A midst the rage, grief and despair over the killing of 57 Israelis in a quick-fire series of Hamas bombings, it is understandable that many find it hard to see how the Middle East peace process can possibly continue.
Israeli troops are back in the West Bank in force.
Palestinian towns once more have been sealed off, and hundreds of Palestinian activists, suspected of being Islamic extremists, have been arrested. It's as if that famous handshake between Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin on the White House lawn never happened. But the images of torn bodies and twisted steel obscure the enormous changes that have taken root in Israel, the Palestinian territories and the larger Arab world since the 1993 Israel-PLO accord. Israelis have dramatically broadened their diplomatic and economic horizons, producing a warm peace with neighboring Jordan and commercial relations with a half-dozen other Arab states. For the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the peace process may not yet have produced their long-sought independent state, but it has given them a cherished measure of political autonomy and personal dignity that they have never before experienced.