Revolutionary socialist & anti-imperialist; Rebel Breeze publishes material within this spectrum and may or may not agree with all or part of any particular contribution. Writing English, Irish and Spanish, about politics, culture, nature.
Palestinian flags waved as people gathered on the pedestrian reservation in Dublin’s main thoroughfare, O’Connell Street, to mark Palestinian Land Day March 30th, anniversary of the 1976 confiscation of Palestinian land by the Israeli Zionist State.
Naturally, the event also addresses the continual threat to additional Palestinian land by Zionist settler occupation, Israeli judicial and army demolition of Palestinian housing and intimidation, harassment and terrorism against Palestinians in Jerusalem.
Palestine supporters gathering for Land Day (Photo: D.Breatnach)
The Dublin event was organised by the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, a broad organisation that receives broad support not only across the Irish Left and Republican spectrum but also from a great many non-aligned Irish people and even many among voters for mainstream political parties.
This support was emphasised by frequent drivers in passing traffic, both public, taxis and entirely private, blowing their horns in approval of the rally. The population of the Irish state has gone from being in general support of the Israeli State to being generally hostile to its behaviour.1
Zionists tend to depict anti-Israeli Zionism as being anti-Jewish and therefore, according to them, “anti-semitic”2. Quite apart from the wide inapplicability of the term and some isolated historical examples dredged up3, it fails to account for the change in public attitudes over recent decades.
The iconic GPO in the background (Photo: D.Breatnach)
It has been years of viewing even media-sanitised coverage of massacres of Palestinians by the Israeli armed forces with international impunity that has radically altered the opinion of the public in Ireland, in all probability drawing on their own historical experience of foreign occupation.
An elderly Irishman voicing anti-Jewish views did in fact approach the rally but was confronted by other Irish people who emphasised that they were against the Zionist state and not against Jews, soon causing the first man to depart unhappily.
The continual occupation of Palestinian land by Zionist settlers has invalidated even the “two-state solution” (sic) beloved of liberals, making it a practical impossibility, undermining the main ‘concession’ of the supposed solution of the USA-mediated “Palestinian peace process” of 1991.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
The refusal of the Israeli authorities to permit the return of Palestinian exiles while welcoming Jewish settlers, most of whom had no even ancestral connection to Palestine, means that the future for Palestinians in the Israeli state can be at best as an oppressed minority.4
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
Other Palestine news
Even as preparations for the Dublin rally took place, Israeli police shot dead a Palestinian they claimed had tried to wrest a gun from them at the Al Haq Mosque but whom Palestinian eye-witnesses said had merely been protesting the police harassment of a woman.
Since the rally, another two Palestinians have been killed in an by Israeli armed forces raid on Nablus. This brings the total number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces this year alone to over 90, with a high proportion of them children.
Mass protests and even mini-riots by Israeli Jews are currently expressing opposition to the current government’s plans to ‘reform’ the judiciary, to bring it under the greater control of the Executive.
While Israeli Jews are deeply divided on this question the vast majority are agreed on the need to suppress Palestinians, to enforce apartheid and to keep the State as ‘Jewish’ one.
Meanwhile an April 1st Fool’s Day hoax depicting an executive of the sports shoe manufacturer company Puma declaring a boycott of the Zionist state was widely shared on the Twitter social media to overwhelmingly welcoming comment.
Exposure of the hoax received mixed responses, with wide condemnation from pro-Israeli and even some pro-Palestinian sources but others claiming it helped to widely publicise the manufacturer Puma’s close links to the Zionist State and that would enhance its boycott by many.
End.
(Image accessed: Internet)
Footnotes
1Dublin City has had Jewish municipal Councillors and the sixth President of Israel, Chaim Herzog (Hebrew: חיים הרצוג; 17 September 1918 – 17 April 1997) was an Irish-born Israeli politician, general, lawyer and author who served as the 6th President of Israel between 1983 and 1993. He was born in Belfast and raised primarily in Dublin; his father was Ireland’s Chief rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, who immigrated to the British protectorate of Palestine in 1935 and served in the Haganah Zionist paramilitary group, later the Israeli Army where he reached the rank of Major-General. As recently as 1967 the prevailing Irish public opinion seemed sympathetic to the Israeli State and the fictional propaganda and wildly inaccurate historical Hollywood films Exodus (1960) and Cast a Giant Shadow (1966) were widely viewed sympathetically in Ireland.
2The term originally included hatred or fear of all Semitic people, including Arabs and Jews but has come to be understood as exclusively meaning a racist attitudes towards Jews. By no means all Jews are Zionist though Zionists have worked long and hard to make both descriptions interchangeable with a great deal of success among the world Jewish population with possible unfortunate consequences for Jewish populations outside Israel. However many Jews have criticised the behaviour of the Zionist State towards Palestinians, earning the hatred of the Zionists, who cannot label them as anti-semitic and therefore call them “self-hating Jews”.
An event was held on a busy Saturday afternoon in Dublin’s city centre to commemorate IRA volunteer Patrick O’Brien, killed by soldiers of the Irish State.
The event included bagpipe airs, a colour party, speeches and a resistance song.
A colour party with Irish Tricolour and the flags of the four provinces, led by a lone piper marched into and a short distance westward up Talbot Street towards where a crowd waited beside a memorial sign that had been erected shortly earlier. The colour party took up station on the opposite side of the road.
Led by a piper playing Irish airs, the colour party (i.e carrying the flags – the Irish Tricolour and those of the four provinces of Ireland) approaches as the start of the commemoration. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
Among the airs being played on the short march were Thomas Moore’s Let Erin Remember and The Wearing of the Green or The Rising of the Moon, the same traditional air to both different songs referring to the 1798 Rising.
THE SHORT LIFE OF A LOYAL REPUBLICAN
Framed portrait photo of Vol. Patrick O’Brien on display at the commemoration (Photo: D.Breatnach)
Gina Nicoletti, chairing the event, recounted to the crowd a short history of Volunteer Patrick O’Brien who was born on 17 August 1898 in the townland of Woodlands near Castledermot in County Kildare to a local agricultural working couple.
The O’Brien family had 16 children, all of whom survived and ten of whom lived with Patrick and his parents in a three-room house at the time of the 1911 Census.
An obituary published in a Republican newspaper on the anniversary of his death suggests that Patrick moved to Dublin in 1915, joining the Irish Volunteers in December of that year aged 17. He took part in the 1916 Easter Rising under the command of Edward Daly.
Evading capture in 1916 and returning home, O’Brien joined the local Irish Volunteers company in Castledermot but returned to Dublin in May 1917 and became attached to E Company, 3 Battalion, Dublin Brigade, Irish Volunteers, which was based on the south side of the city.
Sean Óg sings The Foggy Dew while accompanying himself on guitar and centre of photo is Gina Nicoletti, who chaired the event. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
An active IRA member during the War of Independence, Vol. O’Brien took the anti-Treaty side in the IRA split in March 1922.
In a response to a renewal of executions of IRA men by the Free State government, Liam Lynch (IRA Chief of Staff) issued the ‘Amusements Order’ on 13 March 1923 banning all cinema, theatre and sports events “at a time of national mourning” with action threatened against non-compliance.
At midnight on 23 March 1923, Patrick took part in an operation to blow up the Carleton Picture House, O’Connell Street (then near the Parnell Monument opposite the Savoy Cinema). The cinema had closed an hour before a landmine at the front entrance shattered the glass of several windows.
