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So, what year are we in? The White House occupant, following an extended period of quiet support, has finally intervened to stop an offensive by Israeli forces that has reduced large areas of a city in the Middle East to ruins, leaving numerous individuals deceased and generating international condemnation.

The offensive has come after a series of attacks on the Israeli nation. Currently, facing demands from the US administration, the Israel's leader, a conservative politician with an aptitude for popular speech and a strong feeling of historic Zionist mission, has approved a truce.

Historical Parallels

The year is not present day, but the early 1980s. The city is not the Gaza Strip, but Beirut. The American president is the Reagan administration, not today's leadership.

There are numerous variations between what happened in the Lebanese nation more than four in the past and what has happened in Gaza in the past two years. The Hamas raid of recent times, which caused over a thousand and involved two hundred fifty seized, shows limited similarity with the relatively paltry actions of the PLO in the period preceding military entry of the Lebanese nation.

Uncanny Similarities

Some are uncanny. The US leader eventually contacted the counterpart, telling him that what was happening in Beirut was "a holocaust" and saying the relations between their nations could be gravely damaged if the violence continued.

At that time, comparable to present circumstances, the conflict played out in immediate coverage on global media. Many correspondents flew into Beirut to report on for the premier occasion an Middle Eastern conflict without censorship by the combatants.

Subsequent Developments

The events after the conversation from American leadership and the truce in Lebanon is instructive. The liberation movement, its factions and representatives were scattered across vast distances and a various states.

The US administration then removed international forces – a breach of the understanding with the Palestinian leader. Bashir Gemayel, Lebanon's newly elected leader and Israeli-supported figure, was assassinated by Damascus operatives.

Middle Eastern Changes

The same was true across the wider Middle East. By the late seventies, the predominantly worldly and progressive ideas that had looked to deliver the promise of a changed reality in the Middle Eastern nations a decade or so earlier were weakened.

The consequences of this emerged rapidly, very quickly

Throughout the area, the Israeli state and the US now faced adversaries who were much more stubborn, dangerous and effective than the secular movements and independence advocates of previous times.

Global Approach

In the west, the consequences of this were counterintuitive. Through the seventies, western analysts and policymakers had tried to analyze what led to violent extremism.

Then, in the early 1980s, this ceased. National figures in the United States, the United Kingdom and additional countries were lost interest in "underlying reasons" of unrest.

Contemporary Echoes

In recent days, reports indicate that current leadership told government representatives that the country could not oppose international consensus and recognized Palestinian aspirations for a sovereign entity.

This too was an repetition of 1982. In the aftermath of the military incursion of Lebanon, previous leadership told Israel that the power of its military alone could not "establish permanent resolution" and accepted "proper claims of the Arab residents."

But a US-led comprehensive agreement intended to resolve those concerns failed to progress. Overseas, Palestinian leadership observed impotently.

International interest in the Middle East decreased. Israel opposed compromises. Later, there was the major unrest, and the establishment of further armed organizations.

• The repetitions of previous events offer sobering lessons for present-day resolution attempts
• Permanent settlements require confronting underlying issues rather than short-term truces
• Local circumstances continue to change in complicated and sometimes unexpected ways