Blair won't back Olmert's withdrawal plan

In his first meeting with new Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, British Prime Minister Tony Blair refused to publicly back Israel's unilateral plan for partial withdrawal from the West Bank.

The Guardian reports that Mr. Blair said that unilaterial action was not the best course. Instead, he called on Israel to negotiate with the Palestinians to end the conflict.

"I do not want to go down any other path than a negotiated settlement," Mr. Blair said. He did not deviate from the longterm position that Israel should return to its 1967 borders and hand over the West Bank in its entirety to the Palestinians to form their own state.

The Guardian writes that, in a concession made to avoid alienating the Israeli government, Blair did agree with Mr. Olmert that "if negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians failed to make progress, the status quo was not an option." Blair went on to say that it was up to the international community to "either put our best effort into making sure that negotiated settlement becomes a reality, or we are going to face a different reality."

Ha'aretz reported on Tuesday that international opposition to its unilaterial withdrawal plan has led Israel to draft an alternative plan that would be executed in cooperation with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.

According to the plan now being drafted by the Prime Minister's Office and the Foreign Ministry, Israel would propose to Abbas that they reach an agreement to establish a Palestinian state with provisional borders in Gaza plus about 90 percent of the West Bank. The provisional border in the West Bank would match the route of the separation fence, with one exception: Israel would retain security control over the Jordan Valley.

In this way, Israel hopes to present the convergence plan as an implementation of Phase II of the road map peace plan, thereby acceding to the demands of the United States, Jordan, Egypt and others that Israel resume negotiations with the PA under the road map.

Under this proposal, the parties would proceed to Phase II without waiting for the completion of Phase I, which calls for dismantling the terrorist infrastructure.

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Meanwhile, in an analysis of the growing conflict between Hamas and Fatah over control of the Palestinian Authority, Time magazine argues "escalating violence and political tension may leave Israel living alongside a failed Palestinian state whose dangers can't be contained." Time argues that all of the players involved may not have thought out the long term implications of their current strategies.

The U.S. and Europe are using financial strangulation as a tactic to oust the Hamas government and resurrect a discredited Fatah regime in the hope that it can cut a deal with Israel; President Mahmoud Abbas is playing a game of political chicken with Hamas, while Hamas is trying to combine the mutually exclusive options of responsible governance and armed struggle. Israel, for its part, has no faith in negotiations with the Palestinian leadership and has made clear it plans to unilaterally redraw its borders; all the while, it is responding to rockets fired from Gaza with military strikes. But the sum total of all of these pressures may spell the collapse of the Palestinian Authority, leaving Israel living alongside a chaotic political entity not altogether unlike Somalia: awash with guns, broken into mini-fiefdoms ruled by unstable coalitions of warlords, and fertile soil for al-Qaeda.

Time writes that, in the past when tensions escalated, both sides could count on the US and European mediators to help find a way out of the crisis. But a "diplomatic vacuum" has been created when the Western powers withdrew following the election of Hamas. Also, following last week's explosion that killed a Palestinian family picnicking on a beach in Gaza, hardline elements within Hamas who are totally opposed to any talks with Israel appear to be gaining the upper hand.

The Jerusalem Post reports the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) has concluded that evidence shows the beach explosion was not caused by an Israeli naval shell, but most likely by a mine planted by Hamas supporters to prevent operations by Israeli special forces. But Ha'aretz reports, however, that "The importance of the committee's findings are obviously mitigated by the fact that ultimately, the IDF is being cleared by an IDF investigation."

The Los Angeles Times reports that factional violence spread from Gaza to the West Bank. Early on Monday, Hamas gunmen attacked a police building in Gaza that is dominated by Fatah supporters. Later in the day, hundreds of security officers loyal to Mr. Abbas went on a rampage in the West Bank town of Ramallah, shooting into the Palestinian parliament buildings.

Armed Fatah men later destroyed furniture and computers in a Hamas office in Ramallah and, separately, kidnapped Khalil Rabai, a Hamas legislator, from a street in the same city. Rabai was released unharmed a little over an hour later and taken by authorities to Abbas's presidential compound in Ramallah. Abbas was in Gaza City at the time.

Following news of Rabai's abduction, mosques in Gaza aired calls for Hamas followers to take to the streets in protest.

The Associated Press reports that Abbas's office issued a statement condemning the attacks, although Hamas lawmakers said they did not think the president had done everything in his power to prevent it from occuring.

The Chicago Tribune reports that the unrest has been fueled by the power struggle between Abbas and Hamas over control of the security forces, and over Abbas's call for a referendum on a statehood plan that implicitly recognizes Israel. Hamas has rejected the referendum and has declared it illegal.

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• Feedback appreciated. E-mail Tom Regan .