There were no injuries but newspaper articles reported that the sound of the explosion was heard several miles away. Accounts of what happened afterwards were gathered from one of the IRA unit, Volunteer Joseph Doody in his pension application.
The unit unexpectedly encountered Free State soldiers coming from the Parnell Monument who opened fire on them and another patrol was approaching from the southern end of O’Connell Street and the unit retreated through Findlater Place and out to Marlborough Street.
In the running firefight in Talbot Street, O’Brien was hit by at least four bullets (three in his left leg and one in his right leg). He fell wounded on the pavement between Speidel’s pork butchers and the Masterpiece Picture Palace at 99 Talbot Street and died about 30 minutes after arrival at hospital.
The colour party lowers the flags in honour of a martyr as the piper plays a lament (Photo: D.Breatnach)
Patrick O’Brien was 24 and his death certificate listed his occupation as an employee of a railway company. His address was 28 Cadogan Road, Fairview which is a cul de sac of Victorian redbrick houses close to Annesley Bridge and opposite the Sean Russell statue.
Only three weeks before Patrick’s death, the Free State CID1 had raided no. 43 Cadogan Road and captured the press used to print the Sinn Féin2 paper An Phoblacht along with eight people who were on site. A number of prominent IRA families lived in the vicinity, including the Brughas.
Patrick O’Brien was buried in the Republican Plot, Glasnevin Cemetery and a volley was fired over his grave, presumably following the funeral in the cover of darkness as the IRA could not have risked such a public display during the burial, in a time of martial law.
The colour party raise the flags again in symbolism of the struggle carrying on after honouring a martyr (Photo: D.Breatnach)
Despite the hard repression by the Irish State on combatants, their relatives and friends, O’Brien’s family were proud of Patrick as displayed in an anniversary notice placed in The Nationalist & Leinster Times.
The Irish Independent reported on 27 March 1923 that at the inquest of Patrick’s death, his brother James told those present:
“[My brother] … belonged to the IRA since 1915 being then about 15 years of age. He had never changed his principles since then. He always intended to die as he did … rather than change his principles as he swore allegiance to the Republic in 1916.”
FLORAL WREATH, SONG AND SPEECH
A representative of Anti-Imperialist Action was called upon and stepped forward to attach a green, white and orange floral wreath to the pole beneath the commemorative sign.
The plaque/ placard commemorating Vol. Patrick O’Brien attached in Talbot Street by Independent Republicans with the floral wreath from Anti-Imperialist Action attached below it (Photo: D.Breatnach)
Seán Óg accompanied himself on guitar singing The Foggy Dew, a popular Republican ballad about the 1916 Rising composed by Fr. Charles O’Neill.
Dublin City Councillor Cieran Perry gave a fairly short speech stressing the importance of these acts of remembrance upholding traditions of resistance in the Dublin working class, also denouncing the fake patriots who stir up racist divisions and hostility in the community.
Perry’s speech also listed some of the crimes of the Irish state, facts underlined when Joe Mooney read out the list of 70 IRA Volunteers formally executed by the Irish state along with those killed in battle or after they surrendered, or were abducted, tortured and murdered in Dublin 1922-’23.
Cnclr. Cieran Perry speaking at the commemoration. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
TRAFFIC AND PEOPLE
Traffic was light along the narrow Talbot Street during the event and slowed down to ease past the crowd that had spilled from the pedestrian pavement into the street. A few minutes’ eastward of the spot is the plaque commemorating the killing of Sean Treacy by the British in November 1920.
There was a substantial number of people in support of the event on both pavements of the one-way street but others gathered too, whether out of curiosity or in sympathy. Some of those present consisted of visitors from other countries, whether as students, tourists or workers.
The crowd grew and spilled on to Talbot Street. [The plaque to Vol. Sean Treacy killed by British soldiers in 1920 is high on the front of a building just beyond the tree on the right of photo] (Photo: D.Breatnach).
Not for the first time I thought that having leaflets to distribute summarising the event and the reason for it would be useful. I spent a little time explaining some aspects of the event and its history to a couple of visitors from Sweden who seemed very interested.
The uniformed Gardaí kept away from the event, though no doubt the plain-clothed political Special Branch had a few of their own in the vicinity to collect faces and try to match names.
THE ORGANISERS: INDEPENDENT REPUBLICANS
The commemorative event was organised by a group by the name Independent Republicans which has been doing great work in conserving and promoting historical memory associated with events such as the 1916 Rising, the War of Independence and the Civil War.
The Irish Free State came to power as an instrument of British imperialism which clothed, armed and otherwise supplied the state’s National (sic) Army. Independent Republicans have collected the names of 70 Irish Republicans killed in Dublin by that Army.
The group has also devoted time and effort to researching the backgrounds and circumstances of death of many on that list, a substantial undertaking for which we owe them a great debt. Their erection of ‘plaque’ signs around the city at the spot where the fighters fell is also great work.
The commemorative plaque/ placard to Vol. Patrick O’Brien’s memory being erected shortly before the start of the event (Photo: D.Breatnach)
On Easter Saturday (8 April) Independent Republicans will be holding a 1916 Rising commemoration in Dublin city centre, details below.
Anti-Imperialist Action will be holding theirs on Easter Sunday (9 April), details below.
End.
FOOTNOTES:
1Criminal Investigation Department, based at Oriel House, where police detectives and some soldiers of the Free State organised operations against Republicans including raids, assassinations, abductions and torture.
2This is not the party of the same name today. Sinn Féin began as a dual-monarchy Irish nationalist party, adopting Republicanism later in 1918. Those who later supported the anti-Republican status of the country and partition by England left the party and another large number left to join the Fianna Fáil party upon the latter’s founding. Briefly in the 1960s the party espoused socialism but split at the end of the decade and Sinn Féin under the Provisionals briefly adopted socialism again during the 1970s. The party of that name today is neither socialist nor even Republican.
A picket outside the Italian Embassy in Dublin on Thursday (23rd) was part of a day of action across Europe in solidarity with an Anarchist prisoner on hunger strike since October in a struggle for more humane prison conditions.
The picket, organised at short notice, included Irish Republicans, Anarchists and revolutionary Socialists. Banners and placards indicated the presence of Saoradh, Irish Anarchist Network and Ireland Anti-Internment Campaign.
At one point five uniformed Gardaí stood near the Embassy’s gate while three plain-clothes Special Branch (i.e. political police) watched from a car across the road. The police numbers may have been due to a request from the Embassy in the midst of attacks on some Italian Embassies in Europe.
Despite the presence of Gardaí, Embassy staff appeared nervous, meeting one visitor at the gate to check her reason for attendance after speaking to her on her mobile phone, rather than first allowing her to enter the garden and approach the main entrance.
Some of the uniformed Gardaí attending the solidarity picket and some of the protesters. (Photo: IAIC)
Three Special Branch Gardaí (political police) parked across from the picketers, surveilling them (Photo: IAIC)
THE HARSHEST ITALIAN PRISON CONDITIONS
Alfredo Cospito is an Italian political prisoner kept under the harshest Italian prison conditions, “41-bis”, which include solitary confinement for most of the day, family visit once a month through glass, no reading matter sent from outside and no phone calls in either direction or lawyer privacy.
According to information on the Internet, these inhumane conditions were developed for Mafiosa leaders, in order to prevent them running their organisations from inside jail and also to pressure them into breaking ranks and informing on their colleagues.
Whatever we may say about that, what can be the intention of subjecting a political prisoner to those conditions, except to break him or to destabilise him mentally? EU recommended rules on prisoner management don’t recommend more than three weeks in solitary confinement.
