OVER the many decades of watching the Israeli-Palestinian conflict play out in horrific loss of lives, untold misery and suffering, and economic turmoil, we have fretted with all peace-loving peoples of the world: Would there ever be an end to that conflict?

What seemed on the surface to be a recent lull was only the calm before the next storm, which erupted Saturday on the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War between them that Israel won and then proceeded to annex more Palestinian territory.

Hamas, an armed group calling itself the Islamic Resistance Movement, is based in Gaza, a 25-mile-long, densely populated area of just over 2.5 million people. Since winning an election in the Gaza Strip in 2006, Hamas has been accused of repeatedly attacking Israel with rockets and mortars.

Israel has retaliated fiercely, targeting Hamas leaders, restricting imports and the movement of civilians, in a strategy of collective punishment which has inevitably resulted in Gaza’s poor infrastructure and living conditions.

Hamas, unlike the Palestinian Authority, refuses to accept the two-state solution or recognise the existence of Israel, vowing to wage armed struggle to establish a Palestinian State stretching from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River.

The fact that Israel occupies vast swathes of land the Palestinians claim as their own, populating them with settlers — notably Gaza and the West Bank — remains a flashpoint for the conflict.

Catching the usually battle-ready Israelis apparently off guard, Hamas struck a deadly blow in parts of the Jewish State Saturday, killing many and wreaking serious damage.

After the surprise attack Israel declared war and then a full siege of the enclave, with Defence Minister Yoav Gallant vowing “no electricity, no food, no fuel” and calling Hamas militants “savages”, a sign of the deep anger unleashed.

We in this space don’t take sides in the conflict. In fact, we support the concept of the two states existing in peace, even if its realisation has remained a pipe dream from which we occasionally awake to the brutal sound of war.

If it seems difficult to fathom the depth and intensity of the hostilities, that is because it is. These combatants are the descendants of the sons — Ishmael and Isaac — of the biblical colossus, Abraham. The feelings go back deep into antiquity, and no modern manoeuvres have been able to craft a lasting peace.

Like the 1973 Yom Kippur War, this current conflagration is ominous from the point of view of bringing in other countries, notably other Arabs, Russia, and China, on one side and the Western allies of Israel, led by the United States, on the other.

While the Hamas troops appear proud of their stealthy foray into Israeli territory, the decision to strike has put Israel in a dangerous mood because, beyond the lives lost and the physical damage, its pride has been hurt, given that its vaunted intelligence apparatus seems to have faltered.

Beyond the United Nations, there doesn’t seem to be any natural mediator on the horizon. The US moved its embassy to Jerusalem, stoking the fires of Arab hatred, and Russia has no moral authority after its unprovoked war on Ukraine.

Let us hope that the UN has more success than its 1948 attempt to help Israel establish a peaceful State.