The way we in Britain talk about Israel-Palestine says more about us than them

THE war is packaged and globalised. Your sympathy for one side — though the best people care for both — is a signifier of who you are.

- Tanya Gold

Are you for the Intifada or the Occupation? In America some high-school children dance down corridors, singing “from the river to the sea”. I doubt they know which river or which sea. In London posters of Israeli hostages are torn down and thrown to the ground. Elements of the British far-Right side with Israel, which is offensive and transparent. Have they forgotten it’s a Jewish state, or do they just hate Muslims more nowadays?

This has the dimensions of a culture war: between Jew and Muslim, Left and Right, young and old. It shouldn’t be. Israel and Palestine don’t need the world projecting itself onto them for its emotional imperatives, and leisure. They have suffered enough.