There's lots of talk about Plan B in Washington as the Obama administration looks for alternatives to its failed Syria policy. The same goes for various other parts of the region, where the administration is floating ideas about a potential last-minute change of strategy.
Whether in Syria or Palestine - and even Iraq, Libya and Yemen - the United States has seen its hopes dashed, its advice ignored, its red lines violated, and its warnings and ultimatums ridiculed.
US President Barack Obama says he's haunted by Syria; that he's daunted by a repeat of the Libya intervention (which he sees as his biggest failure); that he's troubled by Israel's settlement activities in occupied Palestine, among others.
But he remains adamant that there isn't much he could have done to produce better results in a region that, in his words, is "going through a transformation that will play out for a generation, rooted in conflicts that date back millennia".
Obama: Syria represents 'a challenge to the world'
This is of course a cop-out, and he knows it. These are mostly contemporary conflicts exacerbated by regional and foreign powers, especially by his predecessors.
Be that as it may, the Obama administration is now looking for ways to save face and perhaps regain the initiative in the Middle East. But what went wrong in the first place?