Lawyers for political prisoner Nadia Lioce, who has been living under the 41-bis regime for two decades, have said due to limited hours permitted contact, she has effectively only interacted with people for a total of 15 hours in the space of a year.
Italian media reported Lioce’s lawyers as saying she is now so “psychologically isolated” that, when her mother and sister visit, she is unable to speak to them for more than a few minutes.
Some of the picketers, the Italian Embassy in the background (Photo: IAIC)
Amnesty International and the European Court of Human Rights have both criticised several aspects of the 41-bis, and in 2007 a US court refused to extradite a convicted Mafia drug trafficker on the grounds that the 41-bis regime he would face in Italy would have “constituted torture”.
The Anti-Imperialist Front gave a call for an international solidarity day of action which found an active response in many countries.
Alfredo Cospito’s case is up for review by the Italian prison system this month and pickets and other actions have been organised around Europe to exert pressure on the Italian penal authorities to release Cospito into house arrest in his sister’s home.
The picket displayed not only internationalist solidarity but exemplary broad unity of disparate political forces in solidarity with an Anarchist political prisoner. Hopefully this unity will continue to be built upon as time goes on, for the unfolding struggles of class and nation demand it.
Hopefully the international actions will cause the Italian authorities to relax the inhumane conditions of Alfredo Cospito’s incarceration but now Italian authorities are claiming that Cospito is somehow coordinating violent actions from within his extreme isolation.
Another two of the picketers (Photo: IAIC)
A side trip into history
The Italian Embassy is in Northumberland Road, on the south side of the Grand Canal (near the Israeli and US Embassies).
As they were leaving, some of the picketers took time to look at a plaque and monument to the Mount Street Bridge Battle between Irish Volunteers and British soldiers in 1916. Four Volunteers were killed and between 26 and 30 Sherwood Foresters, with 134 more wounded.
Mount Street Battle Monument, on the Bridge over the Grand Canal itself. The English explanation is on the reverse. (Photo: IAIC)
A number of Volunteers were captured but a number got away also. Two of the buildings from which the Volunteers fought remain, bearing the marks of bullet strikes. The third, Clanwilliam House was set on fire by the British and was replaced by a 1960s-type office building later.
Mucha gente sabe que el 17 de marzo es el Día de San Patricio, una fiesta nacional en Irlanda y un día festivo en algunos otros lugares del mundo donde la diáspora irlandesa ha tenido un impacto (1. ¿Pero por qué? ¿Y por qué el trébol y el color verde?
Al cristiano San Patricio, un esclavo galés fugitivo de los irlandeses que regresó como misionero cristiano a Irlanda, se le atribuye el papel principal en la conversión de los irlandeses de sus religiones paganas al cristianismo. Como tal, es venerado por las iglesias católica y protestante.
A diferencia de muchos lugares de Europa, la conversión parece haber sido en gran parte pacífica, sin evidencia del fuego y la espada con los que se impuso en muchas otras tierras. Quizás debido a esto, los monjes irlandeses registraron gran parte de la rica mitología y leyendas de la Irlanda pagana.
Pero no existe razón histórica cualquiera para asociar a Patrick con el trébol. La afirmación de que lo usó para demostrar el tres en uno de la Trinidad cristiana es una fábula y las copias de su Confessio, ampliamente aceptada como la auténtica autobiografía de Patrick, no lo mencionan.
La referencia a esta fábula no se registra hasta siglos después, pero un argumento mucho más convincente en contra de su veracidad es que los paganos tenían muchas trinidades deístas y los irlandeses no fueron una excepción, entre los cuales la diosa Mór-Righean2 en la saga Táin3 es la mejor recordada.
De hecho, parece que hay pocas razones para creer que los druidas preferían el trébol y la búsqueda en Internet hace años no arrojó ninguna referencia hasta que más recientemente apareció una sola referencia que no proporcionó la fuente de su afirmación.
Entonces, no hay una razón auténtica para el trébol, pero ¿qué pasa con el color verde? Resulta que la asociación de los irlandeses con el color verde también es históricamente reciente, y el azul tiene una asociación anterior. Incluso hoy, solo una de las cuatro provincias, Leinster, tiene verde en su bandera.
Una bandera similar a la de Leinster, un arpa dorada sobre un fondo verde, fue ondeada por primera vez e introducida por Eoghan Rua Ó Néill a la Confederación Católica, la alianza de irlandeses y colonos normandos contra Cromwell y el Parlamento inglés en 1642.
Siguieron varias versiones de Arpa y Corona en banderas, pero la primera organización republicana irlandesa de masas, los Irlandeses Unidos, volvieron a colocar el Arpa sin la Corona sobre un fondo verde para su bandera, con el lema “está recién encordada y se escuchará” al lado del arpa.
El emblema de los Irlandeses Unidos; el arpa fue reproducida dorada sobre fondo verde para la bandera. (Imagen de origen: Internet)
John Sheils, presbiteriano de Drogheda e Irlandés Unido, en su canción The Rights of Man de estilo aisling compuesta en algún momento antes del levantamiento de 1798, reunió los íconos de una Irlanda femenina, el arpa, el color verde, San Patricio y el trébol juntos en su llamado a la unidad contra Inglaterra.
Aludiendo a “la planta de tres hojas”, Sheils hace que San Patricio declame que
“es tres en uno, para probar su unidad en esa comunidad que aguanta impunemente a los Derechos de la Humanidad.” (Traducido del inglés por DB)
El “tres en uno” es una referencia obvia a la unidad de “católicos, protestantes y disidentes4” buscada por los Irlandeses Unidos y vocalizada por Wolfe Tone entre otros líderes. Sin embargo, no hay evidencia de un uso a gran escala por parte de los ‘Unidos del trébol para significar esa unidad.
Y el verde puede haberse inspirado en el color que Camille Desmoulins pidió a los parisinos que usaran en sus sombreros como señal de revolución dos días antes de la toma de la Bastilla en 1789, aunque pronto eligieron el azul para emular la Revolución Americana.
El fracaso de los levantamientos de los Irlandeses Unidos en 1798 y 1803 fue seguido por una severa represión, lo que refleja el temor de la Corona y sus leales colonos de perder su colonia irlandesa. El débil Parlamento irlandés fue abolido por sobornos e Irlanda se convirtió en parte formal del Reino Unido.
Como festividad cristiana, el Día de San Patricio podría haber parecido un día de fiesta inocuo, aceptable para el gobernante y los gobernados, por lo tanto, seguro para celebrar y usar el trébol como algo inocuo.
Llevando el Verde
Me parece probable que en una atmósfera de represión a gran escala, las personas que simpatizan con los republicanos irlandeses podrían optar por vestirse de verde en público al menos un día al año, en forma de trébol en “St. Día de San Patricio.”
La canción The Wearing of the Green hace referencia a la represión que siguió al levantamiento de los Irlandeses Unidos de 1798 con la letra “Están ahorcando a hombres y mujeres por llevar el verde” y “La ley prohíbe que el trébol crezca en suelo irlandés“. (6) (Traducido del inglés por DB)
La Hermandad Republicana Irlandesa, formada el día de San Patricio de 1856 simultáneamente en Nueva York, EE. UU. y en Dublín, Irlanda, adoptó el arpa dorada sobre un fondo verde para su bandera, aunque también usaron el Sunburst, que se cree que es el símbolo de los legendarios guerreros Fianna.
