Thirty-five years ago, Queen Elizabeth's silver jubilee was greeted with graffiti declaring "Victory to the IRA, stuff the jubilee."

Wednesday marked a highly significant turnaround as the queen, in her diamond jubilee year, met and shook hands with a onetime senior Irish Republican Army commander who once stood against everything she represented and even considered her a legitimate target.

As a British person and a journalist, I never thought I'd see this day.

This is because I grew up with Northern Ireland. What does this mean? It means watching with incredulity as the IRA targeted the British establishment, including a sitting prime minister -- almost succeeding in assassinating her.

Coverage of event by NBC News' U.K. partner ITN News

The "troubles," as they were diplomatically called, became part of everyday life. We watched clashes with soldiers on television. News of bombings was a constant drip-drip in the news. It was one of those things that as a boy and a young man, I thought would never end. 

So the meeting with Martin McGuinness, the first between the queen and a senior member of the IRA or its political wing Sinn Fein, is a landmark in the peace process 14 years after the militant group ended its 30-year campaign against British rule.

PhotoBlog: A historic handshake, a historic image in Northern Ireland's peace process

On Tuesday, she held a private meeting with relatives of the 11 people killed in a 1987 bombing in Enniskillen, an attack that sparked a wave of revulsion against the IRA and helped convince its leadership to engage in the peace process.

3,500 killed
Belfast's Lyric theater, the venue of the historic handshake, has probably never felt so much attention during a performance as it did during the get-together between the British monarchy and Sinn Fein. 

Photos: Queen Elizabeth II begins her 20th trip to Northern Ireland

Few will know what the queen was thinking. But surely it was a difficult event for her, and not just because of the more than 3,500 killed in the conflict, 1,800 of whom were innocent civilians, according to The Guardian.

Paul Faith / Pool via AFP - Getty Images

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II shakes hands with Northern Ireland Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness in Belfast on Wednesday.

It is doubtless especially poignant for her because her cousin, Lord Mountbatten, was killed in 1979 when the IRA blew up his boat in Southern Ireland. He was the man who many believe was responsible for the queen's marriage to Prince Philip, and was a guiding influence to the heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles.

The countless threats her family has lived with must have contributed to a feeling of unease ahead of the meeting. But the queen's real thoughts will probably never be known, nor will her reaction when she was advised to perform this duty.

'It will be difficult': Queen meets IRA victims before landmark handshake

And it wasn't only the queen who was taking a chance -- it came at a cost for McGuinness too. He was being branded a traitor, with a lot of republicans saying that he has sold out and betrayed the principles they stand for.

Republicans protested against Wednesday's meeting, and McGuinness' decision could hurt his political ambitions.

British reaction on a political level has by and large been supportive, despite the bitterness and painful memories of the past.

Norman Tebbit, a former Conservative Party Chairman and a survivor of a deadly bombing in the seaside city of Brighton that targeted Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, saw it as a victory over the IRA.

Before Wednesday's event, Tebbit wrote in The Telegraph that the meeting would be a victory for the queen, the monarchy and Great Britain: 

"I am glad that Mr McGuinness appears to have now accepted on behalf of IRA/Sinn Fein the sovereignty of Her Majesty over Northern Ireland, and I hope that this is a step towards a public recompense and confession of his regret for the violence unleashed by them in his name."

While the meeting does not mark the end of tensions in Northern Ireland, it draws a line under a conflict that cost the lives of thousands and beset the queen for half of her reign.

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Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness, a former Irish Republican Army commander, will meet with Britain's Queen Elizabeth II next week and shake hands in an historic first for the Northern Ireland peace process, the party has confirmed.

The Northern Ireland deputy first minister will attend a cross border event in Belfast on Wednesday, which the president of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins, will also attend.

Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams said the decision had been taken after consulting with grass roots support and allowing the party's ruling council, the ard comhairle, to decide at a 4-hour meeting in Dublin.

“This will understandably cause difficulties for some republicans and nationalists,” Adams said. “Especially for those folks who suffered at the hands of British forces.”

WPA Pool via Getty Images file

Sinn Fein confirmed that Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland Martin McGuinness and First Minister Peter Robinson are to meet with Queen Elizabeth II during her visit to Northern Ireland next week. They are shown here arriving for a meeting at 10 Downing Street on June 8, 2011 in London.

Adams, who, alongside McGuinness, helped end decades of sectarian violence and gave Catholics an equal voice in a power-sharing government with former Protestant foes, said, "This is a very significant initiative by us. We don't have to do it, we are doing it despite the fact that it will cause difficulties for some of our own folk but we think it's good for Ireland."

Sinn Féin stressed the meeting is not a celebration of the queen's Diamond Jubilee, although 86-year-old monarch will be in Northern Ireland at the time for jubilee events.

There has been speculation since the queen's momentous visit to Ireland in May last year that a senior Sinn Féin figure would meet her at an event.

Stefan Wermuth / Reuters

Britain's Queen Elizabeth smiles after her horse Estimate won The Queen's Vase on Friday, the fourth day at Royal Ascot, southwest of London.

McGuinness was always the candidate to shake the queen's hand but delicate talks have been going on for months to arrange a suitable venue and occasion.

The meeting is understood to be taking place in the Lyric Theatre in south Belfast and is sponsored by Co-operation Ireland, which works to bring divided communities together.

Since it was established in 1979, the charity has created opportunities for groups from the two main religious communities in Northern Ireland and from both sides of the border to learn about each other's traditions and cultures.

Adams said the party's decision was not unanimous but that a clear majority were in favor of the meeting. He also confirmed that McGuinness would "of course" shake hands with the queen.

The handshake will be viewed as another in a long list of dramatic advances in Anglo-Irish relations.

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The queen has never met a senior figure in the now-defunct IRA, which killed her cousin Lord Mountbatten in 1979, or its political wing Sinn Féin.

The IRA ended its 30-year armed campaign against British rule in 1998, but small splinter groups have continued to launch attacks against British targets, prompting security concerns that have prevented the queen from publicly announcing trips to the province ahead of her arrival.

The Tuesday and Wednesday visit was the first to be announced in advance since violence broke out in the 1960s and will see the queen and her husband, Philip, travel to Belfast and Enniskillen, scene of an IRA bombing that killed 11 people at a memorial service in 1987.

ITV is an international television partner of NBC News. This article also contains reporting by Reuters and Jim Gold, msnbc.com staff. Follow Gold on Facebook here.

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