Bras against Bloodshed

Here's a face you don't see very often - some might give thanks for that. Surprisingly, this motherly-looking old duck happens to be the President of Finland, on a tour of the Middle East. I once went to a sauna in a village outside Helsinki and she reminds me of the old girl who was doing the beating with birch twigs in the snow. Saunas are supposed to be healthy and make one's adrenals excrete ketosteroids. Mine felt like a couple of squeezed lemons afterwards.
A dose of metaphorical twigging however might just be a way forward in the Middle East peace process, since the suggestion has been made by the above that 'more women need to become involved'. I wonder what she really means. More Condoleeza/Hillary  clones? No, I don't think so. Perhaps a few more like the Mairead Corrigans, perhaps. The youngest winner of the Nobel Peace prize in 1976, co-founder of the Community of Peace people and recent deportee from Israel mobilised a grass-roots women's movement which did much to finally bring about an end to the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Such bottom line activism may stand a chance where diplomacy and political footsie has failed. Imagine if all Hamas wives told their gun-toting husbands - "Right, Ali. No more sex till you stop firing Kassams at Sderot and coming home all dirty after grubbing around in tunnels under the Sinai. And, no more of those all-nighters down the mosque with your mates!"
Oh, dear. I'm letting my imagination run away with me again.