Is this reconciliation a gambit by Abbas?

I just saw this story about Hamas suppressing a pro-reconciliation rally in Gaza City.

That is, Hamas suppressed a rally in support of a process it supposedly embraces.

That speaks to a well known structural problem with Hamas (as opposed to its ideological problem, which is that it embraces racism and terrorism both): It’s rear end is often not cognizant of the actions of its elbow, to put it delicately.

So I wanted to predict here one possible outcome of this "reconciliation":

A) It flops.

B) It flops because of Hamas.

C) Mahmoud Abbas, armed with "I tried" legitimacy, has a freer hand to … what? That far I won’t predict. Go for the unilateral declaration of independence? Fire up peace talks with Israel? Both?

I’m not saying Abbas knows for sure this is where "reconciliation" will lead. I would be stunned though if he didn’t count the scenario in the likely column.

Which brings us to: What should Israel and the United States do?

I’m at the American Jewish Committee’s annual Washington conference, and I just attended a session in which Robert Wexler, mostly defending Obama administration Middle East strategy, and Elliott Abrams, mostly attacking, actually agreed for the most part on what Israel should do.

Both said that Israel needed to be more creative in dealing with the democracy movements roiling the region. Instead of reflexive "gevalts," Israel should show creativity. If Obama calls for a solution based on 1967 lines, with land swaps, Abrams said, instead of clutching his head, Bibi Netanyahu should say "great — we’re all for not going back to 1967 borders." (Note the "with land swaps.") That concedes little and gives Israel the upper hand, instead of making it look whiny and marginal.

Wexler made pretty much the same argument.

So how would this apply to the reconciliation? They didn’t go there, but let me posit one strategy.

It may be a bridge too far for Israel and its friends in Congress and the Obama administration to embrace the reconciliation as an opportunity, as Americans for Peace Now has suggested.

But how about, instead of giving Hamas an opportunity to say that Israel and the United States torpedoed reconciliation with pressure on Abbas — everyone just stayed shtum?

I know, it’s hard to keep silent faced with the prospect of the legitimization of a terrorist group. But this process offers just such an opening precisely because the reconciliation’s terms are so opaque.

There’s a "wait and see" loophole here large enough for Hamas to crawl inside and disappear.