Saturday's editon of the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune includes a op-ed of mine, on how this round of Middle East violence could have been avoided: if Bush and the Israeli government strengthened the pragmatists of Hamas looking to move towards a recognition of Israel, instead of undermining them.

The piece covers much of the same ground as last week's LiberalOasis post, "Letting the Militants Win," but includes additional info about the little covered split in Hamas between pragmatists and militants, and how the split led to the abduction of Israeli soldiers.

The Star Tribune piece references articles about the Hamas factions from the Asia Times and The Jewish Week. Both are very much worth reading in full.