Are we an insular people? Well yes of course we are – we live on an island. It’s what islanders are. But that’s in the literal sense. In the sense of being mentally parochial, inward-looking, eyes tight on our own little patch? No and yes. No because if you’ve ever been at a Sinn Féin Ard Fheis, for example, you’ll inevitably find representatives from minorities throughout the world. And if you check the wall mural on the Falls Road, you’ll see a great range of people and issues with which the republicans in the city express solidarity. It’s a healthy sign, to see parallels between your own circumstances and that of others.
On the other hand yes, we are an insular people. I base this on one criterion only, I should add. When I do a blog about something that is not rooted in Ireland, the number of readers falls off. Every time. It’s natural I suppose that we’re more interested in our own problems than those of others, but we do need to exert ourselves to show greater empathy with those beyond our island.
I include myself in that gentle reproof. For days I’ve been receiving requests to do something on the situation in Gaza. On principle I don’t like people telling me I should do a blog on this or that – I like to think I’ve a right to choose for myself. But in this instance I do need a nudge.
On the news this morning, more tales of assaults on Gaza, leaving a total of at least 160 people dead and around 1000 injured. This in reprisal for the killing of three young Israelis. Is this proportionate? Obviously not. It is, in the literal sense, terrorism: this bloodshed is inflicted on Palestinians civilians so that they will pressure Hamas and other groups to end their rocket attacks on Israel. Israel denies this, of course, presenting itself as a small beleaguered nation, surrounded by enemies. And they’re right in that. And they know that we in the West have a guilt complex about Israel. The state’s very existence links into the terrible suffering that was inflicted on the Jews by Nazism.
But the irony is that those who have suffered the most frequently end up as those who inflict the worst atrocities when they get the opportunity. “Those who forget their history are doomed to repeat it” – except that the Israelis haven’t forgotten their history but still inflict horrors on hundreds of innocent others.
A final irony. President Obama has offered the services of the US to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Question: where did Israel acquire the hardware to wage such bloody and efficient war on those around her? From the US. Israel almost certainly is in possession of nuclear weapons. Does the US or any other Western country suggest Israel should be invaded and their nuclear facilities destroyed? You’re joking. I still remember the speed with which both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton hurried to address a Jewish lobby group during their presidential campaign, so that Israel might be assured of the US’s unflinching support should it be required.
If we trace back the source of the death and destruction that fell on the people of Gaza over recent days, then, we see that the responsibility ultimately rests with the US. Withdraw US support or even modify it, and Israel’s attitude to its neighbours would be proportionately modified.
When the conflict here was at its height, we were assured by the US and the UK that there was a better way, that those who doled out death were on the road to nowhere. When will we hear similar words from Obama or Cameron, directed at the merciless slaughter meted out by Israel? We’re told that these attacks were aimed at points from which rockets were launched against Israel. In this morning’s news, we also hear that 88% of those killed and injured were totally innocent civilians.
Yes, it’s all happening far away. Yes, the people dying don’t look or sound like us. But they are our brothers and sisters. Ask not for whom the bell tolls, John Donne said. It tolls for thee.
I find myself becoming increasingly angry at the US and the UK over this issue. Yes, Hamas are firing rockets at Israel but as numbers and indeed independent media has told us, very few if any of these rockets have actually fallen on a populated area. Not a single Israeli civilian has been killed by these rockets in the recent increase in tit for tat violence (thats a Norn Iron phrase right there). The fact that literally hundreds of Palestinian civilians are being killed every day is unforgivable. Yes Israel may think it is defending itself but when you think of what the Palestinians wield compared to Israel you begin to see how barbaric and downright oppressive these attacks are.
One thing I noticed in one of Israel’s media snippets was a military man with many stars on his lapels saying something along the lines of Israel was only attacking Hamas buildings and had the ability to drop single buildings leaving those around them standing. Well in one way they have the ability to drop single buildings leaving those around them intact, but have we seen them exercising this power, no. Another point is Hamas is Democratically elected by the Palestinian people so in attacking only Hamas buildings Israel is attacking Palestinians as a people. In reality Israel is attacking the Palestinian people as a whole but is trying to hide this by saying they are attacking Hamas building and areas.
