Southfield, Mich. (Jewish Renaissance Media) — In September 2000, the Palestinians, under the leadership of Yasser Arafat, plunged off a plateau of tranquility and progress into an abyss of violence. On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s cabinet voted to throw them a lifeline.

The cabinet’s approval of the “road map” steps toward a permanent peace between the Palestinians and the Jewish state is a remarkably generous move, and one we hope Israel will not live to regret.

If — a big “if” in view of past Palestinian behavior — the administration of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas actually does crack down on West Bank and Gaza terrorists, progress will be possible.

Sharon deserves full credit for sense and statesmanship. As a patriot and general, he promoted the settlement movement. As prime minister, he has developed the strategies that have allowed the Israeli military to check much of the potential violence. Now, he is proposing to step back, substituting diplomatic activity for the “facts on the ground” of Israel’s settlement expansion and presence in terrorist hotbeds.

Sharon was remarkably blunt about the move: “You may not like the word, but what’s happening is occupation. Holding 3.5 million Palestinians is a bad thing for Israel, for the Palestinians and for the Israeli economy. We have to end this subject without risking our security.”

That pragmatic assessment is right on target. It is not acceding to terrorism to recognize that Israel can do no better than hold its own economically and socially until the Palestinians retreat from violence.

If saying the words “Palestinian state” make it possible for Abbas to do what he must, then Israel is saying those words — which, of course, it was willing to say before the second intifada began 32 months ago.

President Bush also deserves credit for his willingness, at long last, to put himself visibly behind the process of bringing these historic antagonists together. He has wisely rejected the advice of those who said that he should not become entangled in a peace process with no assured outcome.

Now he is correct to build on his demonstration in Iraq of America’s military might to back up his diplomatic goals. History would not forgive him if he sat on his hands.

He must put unrelenting pressure on the Palestinians to respond to Israel’s brave move with the actions that the road map demands to curb their own apostles of violence. He must also address the Arab states’ continuing reluctance to recognize Israel’s right to exist within secure borders.

It is disgraceful, for example, that Egypt would balk at allowing Sharon to come to a meeting with Bush and Abbas in Sharm el-Sheik; or that the Saudi Arabian leaders continue to spurn Jewish leaders when their own crown prince has proposed pan-Arab recognition of the Jewish state.

There is no guarantee that the road map process will advance even to the charted endpoint of Phase I. That depends on what the Palestinians and their Arab allies do next and what Israel feels secure doing in response.

So we accept the start of Phase I with deep skepticism. But we also cherish something we haven’t felt for 32 months — a smidgen of hope.