Mr Abbas will not agree, nor should he, to defer negotiations while the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza takes place.
The withdrawal was a precursor to its withdrawal from Gaza in 2005.
Amid the growing dissent within Likud over the withdrawal from Gaza, Ariel Sharon left the party in 2005 along with many allies to form Kadima.
She was a key player during Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 and followed Sharon when he broke away from Likud to form Kadima in 2005.
In essence, what we see in Olmert's and Livni's machinations is a repeat of Ariel Sharon's and Livni's political maneuvering in the period that preceded the withdrawal from Gaza.
Mr Blair said the Palestinian Authority must now "show the political will to make the withdrawal from Gaza a success and to deliver on the roadmap responsibilities, especially regarding security".
However, voters will recognise that under Mahmoud Abbas, a founding member of Fatah, the PA has found itself sidelined in the peace process by Israel's unilateral moves, in particular the withdrawal from Gaza.
So although an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza would be good in itself, easing life for the Palestinians there and reducing armed friction between the two sides, it would not lead automatically to a broader peace.
Olmert, whose primary goal as prime minister is to reenact the failed withdrawal from Gaza twenty-fold in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem cannot enable the Israeli public to see proof on its television screens night after night that the withdrawal was an abysmal failure.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Olmert��s response to Palestinian violence
At the same time, opponents of appeasement - those who had warned of the dangers of the Oslo process and had spoken out against the withdrawal from Lebanon and a potential withdrawal from the Golan Heights and Gaza - were not congratulated for their wisdom.
If the Palestinians refuse, he says, Israel should move towards unilateral withdrawal, first from the Gaza strip, then from much of the West Bank.
Just as the US was supposed to act as a guarantor for the settlement blocs, so, from Livni's perspective, Fatah forces and an international force comprised of European and perhaps US military units were supposed to protect Israel from Gaza in the aftermath of withdrawal from the area.
In 2002 the league backed Saudi plans for a general peace based on an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza, but the deal was rejected by Israel.
Netanyahu was a harsh critic of Kadima founder Ariel Sharon's 2005 withdrawal of Israeli troops and settlers from Gaza, and his supporters say he has been proven right.
And Mr Sharon is unwilling to start these talks until he has carried out his planned withdrawal of all Israeli troops and settlers from Gaza and part of the West Bank, which is due to take place in the middle of this year.
The withdrawal has forced the IDF to defend the communities bordering Gaza from within those communities.
The right-wing Likud, having tried to swallow what was originally a leftist idea (though Mr Sharon, unlike the left, may have intended the Gaza pullout to be Israel's final withdrawal from occupied territory) was near fission.
Despite these recent developments, it is encouraging that Israel has made previous commitments to peace as confirmed by the Camp David Accords, the withdrawal of its forces from the Sinai, the more recent movement of settlers from Gaza, and its official endorsement of pertinent U.N. resolutions establishing its legal borders.
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