Tensions with the Palestinian population who felt they were being driven from the land and subjugated have many times boiled over, producing indelible images still associated with the region.
It was in this increasingly complex and confusing environment that Dag Hammarskjold and his Congo club of diplomats attempted to keep the lid on a pot that was dangerously close to boiling over.
When they got back to the house, they found that the broth had boiled over, -that the dinner was spoiled; and that two shirts, which had been hanging before the fire, were scorched and utterly ruined.
First, out there came some grand, lighted wax candles, and a fire on the hearth, and a porridge pot boiling over it, because in his mind he said they should come first.