Although the IDF has been careful not to leak too much, it is looking more and more like Israel has shifted into endgame mode. Last night they publicly acknowledged that reservists — possibly tens of thousands of them — have entered the Gaza Strip and joined the fight.

This cannot be good for Hamas’s morale. So far, many hundreds of Hamas fighters have been killed, compared with less than a handful of Israeli soldiers. What little information is coming out sounds like we’re heading towards a finale. Hamas has started talking about “rebuilding” Gaza, as though the thing is done, and just trying to sound like they’ll still be in charge afterwards, or else the already-massive defections will become a tsunami. Israel is allowing more reporters to see more of its tactics, and intelligence officials have now told us that the remaining Hamas leadership is holed up in the basement of Gaza’s biggest hospital. And to make matters worse for Hamas, Iran has just announced that it will cut off its funding if Hamas accepts a cease-fire.

What will happen in Gaza? The easy part is to say that most likely Hamas will be gone, its leaders either killed off or (more likely) granted an eleventh-hour exile. It is quite simply in nobody’s interest to leave them there — not Israel’s, not the Palestinian Authority’s, not Egypt’s, not the U.S. Barack Obama has already reminded us that Hamas is a client of Iran, which is the opposite of saying they have anything to contribute. And speaking of Obama: It sure would be nice from his end if the war were over by the time he takes office eight days from now.

But what then? That’s a lot trickier. The most logical answer is for the world to help the Palestinian Authority retake responsibility for Gaza, including serious investment in infrastructure and the economy. But it’s far from clear that its leader, Mahmoud Abbas, wants to. It was under his rule, after all, that Hamas took over in the first place. Israel has no desire to re-occupy the Strip. A final option may be to set up a second Palestinian Authority there, under the local tribal leaders. It is their groups, after all, who are holding the IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, and a deal might be worked out.

But maybe I’m jumping the gun. There’s still a war to finish. In the final push, much can go wrong.