:: The Future of Palestine ::
Since July 2004, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has faced its most serious internal challenge since it was established in 1994. A violent showdown in the Gaza Strip between competing nationalist factions-an "old guard" and a "young guard"-has threatened to destroy the PA and, with it, what little remains of domestic security and order after four years of uprising against Israel. The ongoing turmoil represents a critical danger, not just for Palestinian society and its dreams of a unified state, but also for Israel's plan to disengage unilaterally from Gaza-a plan the United States is counting on to revive the peace process and to regain much-needed credibility in the Middle East. Khalil Shikaki, mais no Foreign Affairs.Comments:
Perhaps the second intifada has come to an end. Perhaps the cease-fire in the Gaza Strip will develop into a general, mutual cease-fire. For me, the word “cease-fire” has an extra resonance. When I was a soldier in the 1948 war, I twice experienced what it means to wait for a cease-fire. Ury Avnery, mais no 