Now Israel whinges about Hamas firing rockets into its territory and yes, Hamas needs to stop this but we have seen in recent days if not before, Israel has the ability to shoot these rockets out of the sky…literally, with a weapons system known as ‘Iron Dome’. Basically this is a ‘Rafael Advanced Defense Systems’ equivalent of the ‘Patriot missile system’ used by Britain to shoot down the Iraqi Skud missiles during the Gulf War. With Israel throwing all these military forces into the Gaza Strip you would think it would be a more cost efficient option to set up these little jewels of safety in Israeli neighbourhoods until such times as they can beat out a peace agreement with the Palestinians.
Sadly though, I feel any agreement with Israel will be short lived. We have seen in the past that both the Israelis and the Palestinians have had ‘agreements’ if you want to call it that and they have broken down. Personally I feel the last ‘agreement’ was broken by Israel intentionally for their own means.
As of now Israel has stopped all exports and imports into Gaza. They are in contravention on the Geneva Convention. No.
The stated aim of Israel’s blockade is to apply “pressure” or “sanctions” to weaken the economy of Gaza and decrease support for Hamas. This amounts to collective punishment of Gaza’s civilians, and as such is a violation of international humanitarian law under Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Further, as an occupying power, Israel is required under Articles 55, 59 and 60 (yes three articles) of the Fourth Geneva Convention to ensure, and I quote “free, unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief and is prohibited from impeding the full realization of the occupied people’s human rights”.
Israel’s blockade impedes Gazans’ rights to food, to an adequate standard of living, to work, and to the highest attainable standard of health, and therefore is a violation of international law. Yet we see most of the world turn a deaf ear to what the messes say. Millions of people have asked Obama to intervene but has he, of course not because Israel is one of his biggest customers for weapons.
So I suppose to end, we can only sit and wait to see what happens, sit and watch the continued blood shed, or is that all we can do. Will people listen to us if we protest or demonstrate our disgust at this superior military power oppressing and pretty much ethnically cleansing Palestinians?
So Michael, you authoritative opinion on this is that because Israel wields more power, they should do nothing. Hamas were fully aware when they abducted and murdered the three Israeli children that they would get a response from Israel, and they duly obliged. The Iron Dome defence system is limited in its capacity and cannot stop multiple rockets, as I’m sure you have seen the rockets landing in various towns inside Israel. Hamas are making no effort to target specific points, they fire indiscriminately into populated areas. A school was hit earlier in the week, but the children and teachers had heeded the sirens and moved into an air raid shelter, so please don’t make excuses for Hamas. “Israel whinges about Hamas firing rockets into its territory”, what an incredibly puerile comment, I can only presume you are saying these things to invite comment. There have been “literally hundreds of civilians killed every day”, not sure what you mean by that, I presume you are suggesting there have been hundreds killed although your comment does not make sense, and is contradictory. Hamas have been elected in Palestinian areas, so they bear a huge responsibility to their people over their actions, as do the Israelis. Many thousand people from the Palestinian territories work in Israel, and when Hamas fire rockets into Israel, the Israelis automatically close the borders, depriving these people of work and income. Michael, take your patch off and look at this with two eyes, and not as a one eyed irish republican, we don’t have to automatically take sides in other areas.
I think you’re looking at this from a purely British point of view where the power hungry can do what they want. Maybe it is you William who should take the patches from both your eyes and look at it from the point of view that most people have seen but one which Britain, America and most of the other G8 countries fail to see. My ‘comment’ in general was about the disproportional amounts of force Israel is using to stop these attacks but wait….are they stopping, no they’re not because Israel is not only trying to stop said attack but are also trying desperately to rid the Gaza Strip of Palestinians and they are doing a damn good job of it. I took nothing to do with the whole Palestinian/Israeli conflict until the recent bout of killings. It has absolutely nothing at all to do with me being a Nationalist is the slightest so please do not even bring that into it.
