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Knowing when to recognize unpleasant realities is perhaps the most significant hallmark of a statesman.

Israel’s leadership cannot ignore the growing citizen anger at the continuing Qassem rocket attacks on the southern town of Sderot. But it also has to decide how to deal with the Islamist organization Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip.

Its choices boil down to three: maintain the current policy of retaliation and targeted killings of Hamas leaders and those responsible for the attacks; unleash a major ground attack on Gaza to “clean out” terrorists and return control to the Palestinian Authority; or move towards a truce with Hamas – most probably out of public view through diplomatic signaling, second track diplomacy or third party mediation.

The US administration would look askance at a truce, as would PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah Party. Encouraged by the US, Israel has been building up Fatah as a moderate alternative, hoping to chip away at Hamas’s popular support.

It is time for both Israel and the US to acknowledge this policy is failing. Targeting the perpetrators of the rocket attacks will not stop them. An attack on Gaza would cause massive Israeli and Palestinian casualties, end the Annapolis peace process -- already on life support -- and further discredit the Fatah government, which most Palestinians view as a weak tool of Israel. It would also be likely to unleash violence elsewhere in the Muslim world.

Most important, it is unlikely to fatally weaken Hamas. The party is now a part of the Palestinian political landscape as the only effective opposition to Fatah and as a representative of the Islamist currents now prominent in the Arab and Muslim worlds. Hamas has gone to great lengths to differentiate itself from al Quaeda and similar groups. Destroying Hamas’s current leadership could well result in a much more radicalized Palestinian Islamism.

So, is a cease-fire with Hamas possible? And what would be the likely effects?

In fact, Hamas has “signaled” numerous times its desire for a truce. Actually implementing it would be tricky and would require an awareness of Islamic tradition, a degree of trust, and a clear-eyed understanding of what is possible on both sides. Still, a number of mainstream Israeli leaders believe it is essential to try, including a former chief of the Mossad, Ephraim Halevy, not known as a dove.

Hamas’s official ideology is embedded in its founding charter, a bloodcurdling document, which offers no compromise with Zionism. And there is no doubt that those who composed it in 1988 meant what they said.

Founding documents are important but their significance can change over time. For revolutionary movements like Hamas, they serve as a base of theoretical agreement even as different factions develop. Twenty years later, Hamas has garnered more power more quickly than it probably expected. Its leadership would never break away from the Islamist framework in which it is embedded, but nevertheless gives strong signs of desire to face the reality that is today’s Israel. It is in Israel’s interest to encourage this.

Hamas’s leadership understands that Israel is more powerful than ever, with strong US support. It realizes that most neighboring Arab governments have no use for it, but must behave circumspectly because their own populations see it as heroic. Hamas is now a maturing revolutionary movement and beginning to see the virtue of stability. It appears ready for a truce.

Israelis believe that Hamas wants a truce to strengthen itself so as to eventually destroy Israel. But so what? Israel will never turn a blind eye to Hamas, whether the truce lasts for weeks, years or decades. Hamas’s religiously-founded belief that Israel must disappear is not all that relevant any more. Its actions are what count. A truce must certainly limit Hamas’s access to weapons, difficult but not impossible to enforce. With both parties still enemies, the threat of force against any violation is a given.

Such an arrangement between enemies certainly is not new. The US and the Soviet Union uneasily lived in a Cold War for almost half a century. It was not an ideal arrangement but it provided considerable incentives for restraint. And, it prevented nuclear war.

Creating a truce with Hamas is neither a reward nor diplomatic recognition. Nor should it be burdened with any moral implications. It should be seen for what it is, basically a tactical move for both sides.

But it would also constitute a recognition of realities. Hamas is not an aberration or an incidental factor. It and other Islamist organizations are now part of the Middle East reality. We must develop an arsenal of diplomatic tools to deal with them. Otherwise, our tactics will continue to backfire and create more violence and more jihadists.

If Hamas will not accede to a truce, or violates it, Israel will have strengthened its moral and political stance if and when hostilities are resumed. Hamas’s strength can never be a match for Israel. It is time to for both sides to recognize and build on these realities.