October, 2023

Gabriel McCaffrey is an Irish community activist in Canada   I keep seeing bigotry and stupidity from back home over bilingual signs on street names etc.   I’ve lived in Ottawa, across the river from Gatineau, Quebec, for 35 years. All our street signs and road traffic signs are in both English and French. It’s […]

    Pity the people in positions of authority, especially if they’re in the public eye. Their every word is pored over,  judgement is made on every off-the-cuff remark. As a result, many prominent people opt for the safest option. Just one example. Most priests, in the course of most Masses, deliver a homily. This […]

Is there any end to the agony and heartlessness of the Middle East? The UN Secretary-General António Guterres attacked by Israel, because he dared to mention the historical context for that Hamas attack. Think a minute – doesn’t that sound a bit like what happened here during the Troubles?   Meanwhile Sir Keir Starmer, champion […]

One of the great obstacles to peace in the Middle -east is the support for Zionism among right wing fundamentalist Christians in the USA. In her book, ‘The Last Crusade’, the author, Barbara Victor, shows how the Christian right has grown in the USA to become a great ally of Zionism and an enemy of […]

  October 25th 2023Sir,When Britain’s Irish Question was about to be sorted, the British changed the question, so it is said. It appears, now, that a British Northern Ireland Minster, Steve Baker, wants, instead, to change the answer.  Baker requires a 60-40 majority in the North to bring about a United Ireland. The call pays homage to the gerrymandered manner in which the territory was set up and how it was run in places like Derry.The call for a United Ireland is a call for democracy and to reverse a century of British-misrule. A United Ireland will not persecute or discriminate on the basis of national identity. Divide and rule and super-minorities are what Britain does. Baker’s concoction won’t cook well and he should clear out of the kitchen.Yours sincerelyTom Cooper

  A limited brain can only deal with limited information; a brain with a bit more elbow-room can take in information and related data as well, at the same time. I thought of this yesterday evening, as I  watched UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemn the butchery in which some 1400 Israelis died and go on […]

 We all want a peaceful outcome of the inevitable referendum on Irish unity. We don’t want to have  discontented groups of people who feel that the result has left them high and dry. So here’s a couple of modest proposals.   Those voters living in the Belfast area – the exact boundaries could be investigated […]

  Let’s begin with Gaza shall we? Are you sitting comfortably?   In 2006 the American administration and  Israel supported by Britain and the European Union called for elections in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza .   The stated aim of these elections was to have a democratically returned leadership […]

  It’s a sad and bitter thing to say, but there’s no way to avoid the Middle East. If you switch on your TV it’s in every news report, if you leave your TV off it weighs heavy on your mind. So what will the outcome be, if Israel does what it says it’ll do […]

  The Middle East is a powder keg at the minute and could explode at any time.  Usually, the instigator in most scenarios is Israel,  owing to its ability to do as it pleases anytime anywhere due to the fact most know the USA will come riding in to back Israel up no matter what.  […]