Much like Hamas, he is pigeonholed. Hamas is the villain, and Abbas is the weak politician who just can't control the extremists. Mind you, I'm not saying any of this is factually true, I'm just saying that is the perspective in most western countries. Once a politician is diminished that way, or a business leader for that matter, things just don't get better. Well, there are exceptions, but I don't see Abbas as another Churchill, or Palestine as Great Britain.

Nice maneuver.

But that isn't exactly what I meant by differentiating. There is no way to differentiate within Israel when it's in Israel's interests to blame everything on who they choose. It's impossible to prove. The only way for success is to vehemently condemn acts like that, and Hamas doesn't have the...I don't know if status is exactly the right word...to make that believable to the world. There needs to be a central government to say the right things, and unfortunately a method for repressing extremist comments. Yes, that opposes Jeffersonian democracy ideals. But there isn't going to be a Jeffersonian democracy there for centuries if ever, so it's a moot problem.

I think Abbas can't move this forward. Circumstance is what it is. But a strong business leader who isn't interested in war or extreme positions could use his support to get put into power, and do the needful. No guarantees, of course, but there is a decent chance.

It won't happen though, even though this still the most opportune time. It gets less opportune as time passes, and the window will eventually close once again for several years. Sadly.

If so, that is pretty practical proof that it has potential as a strategy. Unfortunately, once the rockets start flying and the kidnappings/murders start, it all goes out the window. I honestly have no understanding of groups like Islamic Jihad. Their concept of life is too dramatically different than mine. I can accept that wars happen, but the idea is to try and find peace, while letting all sides have some dignity.

It's my biggest beef against Woodrow Wilson. But that's a different issue and a different war.

If anyone was to read this link alone, they would never get the impression that atheism had any connection with Norwegians happiness.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2013/10/29/the-worlds-happiest-and-saddest-countries-2013/

Sorry - a true statement.  You yourself have been unable to show from that thread alone that atheism has any connection to Norwegians happiness - in fact, you agreed it does not:
 the first link alone doesn't make the case.
and now you are backtracking?

And, further, again, as noted, you steadfastly refused to note what the link below did say about Norwegians happiness.  Again, very telling.  You just cherry picked.

Remember - no fact is an island to itself.  You might want to practice that with the facts from this link.

My thought process has nothing to do with Israel except peripherally. Someone like al-Masri will have excellent connections in London, New York, and Toronto...probably Germany and France as well. This hypothetical person has to use those types of connections to work directly with G7 countries...all of whom will jump at the chance to look good by welcoming Palestine into the group of civilized countries that want economic growth, not war. It would appeal to the hubris of the other 6 countries, and the US would say all their well laid plans are working out. It has a pretty good chance of working, and making Israel jump on the wagon or look very bad. Obviously this isn't what some parts of Israel wants, but it would be tough to stop.

Part of your problem is you don't watch enough fair and balanced Fox. I wasn't really aware until last night how much effort Israel was putting into propaganda. There were some wild advertisements vilifying Hamas...who I don't really see in as bad a light as many others...and asking for your support via a website called "stophamasnow.com". I haven't worked up the interest yet to check it out, but they were pretty much on every 5-10 minutes. I have MSNBC on now, because I want to see if it's mass advertising.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration is grappling with how to bridge the gap between its increasingly dire assessment of the threat posed by the Islamic State group and the limited, defensive air campaign it has so far undertaken, which military officials acknowledge will not blunt the group's momentum.

For months, administration officials have been divided about the threat posed by the Islamic State as it seized parts of Syria and advanced on towns in Iraq. Now, amid new intelligence about its growing strength, a consensus is forming that the group presents an unacceptable terrorism risk to the United States and its allies.

At issue is whether President Barack Obama, elected on a platform of ending the Iraq war, will heed calls for a campaign to contain or destroy the Islamic State, an undertaking that could dominate U.S. foreign policy for the remainder of his term.

Proponents of doing so argue that the Islamic State must be stopped because it will destabilize America's allies in the region and eventually export terror to Europe and the U.S. Critics of the idea are urging the president just as strongly not to get sucked into another Middle East war, arguing that years of American micromanagement in that region have ended in tears.

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a security forum in Aspen, Colorado, last month that the military is "preparing a strategy that has a series of options to present to our elected leaders on how we can initially contain, eventually disrupt, and finally defeat (the Islamic State group) over time."

Administration officials say the White House has been deeply divided at least since the start of 2014 over how much the Islamic State threatens Americans.

In January, when the militants overran the western Iraqi city of Fallujah, U.S. officials weighed whether to intervene. Since then, the number of Islamic State militants swelled from a few thousand to an estimated 15,000 die-hard members, according to two senior intelligence officials.

Many of the extremists are battle-hardened former members of Saddam Hussein's elite Republican Guard. The Islamic State, which has been disavowed by al-Qaida in a dispute over strategy, wants to strike a terrorist blow at the U.S. to assert its primacy in the jihadist movement, said Derek Harvey, a former Defense Intelligence Agency official who advises U.S. Central Command. "They have been planning do to this for some time," he said. "We just don't know when."