What About The West Bank?

This week, Mahmoud Abbas plans to ask the UN to recognize Palestine as a "nonmember state." Beinart fears the consequences:

The Palestinian Authority is already in crisis. It can barely pay its employees. It’s been battling protests since the Gaza War began. Abbas himself has repeatedly threatened to resign. And according to Haaretz, he recently told U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that if Israel retaliates against his U.N. bid, “I will invite Netanyahu to the Muqata [the Palestinian Authority’s headquarters] in Ramallah and I will give him the keys.”

Is Abbas bluffing? Who knows. But the legitimacy of his power, and his will to retain it, are both in steep decline. This week’s U.N. bid makes the Palestinian Authority’s collapse more likely than ever before. And if the Palestinian Authority collapses, the danger Israel has been facing in the Gaza Strip could soon pale before the danger it faces in the West Bank.