That reminds me of an ancient cartoon dating back to the early years of the last century in which a British "lift" boy is explaining to two Americans why elevators are called lifts in Britain. "I can lift you up and I can lift you down again," the boy says before he continues, "And I can elevate you up, but I cannot elevate you down again."
The problem lies with the word escalator and not the word escalate.
Don't know about that, but the word 'escalation' is very similar to the word escalator. Funny story behind that 'escalator' word. The Otis Elevator company invented the word as the name of a new product. You can probably guess the product, no doubt. Unfortunately they lost the trademark for the word escalator. It became a common usage term. Otis Elevator became famous when they themselves incorrectly used the word as an adjective in one of their own print adds. Big trademark mistake. They are now a historic example of how not to handle a trademarked name. And yes escalators can take you up and they can also take you down.
At any rate, unfortunately it appears that the same great American Foreign Policy Team that brought you 'Downtown Baghdad' and 'The US/Mexican Border' is now trying to 'solve' the middle east crisis, he said sarcastically.