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So, which time period are we in? The White House occupant, after months of tacit encouragement, has at last become involved to end an offensive by Israeli forces that has transformed swaths of a city in the Middle East to debris, leaving thousands deceased and prompting global outrage.

The campaign has been preceded by a succession of attacks on Israel. Now, under pressure from the White House, the Israeli prime minister, a rightwinger with a talent for popular speech and a deep conviction of Zionist historical purpose, has consented to a truce.

Historical Comparisons

The time period is not present day, but 1982. The city is not present-day Gaza, but Beirut, Lebanon. The president is Ronald Reagan, not the current administration.

Exist numerous variations between the events in Lebanon more than four in the past and current circumstances in the Gaza Strip in the last 24 months. The militant assault of recent times, which resulted in 1,200 and saw 250 taken hostage, shows limited similarity with the relatively paltry activities of the Palestine Liberation Organization in the year or so preceding the Israeli incursion of the Lebanese nation.

Striking Parallels

Certain parallels are striking. The US leader eventually picked up the phone the counterpart, telling him that the situation in the capital was "a catastrophe" and saying the relations between their nations could be seriously harmed if the conflict continued.

At that time, much as today, the war unfolded in real time on televisions worldwide. Many reporters traveled to the city to report on for the premier occasion an Arab–Israeli war without information control by any party.

Results and Outcomes

The situation following the call from American leadership and the truce in the city is instructive. The PLO, its groups and representatives were dispersed across vast distances and a dozen countries.

Washington then removed international forces – a breach of the understanding with PLO leadership. The Lebanese president, Lebanon's newly elected head of state and Israel's preferred proxy, was murdered by Damascus operatives.

Middle Eastern Changes

Comparable developments occurred across the broader area. By the end of the 1970s, the increasingly non-religious and modern approaches that had seemed to offer the potential of a new future in the regional countries a decade or so earlier were discredited.

The results of this were quickly apparent, almost immediately

Throughout the area, Israel and the US now confronted adversaries who were considerably more unyielding, lethal and effective than the progressive groups and patriotic organizations of earlier years.

Western Response

In the west, the consequences of this were unexpected. During the that decade, international experts and officials had attempted to comprehend what generated violent extremism.

Subsequently, in the beginning of that decade, this ended. National figures in the United States, the UK and elsewhere were lost interest in "root causes" of violence.

Modern Parallels

Last week, reports indicate that today's officials told the nation's leadership that the state could not fight all the world and recognized territorial ambitions for a state.

Similarly was an repetition of that earlier period. In the wake of the Israeli invasion of that nation, previous leadership told Israel that the strength of its military alone could not "establish permanent resolution" and recognized "proper claims of the Palestinian people."

But a internationally-backed regional peace plan meant to resolve those complaints failed to progress. Abroad, national representatives observed powerlessly.

Worldwide concern in the region waned. The state rejected accommodations. Subsequently, there was the major unrest, and the founding of additional militant groups.

• The patterns of the past provide sobering perspectives for present-day peace efforts
• Lasting solutions require dealing with root causes rather than short-term truces
• Local circumstances continue to change in complex and sometimes unexpected ways