The terrible thing about war is that we get used to it

The war in Ukraine has been going on for two years and one month and it has to be said that we newspaper readers and television watchers have now become almost immune to the appalling images of slaughter and death. This is what happens when wars drag on and on. Even the poor Ukrainians suffering from Putin's butchery and inhumanity have become accustomed to the new normal. The new normal is being shelled and missiled and droned every day and having to hunt for food and shelter. That's their daily life. They hate it and fear it but it's what happens every day and it has been going on for ever and there is no reason to imagine it will stop any day soon. So you become accustomed to the new appalling way of life and survive if you can. Likewise, here in the West we worry about Ukraine and hate Putin for what he is doing but we can't disrupt our lives every day by getting too immersed in the mayhem thousands of miles away. Today Putin launched missiles on Ukraine's largest dam and set it on fire. The consequences will be dreadful for the people of Ukraine but it's just another day in a war which won't go away. It's not quite the same yet in Gaza because it has only been going on for five and a bit months and the images of destruction and suffering are still almost too awful to see. There is a picture in The New York Times today of a man and woman and a child sitting round a primitive cooker making what looks like a thin pancake and a tiny pot of beans, surrounded by broken, destroyed buildings. This is their life, probably for years. Shocking and terrifying but this is what war does to innocent people. We get used to it from our comfortable homes the longer it goes on, and they, the victims, have to get used to it in order to survive.