[Our guest blogger, Mara Rudman, is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress. Mara was a member of the National Democratic Institute international election observer delegation to the Palestinian legislative elections.]

Watch Mara on Fox News:

On Sunday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice acknowledged that she was surprised by the Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections:

I’ve asked [my staff] why nobody saw it coming. … It does say something about us not having a good enough pulse.

To those of us observing the lead-up to the election as well as election day, the results were predictable. The Palestinian people were registering their protest with Fatah, the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority. Palestinians also were registering their despair with leaders who had brought few tangible results from years of efforts to build a Palestinian state. Those in the Bush administration engaged with average Palestinians would have picked this up long before election day.

The Bush administration now needs to fix its blind spot if it hopes to help the Palestinian people move ahead. Read more

Yesterday, we learned ABC News anchorman Bob Woodruff and cameraman Doug Vogt were seriously injured by an improvised explosive device while traveling in Iraq. Woodruff, at the time of the attack, was riding with an Iraqi army unit:

The Iraqi mechanized vehicle they were riding in is considered more dangerous than U.S. vehicles. ABC said the two were traveling that way to get the perspective of the Iraqi military.

The attack underscores the fact that Iraqi security forces have not been properly-equipped to take on the insurgency, a continuing problem that remains a major stumbling block in the Bush exit strategy. President Bush has stated, “Victory will come when the Iraqi security forces can provide for the safety of their own citizens.” And he has assured the American public that we are “building up the Iraqi security forces so they can increasingly lead the fight to secure their country.” But the facts belie his rhetoric.

The Washington Times reported recently:

The emerging Iraqi army is in dire need of more armored vehicles, an issue largely lost in the two-year debate over U.S. soldiers and Marines who at one time lacked protective gear. “¦ “One of the main things is they don’t have much armor at all,” said retired Coast Guard officer Michael Kearney, a defense contractor who is working to bolster the force. “Their people are running around in pickup trucks, and they are getting nailed.”

CBS correspondent Lara Logan traveled to Iraq in late November and interviewed members of the Iraqi security forces to find that the terrorists were better-equipped than the security forces:

LOGAN: Is it fair to say that the terrorists are better armed than you?
BRIG. GEN. AMIR AL-DULAIMI: Yes, of course. [CBS Evening News, 11/30/05]

Thanks to courageous journalists like Woodruff, the American public is able to learn the reality of the situation on the ground, a perspective they do not hear frequently from the administration. Our thoughts and prayers are with Woodruff, Vogt, and their respective families.

UPDATE: Read more