That the Fatah-Hamas coalition government of the Palestinian Territories has collapsed comes as no surprise. Equally unsurprising is the speed with which the Americans, Europeans and Israelis raced to the side of Fatah leader and Palestine president, Mahmoud Abbas. Disintegration was a matter of time: I'd said that much last February.

The so-called Mecca Accord between both Palestinian factions, hurriedly steered by Saudi Arabia, was never a marriage made in heaven. It was, to all intents and purposes, a marriage of convenience for the Saudis. In geopolitical terms, the American-led invasion of Iraq was and continues to look doomed to fail, much like Washington's excursion in Vietnam in the 1960s and 70s. If Iraq crumbles into all-out civil war that's still high on the cards the Saudis will probably feel the greatest pain of all, apart from the second major humiliation for the Americans in 30-odd years.

Even so, Mahmoud Abbas can't afford to grin like the Cheshire cat. He may think he has toppled Ismael Haniyeh, the Hamas-led prime minister in the Palestinian Authority. He hasn't. The strategy become more sly when Hamas rained on the post-Yasser Arafat regime and made Abbas look like the lame-duck that US President George 'Dubya' Bush has become after declaring "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq whilst on board USS Abraham Lincoln outside San Diego bay in 2003.

No matter how cleverly stage-managed these events, they always turn out awry. They're bound to flounder under the weight of their own hype and hubris. Bush has found this out. So has Abbas when bedded Haniyeh, albeit reluctantly. Haniyeh, too, has learnt when he refused to submit to US-led demands to rip the terrorist stripes from its hide and recognize Israel. Now the pitiable Saudis have seen their grand narrative become desert dust.

If Abbas thinks there's mileage in the old Chinese proverb that there's opportunity in crisis he'd better think again. What happens next in the Palestinian Territories will have bloodbath implications there, and destabilisation consequences throughout the Middle East, including the pro-American Egyptian regime of President Hosni Mubarrak the man who brutalised terrorist suspects brought to him on secret American rendition missions in the dead of night. But the biggest problem for Abbas is what to do next.

Abbas' minders call his 'win' over Haniyeh and Hamas a coup. Heady stuff if not fanciful. Truth is, it was self-destruction on Hamas' part. Abbas had only not played the game that coalition partners do. Besides, with the Palestinian economy practically dead, and poverty so rampant, what else could Hamas do but fall on its own sword? And thanks to the US and its allies who have starved the Palestinians of food, medical and financial aid. Their rationale: Hamas is a terrorist organisation. Worse, it's inspired, armed and financed by Iran and Syria, and by those whose Islamic theology sanctions the butchering of Muslims and non-Muslims.

Mock delight

Abbas wasted no time in naming Salam Fayyad as the Palestinian Authority's new prime minister. The West and Israel are delighted. But it's mock delight. More like relief. This was a fall-back plan that had been mapped out months ago when the US and Israel refused to negotiate with the then Hamas-led government that had nowhere to go. Iran is already facing crunching international sanctions for expanding its nuclear program and other surreptitious incursions inside Iraq and elsewhere in the region. And Syria is on close military watch by Israel and the US. Abbas sniffed his chance, waited, then pounced.

Fayyad is somebody with whom the West and Israelis say they can work to revive the cursed Middle East Roadmap. Time will tell. But the problem isn't the Middle East Roadmap. A new problem is brewing fast, with bloody consequences

The first big problem lies in the constitution that breathes diminishing political life not sanity in the Palestinian Authority. In appointing Fayyad, Abbas may have breached the constitution. He may say the 'coup' was justified since it was in response to the hopelessness of the Hamas government. It doesn't get him over the problem. The Haniyeh government's incompetence isn't the basic problem; violating the Basic Law, which was amended in 2003, is: it makes Abbas' appointment of Fayyad entirely illegal.

So is Abbas' 'new emergency' government. The Basic Law mandates that Abbas can neither install an emergency government nor appoint a new prime minister. It can't also claim to be democratic, even if he has done so to please the West and Israelis. That tune alone has seen the Israelis vowing yet again to release US$100 million of frozen Palestinian money. But not so fast. All this smacks of hypocrisy. Foremost is that the new Palestinian Authority is now run by decree the kind found in Pakistan and elsewhere in the Third World where the Americans happily give military and financial support to abominable dictatorships that have plundered 'legitimate' democracies and to round up and kill off radical and militant Islamic threats. It's all Texan and John Wayne-like.

Abbas' old problems are new again, only this time bigger. He has violated almost every precept of the Basic Law. So much so Hamas may seriously challenge Abbas' legitimacy and that of the Fayyad government. Thing is, the Basic Law makes no provision for an emergency government. To make matters worse, few have forgotten the last election, when Hamas thrashed Fatah at the polls to record a landslide win. Back to the Basic Law: it says that the prime minister must be somebody who must represent the majority party. Fatah was not then. Still isn't now. And Abbas was and continues to be the least popular among the Palestinian people. Why should all this surprise?

MANJIT BHATIA, an Australian, is an university lecturer and writer who specialises in international economics and politics, with a focus on the Asia-Pacific. He has been published in The Wall Street Journal.