Remember Frank Purdue? Last week’s flurry of events surrounding Israel and the Palestinians made me think of Purdue’s famous commercial slogan: “It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken.”

That’s because series of tough steps designed to highlight the tight corner into which the Palestinians have painted themselves resulted in, at long last, the faintest glimmer of Palestinian moderation.

Since the Hamas win in the Palestinian elections in January, there has been debate over how to react. “Hardliners” argued that the Palestinian Authority should be pushed to the abyss if not of collapse then of crisis. “Doves” argued that America and the European Union shouldn’t “punish the Palestinians” by denying funding for essential social services.

The same debate had a diplomatic echo. For the most part, Washington and Brussels refused to have anything to do with Hamas officials. Moscow, Beijing, and Ankara have hosted Hamas delegations but downplayed the contacts and made a point of arguing with Hamas over their refusal to yield on the three demands that, if met, would open the door to inclusion: recognition of Israel, acceptance of all previously signed Palestinian-Israeli agreements, and the rejection of terrorism.

They also took the opportunity to comment on the unexpected consequences of the Bush administration’s push for greater democracy in the Middle East. When I asked a senior Russian diplomat why Moscow had hosted a Hamas delegation, he answered, “Why did Condi Rice push for elections?” The Chinese Foreign Ministry had the best line, quoting Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing: “Democracy is a beautiful mother who has given birth to an ugly child.”

Washington wasn’t spared a version of the hard/soft debate. Last week, the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to impose stringent controls on American aid to the Palestinians. Never mind that the Senate version of the same bill will restore some of the executive branch prerogatives stripped out in the House. Congress rejected the advice of pro-Israel doves in Americans for Peace Now and the Israel Policy Forum, both of whom lobbied against the bill. (Congress will also resist the attempts of hawks opposed to the disengagement policy to deny support to the Olmert government.)

All of the dire consequences predicted by opponents of the bill came to naught. The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace predicted that the legislation “undermines the U.S. role in bringing Israelis and Palestinians back to the negotiating table…” The Israel Policy Forum “strongly oppose[d] the bill because it would “obstruct the delivery of essential aid to the Palestinian people.” Americans for Peace Now praised the toned-down Senate version as more “responsible.”

Prime Minister Olmert had met with President Bush on the previous day, and was set to address a specially convened joint session of both houses of Congress later that day.

Mr. Olmert sought and received American backing – sort of – for his unilateral disengagement plan, the platform on which he was elected and formed his coalition government. Assuming the absence of a viable Palestinian negotiating partner, the Jewish state will unilaterally redeploy to new lines of its own choosing. In real terms, this would involve a significant withdrawal from most of the West Bank, and from the overwhelming majority of the Palestinian population there, to lines defined by the route of the security barrier being built to separate Palestinian areas from Israeli ones.

These lines will not be the 1967 lines, and Mr. Olmert was counting on the commitments laid out in Mr. Bush’s April 14, 2004, letter to Ariel Sharon that in the event that new borders are drawn, account will be taken of the major settlement blocs outside the 1967 Green Line.

The American president reaffirmed the views expressed in the April 2004 letter: “I believed it when I wrote it, and I still believe it.” And he lent a virtual endorsement to the Olmert Plan without reversing American policy with its preference for “a negotiated final status agreement. Mr. Bush called the Olmert Plan a “bold” idea that could be an “important step” leading to a two-state solution.

The trick here is that the April 14, 2004, letter commits American policy to the view that “In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949.” Mr. Olmert wants the letter applied to a situation in which there are no “final status negotiations,” a request which, to judge by official statements, was neither fully endorsed nor rejected outright.

In order to grease the wheels, Mr. Olmert pledged a delay in implementing his unilateral plan until after some decent interval during which a last ditch effort would be made to engage Palestinian moderates around the Palestinian Authority chairman, Mahmoud Abbas.

Last Thursday, Chairman Abbas finally made his move, giving Hamas an ultimatum: Either accept the plan for a two-state solution along the 1967 lines recently proposed by Fatah and Hamas prisoners held in an Israel jail by next Sunday, or he would appeal over their heads to the Palestinian voters in the form of a referendum in July.

This took Hamas officials by surprise and also required follow-up steps from Israeli leaders who announced the transfer of a limited amount of weapons and ammunition to Chairman Abbas’s presidential guard.

Assuming Hamas refuses to back down, and if (and this is a big if) Chairman Abbas follows through with a referendum, his position will probably carry the day. That would create an entirely new landscape, full of new dangers and opportunities for Israel.

The prisoners document on which the Abbas referendum is based is not a viable peace plan. But it is as different from the Hamas position as twilight is from dawn.

What is important to keep in mind is that, however long in the planning, Chairman Abbas’s decision to finally stand up to Hamas came right after Mr. Olmert’s unilateral plans received a warm Washington welcome, and a day after Congress voted to tighten restrictions against any economic help for a Hamas-run Palestinian Authority.

So to paraphrase Frank Purdue, it takes a tough stand to trigger a softer Palestinian position.

Mr. Twersky is a contributing editor of The New York Sun.