Thank God they never did get to this level in the Northern Ireland war. But all the ingredients were there for it to have. The British Government botched things badly enough, and helped keep the pot boiling for long long years, but there were at least some kinds of limits, limits which were consistently disregarded in the Holy Land conflict. There's been a feedback process of violence.

Yes there was shoot-to-kill and internment, and Bloody Sunday, all feeding into the madness. But if there had been an official policy of assassination of militants on the streets of Dundalk or Dublin, or as then were driving in their cars with their families; if there had been armed colonies of Loyalist, with military garrisons to guard them set up on strategic places throughout the Republic, and checkpoints on roads everywhere, and armed incursions and raids on communities in the Republic after every bombing carried out by the IRA, or by any breakaway group of militants...

Every conflict is different - they all have their own forms of insanity. But there have been some terrible mistakes made by the Israeli government, and it looks like worse to come. And the outcome will be even worse things happening from the other side.

"This is not the way to put an end to war..."