The world is a mess. Why not find escapism through wine? 

In most children’s stories, the good characters live happily ever after. Works suitable for older readers tend to greater realism. Even ‘Gaudeamus Igitur’, that most joyous of drinking songs, presses the case for carpe diem. ‘Get stuck in to your pleasures laddie,’ it seems to be saying, ‘before it is too late.’

With the world in such a mess – less carpe diem than dies irae – the case for a vinous route to escapism might seen persuasive. Housman seemed to think so. ‘Could man be drunk for ever,’ starts one poem, then all would be well. Not for long. ‘But men at whiles are sober/ And think by fits and starts/ And if they think they fasten/ Their hands upon their hearts.’

As often before, but never with such a threat to civilian wellbeing, the Middle East is a heartsore region. ‘Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world/ The blood-dimmed tide is loosed.’ Last time that I wrote on this page, there was almost a note of complacency. I congratulated myself on an evening spent drinking excellent Italian wine in equally excellent company, and we never once mentioned the Middle East.

Was that mere escapism, or was it a necessary respite from the hard questions which will return with the next day’s news programmes? Perhaps it was a bit of both. Anyway, there has been plenty of the Muddle East since, with one interesting aspect.

In previous controversies – Brexit the obvious example, though an older generation would cite Suez – heated arguments would turn into storms at the dinner table, sometimes with actual storming out, followed by strained or broken friendships. I have witnessed none of that over Gaza, possibly because I have not yet met anyone who thinks that they have the answer.