Ok Michael, it has nothing to do with your background. The reality is that the only way to stop the missile attacks is a ground attack, as the Hamas missile sites are mobile, and they deliberately put them in built up areas.
William fay
What intelligence have you at hand to claim who killed those ‘3 Israelis children’ as you put it? And while I am at, were two of these ‘children’ members of the IDF?
Netanyahu has been spoiling to bust up the recent coming together of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas and strangely enough these 3 deaths have given him his opportunity. In fact Obama practically gave him the nod when he said a few weeks ago that this coming together was unfortunate.
Whether who is right or who is wrong, the sight of people sitting in their deck chairs, cheering and taking selfies whilst in the background, the Israelis defence force ‘knock on roofs’ and bomb homes in the Gaza Strip is a disgusting sight that no right thinking person could dispute. In fact these morbid onlookers were not too worried about Hamas pesky rockets at all come to think of it.
That’s good Wolfe, you are justifying the murder of “three Israeli children”, I have no idea why you feel it necessary to put this in italics.
The pivotal sentence in this morning’s blog is the following: ‘And they (the Israelis) know that we in the West have a guilt complex about Israel’.
In Irish terms this is revealed at its starkest during the annual celebration of cultural codology known as Bloomsday. This is the day when Dublin turns June 16 into Jewn 16, not unlike the way many of those born in the Big Apple think of themselves as being citizens of New York, Jew York.
Though I think that Bloomsday has been shown to be every bit as elastic as the very band on Molly Bloom’s bloomers as it now stretches to a week. Only a matter of time before it becomes Bloomsmonth, one supposes.
It is perhaps the only example anywhere in the world of a festival where the local folk actually celebrate a book, one of whose chapters is, in fact, nothing less than an unsubtle racist attack on the core of their very selves. A case, perhaps, of rabbits caught in the Headlights of the Holocaust?
Consider, discerning readers, if you will: Episode 12, known as the Cyclops. This is set in Barney Kiernan’s pub and features a cantankerous character called The Citizen who is swilling porter in a corner of the dim tavern. At his feet sprawls his mangy, smelly mongrel, Garryowen. When that paragon of all that is pure and noble and oiive-branched in the human race, one Leopold Bloom, enters the tavern, The Citizen unleashes a series of cock-eyed insults and foul-mouthed slanders at the new arrival with all the ferocity of, well, now, Hamas-propelled rockets. The unfortunate Leopold had to hightail it pronto with the sound of a biscuit tin (Jacob’s, one suspects) whizzing past his ear. Luckily, it missed, or we Gaels would not now be celebrating La Bloom.
The Citizen, of course, is a thinly disguised version of Michael Cusack who was the founder of, sans doute, THE most bigoted, the most racist, the most greedy association EVER: one speaks of the GAA, aka The Grab All Association.
Dubliner James Joyce, the son of a Corkonian josser called John A. Joyce (ceist: are all Corkonian jossers called John A?) who ear-pulled his son after a week in O’Connell’s CBS to enrol him in with the SJs of nearby Belvedere College on the sound basis that ‘no son of mine will be educated with the Paddy Stinks and Mickey Muds’. Revolutionary James was obviously content to inherit all the broad-minded prejudices of his da, John A., hook, l. and s.
Now, as one who was one of those Paddy S. and Mickey M.s who had to endure not one week but eleven L-O–N-G years in the same O’Connell’s CBS one has always cultivated a certain interest in the Joyces, pere et fils. (Indeed, one had a classmate who was resident in the very crumbling Georgian house where Araby is located).
