I tend to agree with Stephen Green’s take on the meaning of the appointment of Abu Mazen as Palestinian prime minister; on the one hand, there’s the concern that it’s all another Arafat shell game, but on the other it’s fairly clear that the intifada just ain’t working. The presence of over 200,000 U.S. personnel within a 400 mile radius of Ramallah may also have also had a strongly clarifying effect on the minds of the Palestinain Authority higher-ups—it probably doesn’t hurt that a lot of people have the (IMHO wrong) impression that there’s a cabal of bloodthirsty neocons in Washington just waiting for an excuse to wipe the PLO, Hezbollah, Hamas, and PIJ from the face of the earth.

I largely agree as well that the main problem isn’t so much the Palestinians as their enablers in the European Commission, most notably Chris “I used to be for the rule of law, but fuck it” Patten. If the EU can get its own house in order, I suspect the Palestinians, once faced with the full economic consequences of their leaders’ stupidity, will fall into line in short order.

Previously blogged here.