🔗 Share this article

So, which time period is this? A US president, subsequent to lengthy of tacit encouragement, has finally intervened to stop an military campaign from Israel that has transformed swaths of a urban center in the region to debris, causing thousands deceased and sparking worldwide anger.

This military action has been preceded by a sequence of assaults on the Israeli nation. Now, facing demands from the US administration, the Israel's leader, a rightwinger with a talent for popular speech and a strong feeling of historic Zionist mission, has agreed to a ceasefire.

Historical Comparisons

The era is not present day, but 1982. The urban center is not present-day Gaza, but Beirut, Lebanon. The president is the Reagan administration, not Donald Trump.

There are numerous variations between the situation in the Lebanese nation more than four years past and current circumstances in Palestinian territories in the last 24 months. The October attack of recent times, which killed 1,200 and included 250 captured, differs significantly with the relatively paltry actions of the PLO in the year or so prior to military entry of the Lebanese nation.

Uncanny Similarities

Several similarities are remarkable. Reagan finally made the call the counterpart, telling him that what was happening in the city was "a holocaust" and indicating the diplomatic ties between their countries could be seriously harmed if the fighting carried on.

At that time, much as today, the fighting developed in immediate coverage on millions of screens. Many journalists traveled to the capital to report on for the first time an regional battle without censorship by any party.

Results and Outcomes

The events subsequent to the communication from Reagan and the truce in Beirut is revealing. The PLO, its groups and representatives were scattered across vast distances and a various states.

The US administration then removed international forces – a violation of the agreement with the Palestinian leader. The elected leader, Lebanon's freshly appointed leader and Israel's chosen ally, was assassinated by Syrian intelligence.

Middle Eastern Changes

The same was true across the broader area. By the late seventies, the more secular and progressive ideas that had seemed to offer the hope of a different tomorrow in the Arab and Islamic worlds a decade or so earlier were discredited.

The outcomes of this became very clear, in short order

Throughout the area, the Israeli state and the US now faced enemies who were considerably more stubborn, deadly and efficient than the secular movements and independence advocates of earlier years.

International Reaction

Internationally, the consequences of this were unexpected. During the seventies, international experts and government representatives had tried to analyze what led to violent extremism.

Afterward, in the early 1980s, this stopped. Government officials in the America, the UK and other nations were lost interest in "fundamental sources" of violence.

Current Similarities

In recent days, accounts show that current leadership communicated to government representatives that the country could not fight all the world and admitted Palestinian aspirations for a state.

This also was an echo of that earlier period. In the aftermath of the military incursion of the neighboring country, earlier administration told Israel that the power of its military alone could not "achieve enduring settlement" and acknowledged "justified demands of the Palestinian people."

Yet a internationally-backed diplomatic initiative intended to answer those concerns failed to progress. Abroad, Palestinian leadership looked on powerlessly.

Global attention in the Middle East waned. Israel opposed compromises. Later, there was the major unrest, and the founding of further armed organizations.

• The patterns of the past offer thought-provoking lessons for current diplomatic initiatives
• Lasting solutions require dealing with root causes rather than temporary ceasefires
• Local circumstances continue to develop in multifaceted and frequently surprising ways