Israel/Palestine: leadership crises and the risk of escalation

So, Sharon had a cerebral hemorrhage today… and in Palestine the humiliating concrete barricade that has kept the Palestinians of Gaza separated from those of their countrymen who live in Egypt was breached by out-of-control elements from one of Fateh’s rapidly proliferating lunatic fringes.
Both these events– Sharon’s expected absence from active politics for at least the next few weeks and perhaps forever, and the continuing implosion of Abu Mazen’s Fateh movement (as described in more detail here)– have thrown the Palestinian-Israeli theater into a state of great uncertainty and risk.
Less than two months ago, Sharon upset the complex jigsaw of Israeli party politics by quitting Likud, and set up his own new, highly personalized party, Kadima. In his absence from politics, daily governance of Israel (presumably including of its armed forces) will be under the control of acting premier Ehud Olmert, a reasonably moderate and level-headed man.
But will Olmert be able to ride herd on hawks in the security apparatus in the same way Sharon was able to, when he chose? That’s the first question.
The second is whether the Palestinian election scheduled for January 25 will go ahead… Or if not, what?
The third is how on earth can rapid escalations of violence between Israelis and Palestinians be headed off over the next few weeks?
The fourth, and most burning issue is how can a hopeful, authoritative and far-reaching peace negotiation be started and concluded between these two very fearful, very jumpy national groups amid conditions of such intense political uncertainty– both in their area and also in the region more broadly?
I wish Sharon well as a person. I hope he pulls through this physical crisis. (Though I disagree with the hyperbole engaged in by one Palestinian commentator, Ghazi al-Saadi, who reportedly gushed that Sharon has been “”the first Israeli leader who stopped claiming Israel had a right to all of the Palestinians’ land.” Untrue. Yitzhak Rabin pioneered that position in modern times– and lost his life for it a decade ago.)
But the crisis now engulfing these two peoples is much, much broader than just the fate of that one man, Sharon, or of the infant party he had launched.
… Wow, yet another element has been added to W’s “perfect storm”. Violence, unpredictability, and a real risk of massive escalations in Israel/Palestine, posing a challenge to the Prez at the same time as all the other challenges pouring in on him from inside the US, and from the Persian Gulf…
I think we all need to pray for calm, sanity, inter-human recognition,and the choosing of de-escalatory, nonviolent paths.