(Imagen procedente de: Historia de Irlanda)
La formación de la IRB, o “los fenianos”, como se les conoció tanto por amigos como por enemigos, se produjo en una época de gran emigración irlandesa, entonces mayoritariamente católica en religión y superando con creces la de la mayoría protestantes y disidentes de finales del siglo XVIII a los EEUU y a Canadá.
Oleadas de emigrantes irlandeses siguieron a quienes lograron salir de Irlanda durante la Gran Hambre de 1845-1848. Cada vez que iban a un país o colonia de habla inglesa, los irlandeses católicos sufrían discriminación por parte de los protestantes anglosajones blancos (WASPs) que se habían establecido allí antes que ellos.
Los irlandeses que formaron un batallón para luchar contra la segunda guerra expansionista de Estados Unidos contra México (1846-48) pueden haber enarbolado la bandera verde y el arpa; ciertamente llamaron a su unidad el Batallón de San Patricio y eran conocidos por los latinoamericanos como “Los San Patricios”.
En el Extranjero
El Día de San Patricio se convirtió en uno de celebración de la identidad irlandesa, más étnica que religiosa, una forma incluso de hacer alarde de esa identidad frente a sus detractores y perseguidores. Los irlandeses que luchaban en gran número en el Ejército de la Unión lo celebraron durante la actual Guerra Civil Estadounidense (1861-65).
En su primera invasión de Canadá en 1866, los veteranos de la Guerra Civil Estadounidense organizados por una rama de los fenianos ondearon una bandera verde con un arpa y, se dice, con las letras “IRA” en ella, el primer uso de este acrónimo en historia.
Pintura representando la Battalla de Ridgeway, la invasión Feniana de Canadá, 1866: observe la bandera irlandesa (Imagen obtenida: Internet).
Después de la guerra, los irlandeses en los EE. UU. celebraron el Día de San Patricio en desfiles masivos con sus veteranos del Ejército de la Unión en sus uniformes de regimiento, arrojando su identidad y su contribución a los EE. UU. frente a sus perseguidores, no solo los intelectuales WASP sino también los nativista “Know Nothings”7.
Los convictos irlandeses en Australia celebraron la fiesta en 1795 y, desde que fueron sentenciados en 1798 y 1803 los Irlandeses Unidos y fueron enviados allí encadenados, probablemente celebrados a menudo después por ellos, así como por los presos políticos posteriores, los Jóven Irlandeses en 1848 y los Fenianos en 1867.
La diáspora irlandesa en Australia, que fue calumniada debido a la oposición de muchos a luchar por el Imperio Británico en la 1a Guerra Mundial, marchó en un desfile el Día de San Patricio en 1921 con veteranos de la Primera Guerra Mundial en uniforme al frente,10 pidiendo la autodeterminación de Irlanda.
Como activista de la comunidad irlandesa en Gran Bretaña, nunca hubo dudas sobre dónde estaría yo el 17 de marzo: celebraría el día de la fiesta con la comunidad en el evento que habíamos organizado, ya sea un desfile o una recepción.
Durante una época de bombardeos del IRA y represión generalizada de la comunidad irlandesa11, hubo algunos llamamientos para abandonar los desfiles de San Patricio, pero otros y yo sentimos que era más importante que nunca celebrarlos en público en un momento en que la comunidad estaba bajo ataque y lo hizimos.
James Connolly debe haber experimentado la celebración del Día de San Patricio en su comunidad de la diáspora irlandesa en Edimburgo, más tarde como inmigrante en Irlanda, nuevamente como inmigrante en Nueva York y nuevamente como inmigrante en Irlanda.
Monumento a James Connolly, Beresford Place, Dublín. (Foto obtenida: Internet)
En marzo de 1916, un mes antes de su conjunto liderazgo del Alzamiento por el que sería fusilado por un pelotón de fusilamiento británico, escribió apoyando la celebración por parte de los irlandeses del Día de San Patricio.
“… la mente irlandesa, incapaz debido a la servidumbre o esclavitud de la raza irlandesa de dar cuerpo y existencia material a sus pensamientos más nobles, crea un emblema para tipificar esa concepción espiritual por la cual la raza irlandesa trabajó en vano.
“Si esa concepción espiritual de la religión, de la libertad, de la nacionalidad existe o no existió en ninguna parte excepto en la mente irlandesa, es sin embargo una realidad histórica tan grande como si estuviera incorporada en un libro de estatutos, o tuviera una existencia material garantizada por todas las páginas de la historia.”
“Por lo tanto, honramos el Día de San Patricio (y su leyenda aliada del trébol) porque en él vemos la concepción espiritual de la identidad separada de la raza irlandesa: un ideal de unidad en la diversidad, de diversidad que no entra en conflicto con la unidad“.(12) (Traducido del inglés por DB)
No pidió, y ciertamente habría repudiado, la celebración del día de la fiesta por parte de una unidad del ejército británico con ramitas de trébol o por políticos irlandeses neo-colones que lo celebraran con líderes del imperialismo estadounidense.
Al comentar sobre el viaje inverso de ese tipo cuando el presidente estadounidense Reagan llegó a Irlanda (en medio de una represión de la oposición anti imperialista a gran escala por parte del Estado irlandés), el bardo irlandés de la canción folklórica Christy Moore cantó en Hey Ronnie Regan:
Estarás llevando el verde Abajo en Ballyporeen, El ‘pueblo de la patata pequeña’; Pon tus brazos alrededor de Garrett Y cuelga tu zanahoria Pero nunca lograrás que me une a la OTAN. (Traducido del inglés por DB)
El poeta anglo irlandés y premio Nobel de Literatura WB Yeats escribió en una reflexión sobre el levantamiento de 1916:
Ahora y en el tiempo de ser, Dondequiera que se use verde, son cambiados, cambiados por completo: Nace una belleza terrible. (Traducido del inglés por DB)
Debería ser “terrible” solo para los enemigos de la libertad y la autodeterminación irlandesas, para los imperialistas, los colonizadores y sus partidarios fascistas y racistas, pero verdaderamente hermoso para todos los demás.
Al despedirnos, volvemos nuevamente a las palabras de John Sheils de la década de 1790 que puso en boca de Irlanda, la diosa Gráinne (traducido del inglés por DB):
Que cada comunidad detesta la desunión; en amor y unidad camina de mano; Y crée a la vieja Gráinne Que esa orgullosa Britannia Nunca más les robará de los Derechos de la Humanidad.
Trifolium dubium, el Trebol Menor o Amarillo, an Seamair Bhuí, candidato más seguro de lista de treboles de ser el “shamrock” tradicional. (Photo: Internet)
Fin.
Notas al pie:
1Terranova en Canadá y la isla caribeña de Monserrat. También es el más celebrado de todos los días festivos nacionales por todo el mundo.
2Suele traducirse en inglés como la “Morrigan”, una trinidad compuesta por tres hermanas, a veces Badb, Macha (número de lugares que llevan su nombre, incluido Ard Mhacha [Armagh]) y Nemain, otras veces Badb, Macha y Anand. A veces se las representaba como hermanas de otra tríada, Banba, Éiriu (de donde se deriva el nombre del país Éire) y Fódla. Las tríadas pueden ser tres aspectos de la única Diosa en cada caso.
3Táin Bó Cuailgne/ The Cattle Raid of Cooley, parte del Ciclo Ulster Cycle de cuentos, protagonizada por el legendario guerrero Sétanta o Cú Chulainn.
4Católicos (la gran mayoría de los irlandeses), Anglicanos (la pequeña minoría pero el grupo religioso reinante) y las otras Sectas protestantes, en particular los presbiterianos, que tenían muchos más seguidores que los anglicanos.
