OPTIONS ON GAZA. Well, it turns out I couldn't see where the U.S. ought to go in handling the situation in Gaza because, as The New York Times reported this morning, there are "Few Good Options for U.S. on Palestinian Violence", or perhaps, as another story reported, "a dwindling menu of policy options." I doubt the U.N. peacekeeping force that some Fatah officials and Israelis want will materialize, though I can see why the Israelis want it, because I can't imagine anything more likely to move Europeans away from their support for the Palestinians than having their countrymen caught in the crossfire of a Palestinian civil war. A European Union border force is also under discussion. The move the U.S. is considering of pressuring Israel to dismantle West Bank settlements as a way of shoring up support for Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas seems as likely to be interpreted as a reward to the Palestinian people for militarily defeating his forces in Gaza, and so shore up support for Hamas, instead. If settlement dismantling is to be done, it ought to be done because it is the right thing to do and as part of a broader move toward Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, rather than as a direct response to growing Hamas military power.
Perhaps the hardest thing for Israelis and Americans to do would be to begin to engage with Hamas through informal talks, a policy option the Times reports some in Israel are considering, though I suspect the present American government would be extremely reluctant to go along with this approach. And at least one Israeli observer sees the division of the Palestinians into a Gaza-Hamastan and a West Bank Fatah-land as an opportunity. Should Abbas use the Gaza takeover as an opportunity to annul the Basic Law, the observer suggests, "Israel should consider strengthening Abbas by transferring funds, renewing free movement for trade and lifting constraints on cooperation with Fatah members." In the meantime, the Israelis are also reportedly considering the rather extreme step of cutting power to Gaza-Hamastan's 1.3 million people, though not the water supply. Such a cut-off has been repeatedly considered over the years, and would likely only make the situation even worse, and the population more strongly pro-Hamas.
