It was history's odd timing: A great historical rupture in the Arab world, bearing within it the promise of remaking a flawed political tradition that knew no middleground between despotism and nihilistic violence, happened on the watch of an American president proud of his deliberateness and his detachment from history's passions.
The Gaza crisis also triggered a round of name-calling within the world of British Islam that has laid bare a rapid diminution of the middleground on which emollient types hope to stand.