Barring some extraordinary electoral reversal, all the signs seem set for Hamas, the militant Islamist movement, to emerge from Wednesday’s Palestinian elections with about one-third of the popular vote. Even if the organisation does not top the poll, it will break the stranglehold of Fatah, the nationalist movement that has grown tired and corrupt after years of political domination.

The democratic breakthrough of Hamas, responsible for almost 60 suicide bombings in Israel in the past five years and still officially committed to destruction of the Israeli state, would seem on the surface like a devastating setback for the peace process. Israeli politicians of all persuasions have condemned the willingness of the international community – including the US and the European Union – to tolerate the participation in the Palestinian poll of an organisation that has yet to renounce the armed struggle, even if it has observed a year-long ceasefire.