Whatever dedication, resources, or creative thinking the Trump administration might bring to bear in trying to resolving the Israel-Palestinian conflict, writes Clifford May, the circumstances for success are, at the moment, simply absent:

Israeli leaders from Labor on the left to Likud on the right are convinced that the withdrawal of their military forces from the West Bank would leave a vacuum—and that jihadists would fill it.

Consider the precedents. In 2005, every Israeli soldier and settler was pulled out of Gaza. Within two years, Hamas had taken control and begun launching missiles at Israeli villages and cities. . . . Five years earlier, the Israelis withdrew from southern Lebanon. That strengthened Hizballah, Iran’s proxy, with whom other wars had to be fought, the last in 2006. . . . Back in 1982, as part of a historic peace agreement signed a few years earlier, Israelis handed the Sinai peninsula over to Egypt. Today, a branch of Islamic State wages an insurgency there. . . .

The Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas—who turns eighty-two this month—does not appear to share Hamas’s religious [dedication to Israel’s eradication]. But were he to end his long career by shaking Netanyahu’s hand on the White House lawn, he’d be labeled a traitor, not just by Hamas but also by those seeking to succeed him in the West Bank, as well as by the Islamic Republic of Iran which, as a direct result of President Obama’s policies, is currently the ascendant power in the Middle East. All this suggests that now is not the time for dramatic diplomatic initiatives. Significant changes will occur once Abbas passes from the scene. American policymakers should be getting ready.

Meanwhile, it’s worth prodding the Palestinians to develop the institutions that both define and sustain true statehood. Lacking those, they will remain dependent on the “donor community” [consisting of the U.S., Europe, and some Arab states] indefinitely. Worse, a Palestinian state could arise, achieve recognition—and then fail. Who would benefit from that?

While conventional wisdom in the Western press believes that the war with Hamas has left Jerusalem more isolated and scuttled chances of expanding the Abraham Accords, Gabriel Scheinmann points to a very different reality. He begins with Iran’s massive drone and missile attack on Israel last month, and the coalition that helped defend against it:

America’s Arab allies had, in various ways, provided intelligence and allowed U.S. and Israeli planes to operate in their airspace. Jordan, which has been vociferously attacking Israel’s conduct in Gaza for months, even publicly acknowledged that it shot down incoming Iranian projectiles. When the chips were down, the Arab coalition held and made clear where they stood in the broader Iranian war on Israel.

The successful batting away of the Iranian air assault also engendered awe in Israel’s air-defense capabilities, which have performed marvelously throughout the war. . . . Israel’s response to the Iranian night of missiles should give further courage to Saudi Arabia to codify its alignment. Israel . . . telegraphed clearly to Tehran that it could hit precise targets without its aircraft being endangered and that the threshold of a direct Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear or other sites had been breached.

The entire episode demonstrated that Israel can both hit Iranian sites and defend against an Iranian response. At a time when the United States is focused on de-escalation and restraint, Riyadh could see quite clearly that only Israel has both the capability and the will to deal with the Iranian threat.

It is impossible to know whether the renewed U.S.-Saudi-Israel negotiations will lead to a normalization deal in the immediate months ahead. . . . Regardless of the status of this deal, [however], or how difficult the war in Gaza may appear, America’s Arab allies have now become Israel’s.