By the way, Fatah’s public endorsement of the two-state solution does not necessarily mean it has abandoned the phased plan — namely, take whatever you can now and fight in the future to get the rest.
Even if Mahmoud Abbas agrees to return to the negotiating table with Israel, it is obvious that any agreement he reaches will be automatically rejected by the radicals.
The radicals in this instance are not only Hamas and Islamic Jihad. There are also radicals within Abbas’s Fatah faction — in addition to non-Islamist terror groups, such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Then there are the radicals in the Arab and Islamic countries, such as Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis, who will never accept Israel’s right to exist.
The best Obama and Israel can hope for is some kind of an interim agreement with Abbas, who knows that he does not even have a mandate from his people to make concessions to Israel: his term in office expired in 2009.
Originally published by the Gatestone Institute. Edited from the original version.