The name Garryowen of the bowler was, of course, a give away in the above chapter. For, around this time, 1904, a pogrom which has gone down in the Annals of Shame in Gaeldom occured. The Limerick Pogrom is, perhaps, the only pogrom in the world which featured (oh the horror of it all!) : one sprained ankle, two broken collar bones and (gasp) no less that three bloody noses !
Kemmy Come Lately was known to play the infamous jig called the Limerick Pogrom with the same enthusiasm as the Tulla (oh, happy title!) Ceili Band used to play the Walls of Limerick. Interesting to note that one of Kemmy’s famous Femmies, one Jan O Sullivan as just been appointed as Minister of Education in the Free Southern State. We Paddy Stinks and Mickey Muds will be watching the progress of Jan (love that name !) with a certain disinterested interest.
Her appointment was caused by the wretched rooting up the rear end administered to one, Alan Shatter. Which was rather a pity. For one was deprived of the intriguing situation which might have developed should, say – God forbid !- the Irish troops stationed in Lebanon have come under fire from either Israel of their proxies. To see on which side of, erm, Defence ole Al would have sat. (One almost said another word, involving h). Now, alas, we will never know.
The same conspiratorial silence greeted the appointment of A. Shatter as the one which continues to greet Episode 12 of Ulysses. But then, as the old seanfhocal in the lingua franca of the Leprechaun has it: ‘Is olc an chearc a chacann ar a huibheacha fein’ (Translaiton, rough, very: ‘Bad indeed is the female cock which shat on his/her own eggs’).
Of course, to return by a circuitous route not unlike the Liffey itself, the main man in the whole Bloomsday shindig was/is a star called David Og Norris (may his tribe increase !). (One almost said Donal Og Cusack !).
Pogrom ! Pogrom ! Get your official Pogrom ! Pogrom of the Game !
Restricting Jude Collins’ intellect and creative thinking to the Six Counties, is cognitive neglect. Good to see that a broader perspective has emerged in your 73rd year.
It is theatre of the atrociously absurd but did you note through the week that Tony Blair was given airtime to explain how Peace may be achieved in the Middle East. The ripples envelope the Obama administration.
I heard Eamonn speak without notes far an hour in Glasgow a few years ago on the ‘international perspective of attrocity from Bogside to Cana’. Brilliant. I may have a recording of it somewhere from the GSA website.
God John you’re merciless – I never thought of 73rd year until you said it. Damn.I think T Blair and Middle East peace envoy matches with Kissinger and Nobel Peace Prize…
Interesting piece by Ben White over on The National
http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/as-gaza-burns-it-is-clear-two-states-would-only-cement-israels-apartheid#full
‘Apartheid domination was never the goal of political Zionism in Palestine. The objective was, simply, a Jewish state, and to realise this aim required the removal of the land’s pre-existing, non-Jewish majority. But it did not turn out to be so simple, and the Palestinian people can point to decades of resistance and steadfastness in the face of efforts to reduce them to “resettled” refugees and obedient minorities.’
zionism is an expression of a political ideology which exists to promote the concept that jews have a right to a homeland .a jewish state.it is not a religious conxept tbeeir sre in facg organisstions .such as jews against Zionism.the idea of a zionist/ jewish only regime being foisted upon an already existing soverign nation/ race/ culturally homomginous society was first at expressed at the Zionist convention in Bassle in the 1890..Over tbe years the template created for this colonial conquest based on a political ideology and financed by the wealthy elite several regions Iin the world were dosissed as possible options for new state of zion.these included Uganda offered by britain latin america madacasgar because it was an island and ofcourse palestine.so the endless war of ethnic cleansing against the palestinians and regional destabilisation promoted by israel and the west in order to preserve this european colony in the middle east could actually be occurring in africa or latin america
did I mention they looked at madgasgsr? thank god they didnt lool at Ireland hadnt wr suffered enough.Thank you Jude for highlighting this ongoing travesty of humanity this is the continued expansion of zionism of a greater israel built on the stolen land the stolen dreams the stolen lives and the stolen hopes and futures of the people of palestine since the jewish national fund began buying up land in palestine in 1901 for jewish settlers only .
