Gaza is now in the hands of Hamas and Palestine is reeling from the conflict. Hundreds of Gazans are gathered at the Eretz crossing to get to Palestine and the West Bank itself is falling into a crisis of authority. What is to come of Palestine?

The LA Times mourns the rise of “Hamastan” in Gaza: “This outcome is further evidence that President Bush has spent six years allowing a terrible foreign policy problem to grow unimaginably worse.”

Fouad Ajami says that the “Palestinian ruin was a long time in coming. No other national movement has had the indulgence granted the Palestinians over the last half-century, and the results can be seen in the bravado and the senseless violence, in the inability of a people to come to terms with their condition and their needs.”

Rich Lowry argues that Sharon gave the Gazans a kind of pharmicon, a poison pill that could cure or kill: “Sharon adopted the principle of giving the Palestinians what they wanted — good and hard. He left Gaza, leaving the Palestinians who had blamed the occupation for their failings to stew in their own toxic politics and, last week, to rip asunder any hope of a Palestinian state.”

Haaretz calls for an immediate opening of the Erez crossing: Many Israelis…see hundreds of haunted and frightened women and children crowding into the corridor of the Erez crossing and asking to be allowed to flee Gaza through Israel to the West Bank in order to save their lives. But the defense establishment sees something else: It sees wanted terrorists about to blow themselves up and Iranian agents…The pictures at the Erez crossing remind any person who still tries not to forget harsh scenes of locked, sealed gates from the previous century.”

On June 5, 1967 Israel launched the Six Day War. An opportunity for peace came in its aftermath, but it wasn’t taken. The why’s and what’s of that missed chance at peace have the pundits buzzing on this 40th anniversary.

Meir Shalev was born during the 1948 war. He grew up with Israel and next year they will both turn sixty: “Neither of us is young anymore, but I am pleased to report that I look far better. Israel cannot hear anymore, doesn't see well, can't really grasp matters or understand clearly. Worst of all, Israel refuses to undergo the operation that would return it to good health.”

Tom Segev says that “more and more Israelis realize today that Israel gained absolutely nothing from the conquest of the Palestinian territories.” What would have happened if Israel had simply defeated the Arab armies and withdrawn to its 1948 borders? Segev can only imagine the possibilities.

Terence Smith remembers the brief time after the 1967 war when “peace seemed likely and shopping rather than shooting was the major interaction between Israelis and the Palestinians on the West Bank.” No more. Defiant Arab leaders and radical settlers left an opportunity for peace for the selfishness now shown nightly on television screens.

Bret Stephens says that the Six Day War gave Israel the opportunity it needed for survival: “when the sun rose on June 5, 1967, Israel was a poor, desperately vulnerable country, which threw the dice on its own survival in the most audacious military strike of the 20th century. It is infinitely richer and more powerful today, sure in its alliance with the U.S. and capable of making concessions inconceivable 40 years ago.”