Be aware that those who yawned at Afghanistan's October 2004 presidential election are trumpeting the arrival of "democracy" to the Palestinians. A vote has been taken in locations administered by the "Palestinian Authority" but because that place is a patently unfree society that has shown no liberal momentum, in fact quite the reverse, the election of Mahmoud Abbas had very little to do with democracy.
We must be very careful not to conflate an election obviously supported by terrorist groups with the demonstration of government by consensus as antidote to authoritarianism. If the Hamas thugs, who now infest Yasser Arafat's fief, believed Abbas would undermine their genocidal plans for Israel, they would be doing what the terrorists in Iraq are doing to Iraqis or what the Taliban threaten to do to Afghans. Over the past three years American-led allies have taken great steps in Iraq and Afghanistan to demolish each country's authoritarian tradition, from the oligarchs to the tips of their military and civil appendages; one can't build atop a flawed frame. The politics of convention and vanity will make do with Arafat's horrid little pit of fear, hatred and ignorance, for which no such ablution has been suggested.
That which your enemy opposes is good for you. Unfortunately, this is currently the metric for success in democratizing the Near East or anywhere else. If strongmen challenge an election, you've done well: that election holds promise for liberty.