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t was supposed to deal an initial, crippling blow to that other non-state Islamist militia, the one based on Palestinian soil itself, that was becoming an increasingly coherent, disciplined and effective fighting force - and, though still lagging way behind it, more and more like the Hizbullah which it sought to emulate, and which, together with Iran, had helped to arm and train it. The missile was Hamas’s trademark weapon too. For years it had been lobbing the primitive, home-made, short-range Qassam into the Israeli border town of Sderot. But of late it had introduced longer-range types that could reach such major southern towns as Ashkelon, Ashdod or Beersheba. The idea behind the inaugural onslaught, said an Israeli defence analyst, had been ‘to kill as many people connected to Hamas as possible’ in the hope of persuading its leaders to ‘surrender or plead for a ceasefire’. That was why, ‘in planning to attack buildings and sites populated by hundreds of people, the Israeli Defence...

EPILOGUE Obaman Peace — Or Seventh War? Coming hard on the heels of Lebanon 2006, Gaza 2009 was yet another and yet more dramatic episode, not merely in the Arab-Israeli conflict but in that interconnected, multi-faceted Middle Eastern mega-crisis of which it is the heart. Could anyone doubt that without some new and truly serious diplomatic action to stop the rot, not only would things get worse, they would do so at a quickening pace? If there was any quarter in the world that might - and after decades of unseriousness it is as well to stress the might — possess the means, and above all the will, to undertake one it had to be the new American administration. This is not the place for an armchair contribution to the ‘peace process’, or rather to that industry - of debates and seminars, policy papers and punditry, the outpourings of think tanks and academia - which, in addition to the practical exertions of governments and international officialdom, it endlessly engenders. Suffice it t...