INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The conflict among Palestinians and Israelis is decades old, but Saturday’s attack by Hamas to this level of violence was unprecedented, says a professor who studies the Middle East.

It’s a conflict that Pierre Atlas, a senior lecturer at the IUPUI School of Public and Environmental Affairs in Indianapolis, has followed for years. But, he says, the devastation that the Palestinian militant group Hamas has left on Israel and the region is expected to stretch even farther.

“The fact that Hamas fighters actually went into Israeli towns and took hostages and dragged them across the Gaza, the fact that they went in and massacred 260 kids at an open-air concert and took a bunch of them hostage, this has never happened before.”

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He says the roots of the Palestinian and Israeli conflict over go back about a century. Both groups are indigenous to the Holy Land, divided on land by what’s considered the Gaza strip.

“Israel has been controlling the West Bank since 1967. And they’ve been sharing control with Palestinians there. But Hamas is different. Hamas is an Islamic group they want to turn every inch of Palestine into an Islamic state.”

To put into perspective, Atlas says, Hamas and Palestinians are similar to the Taliban and Afghans in terms of the rigid views of Islamic theology, adding that most Palestinians don’t see the world as they do.

He says using Gaza as a launching pad for attacks is, in essence, holding Palestinian people hostage by Hamas in Gaza while also facing a Gaza blockage by Israel.

“Promising execution videos there, they are promising to execute hostages. They are promising to put out videos away Isis did. They are very bad actors, and they don’t represent the majority of Palestinians.”

Comparing this level of violence to what Americans saw with 9/11, he says, this attack will likely be answered with an even harder blow as Israel called up 300,000 civilian soldiers and declared war.

Atlas says Americans with duel citizenship are on both sides, which will likely create problems. But, it’s hard to say what the full international implications will be. He says countries will likely start picking sides.