A new analysis

Perhaps the situation in the Middle East has changed significantly without our realising it (this analysis is based partly on an interview with Avi Bachur of the Inst for Intl Relations in Herzliya on IBA English News). Since the Second Lebanon War and Operation Cast Lead both the northern Lebanese border and the southern Gaza border have been unusually quiet (there are still rockets being fired from Gaza, but relatively few, and recently there was a period of 10 days when none were fired and this is without a formal ceasefire). Even during the recent war in Gaza, Hizbollah, despite it's threats, refrained from intervention. This is probably due to the drubbing both received from the IDF, even though they both declared victory, that convinced them of Israeli might and the sheer stupidity of trying to provoke us again. Both Sheikh Nasrullah and PM Haniyeh have stated in effect that if they had known of the strength of the Israeli reaction they would not have taken the actions that they did that precipitated these Israeli responses.
If that is the case, then Israel has earned a period of quiet in which the local proxies of Iran will not actively attack us. On the contrary, they are now (as a result?) involved in internal matters, Hizbollah with trying to become a player in Lebanon's internal politics, and Hamas in Gaza trying to face-down the PA in Ramallah and come to terms with the Egyptians. Meanwhile the Egyptians have become much more serious in preventing weapons being smuggled into Gaza, due mainly to their fear of a relationship of Hamas with their own Muslim Brotherhood. All these developments are good for Israel and for quiet in the region, apart from the potential threat from Iran itself.
At the same time there is no possibility of rapprochement between the Islamist pro-Iranian Hamas regime in Gaza and the Palestinian nationalist Fatah regime in the PA on the West Bank. The two are fundamentally opposed and cannot come to any form of unity. Since Israel can only make peace with a Palestinian government that represents all of the Palestinians, that means that any peace process at the moment is illusory.
We should concentrate on helping those Palestinians who want to advance towards a Palestinian State in the PA to develop their economy, infrastructure and governance. This is likely to be the gist of the new policy that the Netanyahu Government will be present to Pres. Obama during his first visit to Washington in June. Only at the end of this (probably long) road can there be a "two state solution." Further, there is no evidence whatsoever that the outcome of peace negotiations between Israel and any Palestinian entity would change the religiously ordained policies of the Shia regime in Iran. Facing this reality is something that the EU and the US must come to terms with, since their oft-repeated mantra of "peace process" is a form of political theater based on wishful thinking.