5 Los Irlandeses Unidos fueron muy influenciados por la Revolución Francesa, por supuesto.
6 La versión más conocida es la del dramaturgo Dion Boucicault, adaptada para su obra de 1864 Arragh na Pogue, o La Boda en Wicklow, ambientada en el condado de Wicklow durante la rebelión de 1798 (Wikipedia)
7 Bandas ‘nativistas’ de los primeros colonos estadounidenses que se movilizaron violentamente contra los irlandeses y los afroamericanos; cuando fueron juzgados en la corte, afirmaron “no saber nada”.
9Tal fue la oposición popular que los británicos temieron imponer el servicio militar obligatorio y, en cambio, celebraron un referéndum en el que se votó por no tener servicio militar obligatorio. Un segundo referéndum fracasó nuevamente, aunque por una mayoría más pequeña. Sin embargo, muchos voluntarios australianos de procedencia murieron luchando por el Imperio Británico.
10 Por supuesto, tal identificación con el ‘nuevo país’ de asentamiento puede ser problemática en sí misma, particularmente si ese país es o se vuelve imperialista, como de hecho ha sido el caso con los EE.UU y con Australia).
11Especialmente a partir de 1974 hasta el resurgimiento de la comunidad en apoyo de los Huelgistas de Hambre en 1981.
12Subrayado por mí, seguramente un mensaje apropiado para estos tiempos.
Many people know that March 17th is St. Patrick’s Day, a national holiday in Ireland and a public holiday in some other places in the world where the Irish diaspora has had an impact1. But why? And why the shamrock and the colour green?
The Christian Saint Patrick, an escaped Welsh slave of the Irish returned as Christian missionary to Ireland is credited with the main role in the conversion of the Irish from their pagan religions to Christianity. As such, he is revered by the Catholic and many Protestant churches.
Unlike many places in Europe, the conversion seems to have been largely peaceful with no evidence of the fire and sword by which it was imposed on many other lands. Perhaps because of this, Irish monks recorded much of the rich mythology and legends of pagan Ireland.
But there is absolutely no historical reason to associate Patrick with the shamrock. The claim that he used it to demonstrate the three-in-one of the Christian Trinity is a fable and copies of his Confessio, widely accepted as Patrick’s authentic autobiography, do not mention it.
Reference to this fable is not recorded until centuries later but a much more convincing argument against its veracity is that pagans had many deistic trinities and the Irish were no exception, among which the Mór-Righean goddess2 in the Táin saga3 is the best remembered.
In fact, there seems little reason to believe that the druids favoured the shamrock either and searching the internet years ago threw up no references at all until more recently one reference only surfaced that gave no source for its claim.
So, no authentic reason for the shamrock – but what about the colour green? It turns out that the association of the Irish with the colour green is historically recent also, with blue having an earlier association. Even today only one of the four provinces, Leinster, has green on its flag.
A similar flag to the Leinster one, a golden harp on a green background was first flown and introduced by Eoghan Rua Ó Néill to the Catholic Confederacy, the Irish and Norman settler alliance against Cromwell and the English Parliament in 1642.
A number of versions of Harp and Crown on flags followed but the first mass Irish Republican organisation, the United Irishmen brought the Harp without the Crown back on to a green background for their flag, with the motto “it is newly strung and shall be heard” next to the harp.
The United Irish emblem; the harp was reproduced in gold on a green background for the flag. (Image sourced: Internet)
John Sheils, a Drogheda Presbyterian and United Irishman, in his aisling-style song The Rights of Man composed sometime before the 1798 Rising, brought the icons of a female Ireland, the Harp, colour Green, St. Patrick and the shamrock together in his call for unity against England.
Alluding to “the three-leaved plant” Sheils has St.Patrick declaim that “it is three in one, to prove its unity in that community that holds with impunity to the Rights of Man.”
The “three in one” is an obvious reference to the unity of “Catholic, Protestant and Dissenter4” sought by the United Irishmen and vocalised by Wolfe Tone among other leaders. However, there is no evidence of wide-scale use by the Unitedmen of the shamrock to signify that unity.
And the green may have been inspired by the colour which Camille Desmoulins called on Parisians to wear in their hats as a sign of revolution two days before the storming of the Bastille in 17895, though they soon chose blue in emulation of the American Revolution.
The failure of the United Irish risings in 1798 and 1803 was followed by severe repression, reflecting the fear of the Crown and its loyal settlers of losing its Irish colony. The weak Irish Parliament was abolished by bribery and Ireland became a formal part of the United Kingdom.
The Wearing of the Green
As a Christian festival, St. Patrick’s Day might have seemed an innocuous feast day, acceptable to ruler and ruled, therefore safe to celebrate and wearing the shamrock as something innocuous.
It seems likely to me that in an atmosphere of wide-scale repression, people of Irish Republican sympathies might well choose to wear green in public at least one day a year, that being in the form of the shamrock on “St. Patrick’s Day.”
The song The Wearing of the Green references the repression following the United Irish uprising of 1798 with the lyrics “they’re hanging men and women for the wearing of the green” and “the shamrock is by law forbade to grow on Irish ground.”6
The Irish Republican Brotherhood, formed on St. Patrick’s Day 1856 simultaneously in New York, USA and in Dublin, Ireland, adopted the golden Harp on a Green background for their flag, though they also used the Sunburst, believed symbol of the legendary Fianna warriors.
(Image sourced: History Ireland)
The formation of the IRB, or “the Fenians” as they became known by both friend and foe, occurred in a time of huge Irish emigration, then overwhelmingly Catholic in religion and surpassing by far that of the mostly Protestant and Dissenters of the late 18th Century to the USA and Canada.
Waves of Irish emigrants followed those who managed to leave Ireland during the Great Hunger of 1845-1848. Whenever they went to an English-speaking country or colony, the Catholic Irish suffered discrimination from the White Anglo-Saxon Protestants settled there before them.
The Irish who formed a battalion to fight the USA’s second expansionist war against Mexico (1846-48) may have flown the green flag and harp; certainly they named their unit the St. Patrick’s Battalion and were known by Latin Americans as “Los San Patricios“.
St. Patrick’s Day in Exile
St. Patrick’s Day became one of celebrating Irish identity, more ethnic than religious, a way even of flaunting that identity in the face of their detractors and persecutors. The Irish fighting in huge numbers in the Union Army celebrated it during the actual American Civil War (1861-65).
In their first invasion of Canada in 1866, American Civil War veterans organised by a branch of the Fenians flew a green flag with a harp and, it is said, with the letters “IRA” on it, the first such use of the acronym in history.
Painting depicting the Battle of Ridgeway, Fenian invasion of Canada, 1866 – note the Irish flag (Image sourced: Internet).
After the War, the Irish in the US celebrated St. Patrick’s Day in mass parades with their Union Army veterans in their regimental uniforms, flinging their identity and their contribution to the USA in the face of their persecutors, not only the highbrow WASPs but the nativist “Know Nothings”.7
Irish convicts in Australia celebrated the feast day in 17958 and, since sentenced 1798 and 1803 United Irish were sent there in chains, likely celebrated often afterwards by them, as well as by subsequent political prisoners, Young Irelanders in 1848 and Fenians in 1867.
The Irish diaspora in Australia, who were maligned due to the opposition of many to fighting for the British Empire in WW19, marched in parade on St. Patrick’s Day in 1921 with WW1 veterans in uniform at the front,10 calling for self-determination for Ireland.
As an Irish community activist in Britain, there was never any question as to where I would be on March 17th – I’d be celebrating the feast day with the community in the event we’d organised, whether a parade or a reception.
