It's an international event with a global audience. The national airport is awash with incoming delegates, visitors and a huge press entourage.

There are flags, buoyantly happy spectators and admiring media coverage. Extraordinary as it is to believe, that was the joyful Israel and the1968 Paralympic Games - just a year after the Six Day War.

It is almost unimaginable that Israel would be able to stage such an event in today's hostile political climate. And yet: why not? More than anywhere else, the Paralympics is a template for co-operation. You never know. Peace might break out.