The people of Israel voted Hamas

In the elections for the 18th Knesset, the people of Israel also determined the future of the Palestinian leadership. The scenario that Mahmoud Abbas and his diplomatic platform will survive and remain viable vis-a-vis Benjamin Netanyahu's government, much like Yasser Arafat in 1996, is highly unlikely. An absence of a diplomatic process, and the expected strengthening of Hamas as a result, will lead to Fatah's abandonment of the diplomatic arena and its linkage with, or replacement by, Hamas.

Arafat was forced to watch Netanyahu, who saw "the PLO state" as an existential danger, put together a right-wing government. The Western Wall Tunnel episode, American pressure, the temporary war against terror, and support of the diplomatic process from a majority of the public yielded few diplomatic fruits - the Hebron Agreement and the Wye River Memorandum - yet kept the process going. The PLO did not lose its superiority to Hamas even while Netanyahu canceled negotiations on a final-status agreement, reduced the scope of Israeli withdrawals as stipulated by the interim agreement, and enabled the doubling of the Israeli population in the territories.

Abbas survived during the Olmert government's term due to the support of moderate Arab states and most of the international community, American aid, and the Israel Defense Forces' presence in the West Bank. A Netanyahu government is tantamount to compounding Abbas' predicament: an Israeli refusal to discuss the Arab initiative; the absence of a binding document in the wake of the Annapolis process; Hamas control of Gaza, which is gaining more legitimacy following Operation Cast Lead; a strengthening of "the Iranian camp;" a limping economy; and a further increase in the number of settlers.

If Netanyahu overcomes American pressure and the ostracism of Europe and the Arab states, he will have to carry out the "legacy" of Ehud Olmert, Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak. If Avigdor Lieberman succeeds in limiting the High Court of Justice on security matters, Netanyahu could complete the construction of the security fence along a route that will carve up the West Bank. He could fulfill the National Union's demand to "launder" the outposts in the spirit of the agreements Barak negotiated with the settlers. He will issue tenders for the building of settlements west of the fence, and the troika of leaders who sanctified the fence route as the future border will not be able to utter a sound from the opposition. The simmering tensions in the West Bank will serve as a pretext for Netanyahu to maintain the hundreds of checkpoints that have strangled the Palestinian economy, and Barak can only keep mum.

The response to the Israeli elections was the acceleration of talks between Hamas and Fatah, with Egypt's support, all toward the goal of creating a Palestinian entity to cope with Israel's expected abandonment of the Annapolis process and Lieberman's demand to topple Hamas. This is tantamount to a violation of the renewed cease-fire, if one is attained. If the Palestinian reconciliation process bears fruit, Hamas will renounce its declared goal of establishing a new PLO and will join the existing one, a process that will encourage calls to reintroduce the principle of "resistance" into the PLO platform and condition its adherence to existing agreements on Israel's abiding by those same agreements.

The absence of a substantive diplomatic process will move Fatah, 16 years after the Oslo Accords, to acknowledge that its strategic decision to opt for the diplomatic route and to abandon "the armed struggle" has failed. The distance from this point to a complete takeover of the PLO, which is recognized as the sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, by the Hamas agenda is short.

Thus, in a stroke of irony, PLO negotiators are awaiting Netanyahu and Lieberman with Hamas-like viewpoints, amid the international pressure that will be put on Israel to advance a solution of two states for two peoples. One may assume that none of them will want to discuss the alternative of one state between the Jordan River and the sea because in such a state, in which a majority of citizens will be Palestinian, Lieberman's citizenship law will come back to hit us like a boomerang.

The writer is a member of the board of directors of the Council for Peace and Security and one of the architects of the Geneva Initiative.