The landmark reconciliation agreement unveiled in Cairo between the Palestinian groups Fatah and Hamas should be a cause for celebration, albeit tempered by some skepticism.
The statements delivered on the momentous occasion, the ostensible end to years of stalemate and division, have sounded all of the right notes. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas says the reconciliation will turn the page on a phase of ugly discord, while Hamas’ Khaled Mashaal is pledging to do anything it takes to translate the agreement into facts on the ground.

In fact, such statements by Palestinian politicians, who regularly promise to work for the greater good of the Palestinian people, have been made before, in different contexts. But with the Cairo agreement, there is now reason for observers and others to watch carefully what happens next.
Palestinian leaders must prove wrong the many skeptics, and demonstrate the maturity and responsibility needed to move the reconciliation from the realm of photo opportunity to one of political reality.

The track record of the Palestinians has seen them miss a score of opportunities to press forward with their announced campaign of achieving national sovereignty. They have experienced bitter and bloody factional infighting that has resulted in a depressing list of human casualties on both sides, while delaying the prospects of peace, and a Palestinian state. Needless to say, the internal divisions have given Israel a prize in the form of a pretext that it has repeated ad infinitum: There is no Palestinian partner for peace.

According to Palestinian leaders, all of the lost opportunities can now be considered a thing of the past. It might be easy to be cynical about the achievement in Cairo, but the reconciliation announcement did come in the wake of the momentous changes under way in the Arab world, led by Egypt.
Perhaps the Arab revolutions have caught the attention of the Palestinians, who might end their history of being pulled in different directions by regional and international powers, and finally translate their dreams of statehood into reality. These divisions and external alliances have been detrimental to both the Palestinians and their backers, it should be noted.

While the reconciliation represents a major achievement, the pressure is naturally on the Palestinians to deliver, in the form of presidential and parliamentary elections within a year, to cement the rapprochement.
But another test will come sooner, when the United Nations General Assembly holds its annual meeting in September. The Palestinians must now capitalize on the recent international support for achieving statehood, a dream that has seemed impossible to achieve amid the grinding Fatah-Hamas stalemate.
In the run-up to the meetings in New York, the world will be watching to see whether the Palestinians can continue moving toward unity, and will have scant patience for any acts that derail their momentum generated in Cairo.