Israel’s general election, though still inconclusive, has backed the country into a political gridlock bordering on ungovernability. The overall triumph of the right, furthermore, elbows aside any slender chance Israel will look to its future by giving up the remnant of Palestine it occupied in 1967 and clearing the way for an independent Palestinian state.

It has been a paradox of the past dozen or so years of fizzling peace talks that while a majority of Israelis wanted a negotiated solution their electoral system seemed incapable of disgorging a government capable of closing the deal.