During a time of IRA bombings and widespread repression of the Irish community11 in Britain there were some calls to abandon St. Patrick’s parades but I and others felt it more important than ever to hold them in public at a time when the community was under attack and we did so.
James Connolly must have experienced celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in his Irish diaspora community in Edinburgh, later as an immigrant to Ireland, again as an immigrant to New York and back again as an immigrant once more to Ireland.
James Connolly Monument, Beresford Place, Dublin. (Photo sourced: Internet)
In March 1916, a month before his joint leadership of the Rising for which he would be shot by British firing squad, Connolly wrote supporting the celebration by the Irish of St. Patrick’s Day.
“ … the Irish mind, unable because of the serfdom or bondage of the Irish race to give body and material existence to its noblest thoughts, creates an emblem to typify that spiritual conception for which the Irish race laboured in vain.
“If that spiritual conception of religion, of freedom, of nationality exists or existed nowhere save in the Irish mind, it is nevertheless as much a great historical reality as if it were embodied in a statute book, or had a material existence vouched for by all the pages of history.”
“Therefore we honour St. Patrick’s Day (and its allied legend of the shamrock) because in it we see the spiritual conception of the separate identity of the Irish race – an ideal of unity in diversity, of diversity not conflicting with unity.12”
He did not call for – and would have certainly repudiated — the celebrating of the feast day by a British Army unit wearing sprigs of shamrock or by Irish Gombeen politicians celebrating it with leaders of US imperialism.
Commenting on the reverse journey of that kind when President Reagan came to Ireland (amidst widescale Irish State repression of opposition) in 1984, Irish bard of folksong Christy Moore sang in Hey Ronnie Regan:
You’ll be wearing the greeen Down in Ballyporeen The ‘town of the little potato’; Put your arms around Garrett And dangle your carrot But you’ll never get me to join NATO.
The Anglo-Irish poet and Nobel Literature Laureate WB Yeats wrote about the colour green in reflection on the 1916 Rising: Now and in time to be, Wherever green is worn, Are changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.
It should be “terrible” only to the enemies of Irish freedom and self-determination, to imperialists, colonisers and their fascist and racist supporters but truly beautiful to all others.
In parting, let us come again to John Sheils’ 1790s words which he put in Ireland’s, Gráinne’s mouth:
Let each community detest disunity; in love and unity walk hand in hand; And believe old Gráinne That proud Britannia No more shall rob ye of the Rights of Man.
End.
Trifolium dubium, the Lesser or Yellow Clover, an Seamair Bhuí, top of the candidate list for the “shamrock” title. (Photo sourced: Internet)
Footnotes:
1Newfoundland in Canada and the Caribbean island of Monserrat. It is also the most widely-celebrated of all national feast days across the world.
2Usually rendered in English as “the Morrigan”, a trinity composed of three sisters, sometimes Badb, Macha (number of places named after her, including Ard Mhacha [Armagh]) and Nemain, at other times as Badb, Macha and Anand. They were sometimes represented as sisters of another triad, Banba, Éiriu (from which the name of the country Éire is derived) and Fódla. The triads may be three aspects of the one Goddess in each case.
3Táin Bó Cuailgne/ The Cattle Raid of Cooley, a part of the Ulster Cycle of stories, featuring the legendary warrior Sétanta or Cú Chulainn.
4Catholic (the vast majority of the Irish), Anglican (the tiny minority but reigning religious group) and the other protestant sects, in particular the Presbyterians, which had a much larger following than the Anglicans.
5The Unitedmen were greatly influenced by the French Revolution, of course.
6 The best-known version is by dramatist Dion Boucicault, adapted for his 1864 play Arragh na Pogue, or the Wicklow Wedding, set in Co. Wicklow during the 1798 rebellion (Wikipedia)
7‘Nativist’ gangs of earlier USA settlers that mobilised violently against the Irish and African Americans; when tried in court they claimed to ‘know nothing’.
9Such was the popular opposition that the British feared to impose conscription and instead held a referendum which voted not to have conscription. A second referendum failed again though by a smaller majority. Nevertheless many Australian volunteers were killed fighting for the British Empire.
10Of course such identification with the ‘new country’ of settlement may in itself be problematic, particularly should that country be or become imperialist, as has indeed been the case with the USA and with Australia (in subservient partnership with the UK and with the USA).
11Particularly from 1974 onwards until the community’s resurgence in support of the Hunger Strikers in 1981.
12Underlining mine, surely an appropriate message for these times.
A new socialist Irish Republican hardcopy newspaper has appeared in Ireland in recent months. January and February 2023’s editions, believed to be nos. 3 & 4 are reviewed here.
HARD-COPY NEWSPAPERS
While today, at least in the developed world, the production of Internet media is of great importance for the revolutionary movement as much as it is for the capitalist system, the hard-copy newspaper disseminated by hand still has an important role.
Hardcopy newspaper distribution entails contact in the real world with real people, answers given to questions asked and challenges made, contacts made between the potential organisers and potential activist supporters, can go from hand to hand and be left for a random reader.
Online media has no equivalent to this.
Lenin observed that the revolutionary newspaper is an organiser, not only in its calls to action but in the necessary tasks of production and distribution. Ireland has very few revolutionary newspapers and not even one weekly one, to say nothing of daily editions.
An Phoblacht Abú is produced and distributed by Irish Republican Socialists, whose activist manifestations have been seen in the Revolutionary Housing League’s occupation of empty buildings and its calls for a general emulation of such actions.
Another manifestation has been the activities of Anti-Imperialist Action, notably in protest pickets against imperialism and neo-colonialism, antifascist actions and anti-spiking campaigns, also in commemorations of Republican martyrs, often supported by sticker and leaflet campaigns.
An Phoblacht Abú Front January 2023, front page.
CONTENT, FORM AND PRICE
Both issues reviewed contained 16 sides of A4 pages, composed of two A3 sheets folded in half, one inside the other. They sold at 2 euros per issue – less than one-third the price of most pints in Dublin and much longer to consume!
In general the articles are well-written and with few typographical errors. The editions reviewed here covered national and international news and the overall line in the content is of revolutionary overthrow of the ruling class and eschewing electoralism.
With regard to coverage of national issues, anti-fascism, anti-racism, building a broad front, opposition to NATO and the British occupation of the Six Counties and the neo-colonial and neo-liberal ruling class of the Twenty-Six Counties have figured prominently.
Apart from such regular themes, January’s issue documented the struggle against student fees and treachery of the student union executive in Maynooth and reported a joint Republican Prisoners’ solidarity picket in Dublin along with the release of a known Loyalist sectarian murderer.
Commemorations of Irish Republicans murdered by the Free State during the Irish Civil War/ Counter Revolution (1922-1923) figured in both issues.
In foreign news coverage, actions of peoples’ guerrilla forces in the Philippines and India, for which one would search the main dailies in vain, are covered in both issues and, in January’s, Scottish independence and John McLean and Israeli expulsion of Palestinian campaigner Salah Hamouri.
The environmental struggle in Germany figured in February’s issue.
Regarding economic questions, the rise in “cost of living” and housing crisis attacks on working people were addressed in short articles. Wider pieces on action were included on class struggle and community representation and action in the February edition.
LOOKING AHEAD
The appearance of An Phoblacht Abú is welcome and it is hoped can be sustained. Hopefully further issues will deal with questions of culture and the Irish language, the war in Ukraine (on which the Left seems deeply divided), historical-cultural conservation, trade union organisation and education of the people.
