BEIRUT — Out of crisis comes opportunity, which describes the current brief lull in the war between Israel and the Palestinian resistance movements in Gaza. Rather than just trying to calm things down, this is the moment to push hard diplomatically towards more serious negotiations, on the basis of a new, more credible, balance of power.

The Israeli government and the two main Palestinian Islamist resistance groups, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, have all indicated their willingness to engage in Egyptian-led indirect talks to bring about a lull in the fighting. Whether this is called a “cease-fire,” a “truce” or — as Khaled al-Batsh, an Islamic Jihad leader in Gaza called it — “a calm atmosphere” that Egypt requested as a prelude to a wider deal, is mere word-craft. The more significant political meaning of what is going on today is that parties that have declared their diehard determination to destroy each other are quietly negotiating implicit coexistence.

Neither side is comfortable with the continuing warfare, even though they can both withstand it and persevere in their attacks. Nor is either side willing now to explicitly accept a formal agreement with the other, though they both benefit from an end to the mutual attacks.

It should be the highest priority of all concerned external parties — the Americans, Arabs, Europeans, Russians and the U.N. — to exert heroic, unrelenting efforts in the coming week to push both sides to an agreement that achieves three things:

1) cements the long-term cease-fire and makes it an open-ended truce;

2) exchanges Israeli and Palestinian prisoners; and,

3) reopens closed border points to allow the Palestinian Gazans to live a normal life and restart their economy.

A fourth urgent goal that should be handled in parallel is an Arab-mediated attempt to revive the unity government between Fatah and Hamas in Palestine, based this time on a clearer agreement for a national internal security force.

The importance of a negotiated long-term truce between Hamas-Islamic Jihad and Israel cannot be over-stated. It would represent a historic breakthrough that could open the way for future negotiations to a permanent resolution of the conflict. It would allow both populations to live a reasonably normal life, free from fear of missile, bomb and rocket attacks from the other. This would spur economic growth, which in turn would provide a powerful base for more urgent peace negotiations — as Northern Ireland taught us. Political leaderships on both sides would enjoy enhanced credibility, at home and in the eyes of the enemy with whom they must negotiate a full peace one day.

Most significantly, a truce would mark a historic and permanent shift in the negotiating balance between Palestinians and Israelis. By entering into a truce, Israel would have acknowledged the impact of the Palestinian Islamic resistance movements, and signaled that it is prepared to engage diplomatically with them. Israel should not hesitate to do this out of an exaggerated sense of honor or political pride, or on the assumption that it is giving an inch and will soon have to concede a mile. For the Palestinians would be making the same concession in return: tacit recognition of and negotiations with the state of Israel, whose legitimacy they had always rejected. When both sides give, they both gain.

A Hamas-Fatah national unity government is inevitable. If it happens in the wake of a new Hamas-Islamic Jihad-Israel truce, such a unity government would be in a stronger negotiating position with Israel. The lesson we learn from this? Inflict enough pain on your enemy, and you open the door to a negotiated agreement to stop the mutual pain. It’s not pretty, but this is how history and nationalism work. This is also how lasting peace can be negotiated by parties of equal credibility.

The current “peace process,” to the contrary, is an embarrassing sham that takes insincerity and self-deception to the level of collective hallucination: The Palestinian leadership of President Mahmoud Abbas meaninglessly suspends and resumes peace talks and pleads shamelessly and unsuccessfully for American life-boats.

New Israeli settlements

Israel continues to expand its colonial settlements in occupied East Jerusalem. The American government that named itself at Annapolis the arbiter of compliance with the “road map” peace-making requirements meekly calls continued Israeli colonization “not helpful” to the peace process; and the Arabs, Europeans, Russians and U.N. seem blissfully oblivious to their potential to play a constructive role in this saga.

The current Israel-Hamas-Islamic Jihad indirect contacts offer a rare opportunity to build a new, more credible diplomatic structure based on two formidable warring parties who respect each other because they have proved themselves able to kill and terrorize each other. They have an incentive to negotiate meaningfully, rather than to smoke delusional diplomatic drugs as Israel, Abbas and the Americans are doing.

Rami G. Khouri is editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon. © 2008 Rami G. Khouri