Hamas was given no chance to perform its duties as the elected representatives of the Palestinian people. What they refused to do was renounce violence and accept the right of the state of Israel to exist. But neither the US nor Israel has renounced the use of violence, and both are guilty of invading countries and murdering citizens in the very recent past. The Palestinian people have been the victims of Israeli violence throughout the brutal occupation of the Palestinian territories. The withdrawal of Israel was followed by a shutting down of Gaza and further restrictions of the movement of people and goods within Gaza, and in and out of Gaza. People have been suffering and dying for lack of medicine, food, etc. The disengagement plan had nothing to do with moving toward peace or giving the Palestinian people their own state and everything to do with a shallow attempt to rid the Israeli government of its obligations toward the Palestinians as an occupying force. Yes, the situation has gotten worse, but it is the fault of Israel.

Hamas is the only party that maintained any restraint regarding the use of violence, and this in the form of a ceasefire which was largely ignored by Israel and the west. Hamas has also, on several occasions, offered a truce with Israel for an indefinite period of time. Israel ignored this effort toward peace as it has ignored every such effort.

Israel has never promised a real state for the Palestinian people. Arafat, corrupt monster that he was, did recognize Israel, as well as forsaking the Palestinian right of return, but it won him nothing for his people. Instead, there was an increase in illegal settlements in the territories throughout the years following the Oslo accords.

Of course Hamas refuses to recognize the right of Israel to exist as a state with one set of laws and rights for Jewish people, and another for Arab citizens. To do otherwise would be to accept the blatantly racist laws inflicted upon the Palestinians living in Israel.

Which Israel is it that demands recognition? Which borders are we talking about? 1967 lines? Israel has no intention of returning to these borders, as Olmert tell us “…there is an obligation to emphasize that the government’s position and public consensus rule out returning to the 1967 lines.”
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/co​ok.php?articleid=10171

So, we have a democratically elected government which Israel refuses to negotiate with, and which much of the western world boycotts with brutal sanctions.

It was not long ago that Fatah was found to be an unfit partner for negotiations. Now Abbas is suddenly the leader of all Palestinians. It is just another blatant and pathetic lie.

The goal of Israel is to maintain at all cost the Jewish nature of its state, democracy be dammed. Further, Israel wants to take land that is desirable and expel the indigenous population from these lands. But in its greed and aggression, Israel is making the two state solution - never something it was committed to to begin with - a near impossible solution. This is counter to its own interests because, apathetic and indifferent as the international community is, it will not allow Israel to completely eradicate the Palestinian people. This means that sooner or later, the Palestinian people will be citizens of Israel.

And nobody finds it hypocritical that Palestinians are forced to recognize Israels "right" to exist, but Israelis and the U.S. don't have to recognize Palestinians right to exist, and their right to democratic elections? We cant go around refusing to recognize foreign governments, and doing illegal things to them, yet expect them to recognize, and respect us as sovereign nations. Any government elected by the people is LEGITIMATE.

The same thing that happened to the Bush foreign policy, Carter's foreign policy, and Woodrow Wilson's. It migrated from a moralist "With us or Against Us" to a Realist "We'll take friendly assets where we can get them". All moralist foreign policies eventually suffer this self-correction.