AVAILABLEat 2 euro per copy (back issues sometimes free) from sellers and supporters or from irsmedia@protonmail.com
Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (with kind donation of photos)
(Reading time: 7 mins.)
08 March 2023
Photo Coca Plants Northern Colombia: G.O.L.
The drugs issue in Colombia supposedly occupies the time of and is a concern to the government.
It has been an important issue for all the governments and as was to be expected it is one that has come up again in the dialogues with the ELN, despite this organisation denying any links to the drugs trade.
The author (left) and Pablo Beltran, the ELN negotiator (centre) and representative of social movement in Ecuador (right) in 2017 conference in University of Simon Bolivar, Quito, Ecuador. (Photo: GOL)
In the peace process with the FARC, agreement was reached on the issue. What was agreed to in Point 4 of the Havana Accord was abysmal and showed that the FARC did not understand the problem nor the possible solutions.
Of course, there could be a difference between what the FARC understood and what it agreed to, as at the end of the day the state won the war and imposed the greater part of what the FARC signed up to.
Following the agreement in the declarations of the main FARC commanders there is nothing to be seen that indicates that they really understood the problem. Will it be any different with the ELN?
One of the main concerns of the ELN has been to put a distance between themselves and the drugs trade.
Whilst it is true that the ELN is not the FARC, it is also true that in their areas of influence or those contiguous there are coca and poppy crops and the USA is not going to believe them that they have nothing to with it, whether they like it or not. The ELN accepts that it places taxes on economic activities and for the USA that is drug trafficking.
So, some time ago, the ELN issued a statement where they restated that they have nothing to do with drugs and invited an international commission to visit the country to see the reality for itself.(1) They ask that a UN delegate take part in the delegation. They also make a series of proposals in relation to the issue as such.
On the first point, the ELN feels sure of itself regarding its ability to show in practice that they are not drug traffickers. The ELN correctly states that:
When the Colombian government and the USA accuse the ELN of having an active role in the trade, they are lying, but above all they are covering up for those really responsible and the deep-seated problems, which indicate their unwillingness to take real and effective measures.(2)
ELN guerrilla camp, Colombia (Photo: GOL)
But for the USA, it is not about whether they are guilty or not, it is a political tool and weapon and to give them a voice and vote in the affair is extremely dangerous. When the USA accuses the ELN of being drug traffickers, it is not making a mistake.
A mistake on their part would be to say something they believe and be wrong about it, but they accuse the ELN for political reasons on the basis of their strategic needs and the legal basis to their accusations is the least of it: it is just propaganda. By inviting them into the country, the ELN falls into their trap.
The UN participated in the commissions of investigation for supposed weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The lack of evidence of such weapons wasn’t of much use.
The USA played around with supposed or real non-compliance by Saddam and did what they always wanted to do: invade Iraq. In this they counted on the explicit support of Great Britain and the tacit support of others.
There is a myth in Colombia that the only baddies are the USA and that other imperialist powers such as Canada (a country that is not seen as imperialist by many sections of the “Colombian left”), and other countries of the European Union are good, or at least not really that bad to the point they are friends of the Colombian people.
In the case of Colombia, the EU competes with the US in almost everything. The EU is Colombia’s second commercial partner and its companies are dominant in sectors such as mining, health and oil, amongst others.
The ELN also asks for the legalization of drugs. The demand is justified and quite opportune, but their counterparts i.e. the Colombian state is not sovereign in the matter and furthermore there is a need to clarify what is understood by legalization.
If by legalization they mean legalizing production for medical purposes, the bad news is that medical production is already legal. The thing is, that it is controlled. In fact, in many jurisdictions they don’t talk of illegal drugs but rather controlled substances.
Cocaine is a controlled substance. Its production for medical reasons is authorized by the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) and production is almost exclusively carried out in Peru. And the market is quite small, not even reaching 400 kilos per year as I pointed out in an earlier article.(3) It solves nothing in relation to Colombia.
If on the other hand, they are talking about legalizing recreational use, something which could positively impact the Colombian countryside, then it is a matter of international jurisdiction. Colombia cannot legalise it on its own.
Colombia is a signatory to the Single Convention of 1961 that holds sway in the matter and in addition there are power relationships at play.
It doesn’t matter whether it legalises production for recreational use, it will never be able to legally export it, not only without the consent of the other country, but also the whole setup of the UN and its bodies such as the INCB i.e. at the end of the day, the USA.
Even if it is legalized for internal consumption, there are other problems that have already arisen in countries such as Uruguay which legalised recreational use of marijuana or some of the states in the USA.
The banking system dare not receive funds from those legalised markets and the producers resort to old methods more akin to money laundering to deposit legal funds in legal accounts in a legal banking system.
Even in the hypothetical case of the USA and the EU agreeing, the legalisation of cocaine would go far beyond Colombian cocaine and would include other drugs such as opium and its derivatives such as heroin. It is worth looking at the drugs market and its production.
According to the UN, cocaine is produced directly or indirectly in eight Latin American countries (Colombia, Peru and Bolivia account for almost all of it), whilst 57 countries produce opium, the Asian countries being the largest producers (Afghanistan, Myanmar and Mexico dominate the market).
A bucket of opium poppy seed (Photo: GOL)
Cannabis, which is the most widely consumed drug in the world is produced in 154 countries.
For 2020, the UN calculated that there were 246,800 hectares of opium and 234,000 of coca.(4) They also calculate a production of 7,930 tonnes in 2021(5) and 1,982 tonnes of cocaine in 2020.(6) We are not talking about small quantities of production or land. Almost half a million hectares between these two drugs and 64 countries.
Any proposal of legalisation has to include these countries and their peasantry.
The number of drug users is also large. The UN calculates that in 2020 there were 209 million cannabis consumers, 61 million people who had consumed opiates, 24 million amphetamine users, 21 million cocaine consumers and 20 million users of ecstasy.(7)
They say that in 2020, they had calculated that 284 million people between the ages of 15-64 years used drugs, i.e. one in every 18 people in this cohort.(8)
There are consequences to this, in economic but also cultural terms regarding the use and abuse of substances. But there also consequences in terms of health. Some 600,000 people received some treatment for drug problems.(9)
So when the ELN says that “Drug addicts are ill and should be cared for by the states and not pursued as delinquents”(10) their idea is correct, however, the size of the problem is greater than the real capacity of the health systems in the countries that have large numbers of users.
Photo Opium Poppy Nariño Colombia: G.O.L.
The total number of people injecting drugs is 5,190,000 in Asia, 2,600,000 in Europe and 2,350,000 in the Americas (almost 75% of which is in north America).(11)
Of those who inject, 5.5 million have Hepatitis C, 1.4 million are HIV positive and 1.2 million are HIV positive and also have Hepatitis C.(12) These are not minor problems and are high-cost illnesses.
Of course, these figures do not include the unlawful abuse of legal pharmaceuticals. In the USA almost 80% of the overdoses are from the consumption of legal opiates such as fentanyl, which caused 78,238 deaths in 2021 in that country.
But the issue does require legalisation and not other means that the FARC aimed for. The peasants of Colombia did not make a mistake in choice of crop when they planted coca. Coca was and continues to be a very profitable crop, despite all the difficulties that it generates.
There is no need to substitute it with another crop such as cocoa or African palm etc. It is not about the crop but rather the production model and the political and economic context.
The increase in coca production in Colombia, is not due to subjective factors such as the decisions of peasants, not even of the drug barons and less still of the insurgencies but rather objective economic factors.