Jude
Your blog does not dignify a response.
Pro Israel Norma Wilson
Norma, if I may, your answer does not do justice to your posts on here.
Seems like – hear no evil, see no evil.
Wake up to the fact that Israel are not infallible. They make mistakes and have made one now, in the here and now.
Blanket support is not an option.
Imagine if I tried, foolishly, to say “Norma, Your blog does not dignify a response. Pro IRA” in relation to Enniskillen.
No matter what way it is looked at, no matter what the so called justification – Israel is terrorising other people. Killing their children. And the world turns a blind eye.
Please think about that. Carefully.
And yet, Norma, you still give one
gonta agus léargasach a Jude – maith thú.
The crime of Apartheid is defined by the 2002 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court as inhumane acts of a character similar to other crimes against humanity “committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime.” The way we treat children, vulnerable people and older people is a mark of our civilization. While bonfires burned in Belfast, people in England and Scotland queued at food banks. While men women and children are being slaughtered in Gaza, many people on this island are preoccupied with placating a cowboy and his concerts. Palestinian civil society has called for BOYCOTT, DISINVESTMENT AND SANCTIONS. A “lawfare” case brought by the Israeli group Shurat Ha Din was successfully opposed by Australian lobby groups. It is time to leave the “eye for an eye” mentality (Exodus 21:24) where it belongs, in the Old Testament and challenge all war crimes through legal procedures and sanctions.
Outstanding idea Iolar, “BOYCOTT, DISINVESTMENT AND SANCTIONS”, and the result will be – Israel will close the borders to the Palestinians, and many thousand of them will lose their jobs, maybe you could be Tony Blair’s adviser.
Jude, I am so glad you undertook this topic as it goes to the heart of how we interpret events through the eyes of popular media which itself has vested and polarised interests in the outcome of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict.
It is interesting to see the split in how individuals and groups adopt a side of who to support. Conservatives, Unionists/ monarchists & Capitalists seem almost exclusively to support the actions of the Israeli regime while Socialists, Republicans and Muslims would seem exclusively to support the plight of the Palestinian people!
Why is this the case?
The question I suppose is, why are the ordinary people on the street not more outspoken about the worst extremes of the conflict which indiscriminately take the lives of hundreds of innocent women and children.
One explanation is of course apathy but I would contest a stronger motive is the fear as an individual of being labelled an anti-Semite or as an organisation of being targeted by Internet trolls, hackers or financial penalties brought about through negatively generated publicity or withdrawal of investments by corporations or investors.
Israeli lobby groups are extremely powerful. Just look at the register of the Friends of Israel Lobby Group in the Westminster House of Commons. A number of years ago William Hague of the Conservatives was critical of the Israeli Regimes bombing of the Gaza Strip. He was rounded on by the right wing press in Britain and targeted for personal criticism by the Israeli lobby groups until he amended his views and withdrew his criticism of Israeli attacks on Gaza.
It is quite interesting to find bloggers on the same site, who on one hand can condemn the Israelis for firing missiles at Hamas targets in the Palestinian Territories, yet in the same breath can laud their IRA heroes for leaving no warning bombs in towns all over the UK, killing and maiming men, women and children. The level of hypocrisy underwhelms me.
William – can you point to one instance on this site where people “laud their IRA heroes for leaving no warning bombs in towns all over the UK, killing and maiming men, women and children.”?
Sorry Jude, but if people are justifying everything that the IRA did, thus includes the murder of children. The continuum of blogs are lauding the IRA, I’m not sure what your point is here.
Hamas weren’t the only ones to hide their bases among civilians, the British couldn’t stop building their barracks’ near schools,hospitals,etc in the north.
If only the British state copied the Israelis and did a bit of ‘roof tapping’ on republicans during the long war………Isn’t that right William????? I can sense envy when you mention the Israelis actions.
Wolfe, I think you are a member of the thought police.