So as best as I can understand the Obama administration’s framework for a final-status agreement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth — it’s to get the contours of a deal in place and then flesh out the implementation of the deal “within a number of years, apparently up to ten years [...]

Turkey is threatening to cut off ties to Israel over the flotilla raid. (Apparently back-channel talks aimed at repairing the breach in the Israel-Turkey relationship didn’t get very far.) But through Marc Lynch’s twitter feed, we learn: Bashar al-Asad: Turkey cutting ties with Israel would harm stability, peace in the region Marc’s source for that is [...]

The ultimate victory for the Mavi Marmara: Israel has decided to ease the blockade of Gaza, shifting its policy closer toward what supporters of the blockade said it was always supposed to accomplish, preventing Hamas from stockpiling weapons. We’ll have to wait to see how much so-called ‘dual use’ material — stuff that could have [...]

Thanassis Cambanis has an absolute must-read in Foreign Affairs from Gaza about how thoroughly Hamas has benefited materially from the now-to-be-loosened Israeli siege. You know, like most ruling cliques subject to the most-often-counterproductive tactic of economic strangulation. (Sigh.) This, however, ought to be explored: Since the 2006 elections, Hamas’ brain trust has been trying to [...]

Call it the Rorshach Doctrine. Fadi Elsalameen has perhaps the most insightful column on the Gaza Siege written since the inception of this cruel mistake.

Mahmoud Abbas: When asked what he could offer Israelis to show that he was serious about peace initiatives, Abbas reminded the participants that he had addressed the Israeli public in an interview on Channel 10. “Why wouldn’t Bibi go to Palestinian TV and do the same?” said the Palestinian president. “I would never deny [the] [...]

I see where Andrew Sullivan is coming from here, but the sight of a headline like “Was Israel A Mistake?” is enough to make me uncomfortable. Despite some really sleazy recent attacks on him, there isn’t an anti-semitic or anti-Zionist bone in Andrew’s body, and it’s sadly typical of a Manichean debate over the Arab-Israeli [...]

Must read of the day: Eli Lake’s beast of a piece about how the establishment American Jewish organizations have abandoned their longstanding sub-rosa efforts lobbying on behalf of the former Israeli quasi-ally now that the Turkish government has broken with Israel over Gaza. On the one hand, the Shtetl Elders are throwing “Islamist” at the [...]

So this is what I was at this morning: Henri Barkey, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Middle East Program, had an idea for Israel to turn the diplomatic tables on Hamas for the first time since establishing the Gaza blockade. They can reiterate their call for Hamas to release captured soldier Gilad Shalit; rely [...]

I have little to add to Marc Lynch and Kristin Lord’s excellent post about the flotilla raid as a crisis point for the Obama administration’s outreach to the Muslim world. Just read every word. All that I’d care to add is that it underscores how much wishful thinking is involved in asserting that the Israeli-Palestinian [...]