Should Israel be rooting for Fatah or for Hamas in the current showdown in the Palestinian Authority that is teetering on — though it will probably never totally tumble into — full civil war?

On the face of it, that’s a no-brainer. Hamas is a radical Islamic organization that refuses to recognize Israel, calls openly for its destruction, and has increasingly allied itself with Iran. Fatah is a Palestinian nationalist movement with a strong secular component that recognized Israel at Oslo and has a leader, Abu Mazen, who has in recent years repeatedly affirmed his commitment to a negotiated settlement as the only way to lay the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to rest. How could one hesitate for a moment between them?

But it’s not quite so foolish a question as that. Suppose Fatah should prevail in its battle with Hamas — in itself a rather nebulous notion. What exactly does “prevailing” mean in a Palestinian society that is split down the middle and has neither a democratic tradition of resolving such matters at the ballot box nor the ability to settle them by force? One of the ironies of the present situation, after all, is that it is precisely the continued Israeli semioccupation of the West Bank that prevents the two camps from fighting it out to the finish, since there is no possibility of freely mustering and moving military forces when the Israeli army is everywhere in the way.

Still, let us suppose. Would a victorious Abu Mazen, even if he wanted to, be able to negotiate a peace treaty with Israel? Clearly not. In what way would Israel and the Palestinian Authority, which were unable to reach an agreement at Camp David and Taba in the months before and after the outbreak of the second intifada in the year 2000, be able to do so now?

In the six years that have passed since then, mutual trust has plummeted to zero, emotions have grown more extreme, official positions have hardened, and public opinion on both sides has become more intransigent. Whereas even “moderate” Palestinians are more insistent than ever on an Israeli return to the 1967 borders, Israel has in the last several years invested huge sums in a West Bank security fence that does not conform to these borders. And whereas even “moderate” Israelis are as opposed as they have always been to any return of Palestinian “refugees,” the “right of return” has only grown more entrenched as a sacred principle among even “conciliatory” Palestinians. What conceivable accord that could not be reached then would be reachable now?

The answer is none, which is why it is possible to wonder what purpose, from an Israeli point of view, would be served by a Fatah victory. On the one hand, it would only increase pressure from America and Europe, eager to shore up a pro-Western, anti-Islamist regime, to make far-reaching concessions to the Palestinian Authority that Israel cannot afford to make. On the other hand, once it was clear that such concessions were not forthcoming, Palestinian sentiment would swing back the other way again, weakening the moderates and strengthening Hamas in the end.

There is something to be said, therefore, for preferring a Hamas victory now. This would relieve diplomatic pressure on Israel, justify whatever unilateral steps Israel decides it must take to establish demographically and militarily viable borders, and avoid unrealistically raising Palestinian expectations. It might also have a better chance of making possible a long-term Israeli-Palestinian cease-fire that would be less attractive than peace but more tolerable than the violence of recent years. Hamas has often spoken about offering such a hudna, or Islamic armistice, in return for Israeli concessions, and it may be that these would have to be considerably less than those needed to arrive at a final settlement with Abu Mazen.

In some ways, indeed, Hamas, by virtue of its Islamic radicalism, paradoxically would be able to make deals with Israel that Fatah couldn’t. Because it is convinced that God is on its side and Israel will disappear in the end, it isn’t in any great hurry. And because it dreams of a Palestine that will one day be part of a stateless pan-Islamic empire, a few square miles more or less of Palestinian soil in the meantime may not mean as much to it.

But of course, dining with the devil, even with a long spoon, is always a hazardous affair. A hudna with a Hamas government would by definition be temporary — and one hates to think what would happen once it was over, especially if Hamas were allied with an Iran that by then might well be nuclear.

In the long run, then, Israel is probably better off with Fatah after all: At least under a secular Palestinian government that respects some if not all of the freedoms that Israelis have, a more open, tolerant, rational Palestinian society has some chance of developing. If such a society should ever come into being, security fences may no longer be necessary, and citizens of both Palestine and Israel may feel free to come and go across borders that mean no more than they do today in Europe.

True, that’s in the best of cases a very long way off. For the moment, fortunately, Israel does not have to make any hard decisions, because its ability to influence the outcome of the Fatah-Hamas conflict is minimal, and any open support it gives Abu Mazen can only backfire and lead to more Palestinian hostility against him. And the conflict itself, since it is not amenable to the solution of a swift civil war, may continue, repeatedly bursting into violence and pulling back from it, for a long while. Whomever Israelis root for, this time they are spectators in the grandstands.

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