taken out of the equation somehow, let's say regime change. Hamas is weakened. Let's just say Hamas is weakened because it still exists in the West Bank. It'll still have some presence in Gaza. Can that be a moment in which the Israelis and mainstream Palestinians, the Palestinian Authority, can sit down and work out an arrangement and say, let's finally get the Palestinians some measure of autonomy. I hesitate to say an independent state because that's such a big thing. That's not realizable in the short term. But can they make sufficient progress? Can they give them more autonomy and reach a settlement? Again, because the PA, FATA, the PLO are in meltdown, that is very hard to do. So I would say every crisis provides opportunities. I think this is an opportunity, while it's a crisis, while it's ugly, but I think that it also has embedded within it the space and the time to think outside the box and try things that have not been tried so far. Again, I say that with lots of caveats. (85/99)
You are viewing a single comment's thread from: