After Hamas Victory, Israel’s Likely Course

“The Hamas landslide in Palestinian elections has stunned Israelis, but it may also have brought them a rare moment of clarity: with peace talks off the table, Israel will most likely pursue unilateral actions, drawing its own borders and separating itself from the Palestinians.

Ehud Olmert, the acting prime minister, made it clear after an emergency cabinet meeting that talks with Hamas, a Palestinian party sworn to Israel’s destruction, were out of the question, while experts said Israel was now freer to establish its future on its own.

They said Israel — whose own elections in two months could be heavily influenced by the Palestinian results — was likely to focus on speeding up construction of the separation barrier, which runs along and through parts of the West Bank. ” (New York Times )

I woke up this morning wondering how a Hamas government is ever going to convene in one room, given the likelihood that Israeli intelligence efforts would be devoted to finding out the place and time of such a gathering for — shall we say? — undiplomatic purposes.