Should Palestinian self-rule end, hundreds of Palestinians would lose their job, and Israel would have to enter the vacuum created as a result, offering Palestinians security, education and welfare services at a cost Israel cannot afford.

The Palestinian threat to dissolve their self-rule and merge with the State of Israel has been thrown around for some time. Last Thursday night it landed full-force on the desk of the Israeli Prime Minister Benajmin Netanyahu.

The Palestinians are drawing the last card they have to play: Dismantling the Palestinian Authority and negating all of their accomplishments and all of the obligations they have taken upon themselves by the Oslo Accords. Suicide is on our doorstep.

The threat is a last-ditch effort to break the stagnation of peace talks, and force Netanyahu to make decisions that he has refused to accept until today.