This is a key point. It was the decisions of northern countries that impacted the countryside and pushed thousands of peasants around the world to grow opium poppy and coca. The neoliberal cutback policies in the north also contributed to the dramatic rise in problem drug use due to the increase in misery in those countries.
Bedding, equipment and reading material in an ELN guerrilla camp, Colombia (Photo: GOL)
In any discussion we should distance ourselves from the idea that the drugs problem can be solved in a negotiation with the ELN, although they could negotiate some points that would contribute positively to a solution.
But the problem is political and the free trade agreements and other measures that had a negative impact on the countryside have to be looked at again.
Also, they have to reach an agreement with the Colombian government, not for some perks for peasants nor corrupt projects and budgets such as those the FARC agreed to, but rather a political agreement where the government argues and campaigns for the derogation of the Single Convention of 1961.
We began the previous manifesto talking about emergencies. We said that it was essential to reclaim an anti-imperialist and internationalist Euskal Herria2.
And that urgency, that need, is what has brought together comrades from all corners of Euskal Herria here today. Well done all of us!
Capitalism is going through a systemic crisis. They speak to us of a “extraordinary period” but the truth is rather that we find ourselves in a permanent crisis. As we have supposedly departed one, they have already placed us in another.
As of 2020, moreover, we have entered a phase of exceptionality in which States take advantage to impose economic, social and disciplinary policies that point towards a war scenario. Therefore, we cannot separate the capitalist decomposition from the increase in repression and censorship.
Banner reading “Condemning us to war and misery” and section of the anti-NATO march in Bilbao 11 March. (Photo sourced: organisers)
The rise of fascism that is taking place throughout Europe is a direct consequence of the bourgeoisie’s fear of losing the control it exercises over an increasingly exploited and angry population.
In the field of international relations, we are also witnessing the increasing loss of hegemony of the Empire that has controlled the world practically without opposition for the last 30 years.
The bloc led by the United States and NATO, far from accepting the end of its historical cycle, seems determined to increase armed conflicts. In addition to giving a boost to the arms industry, they intend to hinder the growth of emerging powers such as China or Russia.
For this phase of confrontation, they have finally achieved the support of the lobby led by Ursula Von der Layen, the “gardener” Borrell3 and company.
NATO and the EU, together with the Zionist entity that redoubles its attacks on the Palestinian people, are today the main props of this dark period in history.
As far as NATO is concerned, we have to understand that its role goes beyond being a mere military organization. It is true that it is mainly the army of the bourgeoisie (and it is demonstrating this in Donbass, as it has also demonstrated in Yugoslavia, Libya or Syria).
But it has the superior function of being the military arm against anyone who opposes the policies of capital. Today these translate into the over-exploitation and precarity of the working class (especially women and people of colour).
And changes in labour rights to deprive us of material concessions wrested through class struggle, change of laws to increase the repression of those struggles, etc.
A clear example of this is the latest General Budget of the Spanish State, supported by all the social democratic parties4.
The budget supports the deterioration of the material conditions of working peoples to benefit NATO, giving it more control capacity and recognizing their right to appropriate civil infrastructures to defend the interests of the bourgeoisie.
The support for these militaristic policies, at the dawn of a world war, is a real shame and demonstrates the total lack of commitment of the leadership of these parties to the future of the Working Peoples of the world.
In Euskal Herria we are well aware of what NATO represents:
in addition to the military training industrial estate in Las Bardenas or the military exercises carried out at the Araka base (Gasteiz), we have recently witnessed blatant support from the Government of Gasteiz for war industries such as SENER or SAPA.
Nor can we forget the historical support of NATO, through the Gladio network, to the Spanish and French States in their legal and illegal repression5 against the struggle in Euskal Herria.
If we add to this the economic and social exception measures imposed on us by Brussels (private pension funds, increase in the retirement age, dismantling of public health) …
It becomes increasingly clear to us that neither as a nation nor as working class do we have a future within NATO or the EU. The need to destroy these instruments of domination by the bourgeoisie, as well as the Spanish and French States, is more than evident if we aspire to build a future in freedom.
These are not good times, of course not. The situation is becoming more and more complicated throughout the world. And that is why we here today are calling for the activation in each town and each neighborhood of the anti-imperialist Euskal Herria.
Today, we not only reaffirm this rejection, but we once again make an urgent call to join forces with the rest of the working peoples and oppressed nations of the world to stop the imperialist offensive promoted by this criminal organization along with its allies in the European Union.
From Chile to Donbass, passing through Laos, Mali or Vietnam…
LONG LIVE THE STRUGGLE OF THE WORKING PEOPLE!
AN ANTI-IMPERIALIST BASQUE COUNTRY!
Front of march heading towards the Bridge across the Nervión river and the old city (Photo sourced: organisers)
COMMENT: A GIANT STEP FORWARD
Diarmuid Breatnach
(Reading time:One min.)
The estimated 2,000 turnout in support of this demonstration must have exceeded the expectations of the organisers and greatly encouraged them. Two thousand is not a huge number in the highly-politicised Basque Country, even with a total population of less than three million, north and south.
But this is a nation which has for decades been under a political leadership, the surviving members of which have now taken the road of pacificaction, of accommodation to capitalism and the Spanish and French states, of social-democratic ‘opposition’.
This movement had a united national political leadership, an armed guerrilla movement, a daily newspaper, a trade union and smaller affiliated groups; it had café/bars/social centres throughout the southern provinces.
Though in decline and fragmented with the leadership’s embracing of the pacification process (through which, unlike the Provos, they did not even gain the release of their hundreds of imprisoned comrades), it still exercises a heavy influence on politics in the Basque Country.
That is today the ambit of Otegi, EH Bildu and Geroa Bai and neither did their parties participate in Saturday’s demonstration nor as an individual any of senior responsibility in their structures, though certainly individuals in their social and cultural sectors were seen in the march.
In that context and after 25 years of pacification, 2,000 in open attendance is a giant step forward for the Basque resistance. ‘Tús maith, leath na hoibre‘, it is said in Irish: ‘A good beginning is half the work’ and indeed, a beginning is how the organisers view the event.
“Dissident” groups such as Amnistia ta Askatasuna, Amnistia Garrasia, Tinko and Jardun have arisen in the last decade and youth have been very prominent in these and others disparate groupings, which is important for any revolutionary movement.
The photos and videos of Saturday’s demonstration show older and mature faces too, veterans of the struggle and also those active during the pacification period and this too is important, for it brings a certain continuity to the movement and the awareness of mistakes made in the past.
More than 50 organisations in the Basque Country supported the call for this demonstration.
The road ahead will not be easy (when has it ever been for the Basque nation or the working class in general?) but a giant step forward has been taken.
End.
FOOTNOTES
1Askapena is the internationalist arm of the Basque movement for independence and was responsible for a number of years for maintaining a network of Basque solidarity organisations (which in some cases it founded) in Mexico and across a number of European cities, including Belfast, Dublin and Cork. In 2011 five of its leading activists were arrested on charges of supporting the guerrilla organisation ETA, through Askapena’s solidarity with political prisoners. The five defended their right to work with prisoner and internationalist solidarity and were finally acquitted in 2016 earning much admiration for their stance (in stark contrast to the 47 activists in a number of prisoner support organisations who apologised for their activity in a Spanish court in September 2019 in exchange for non-custodial sentences for the majority).
2The current Basque name for their nation, “the Basque-speaking country”, replacing the former “Euskadi”, now used to refer only to the three-province ‘autonomous’ region of Bizkaia, Araba and Gipuzkoa.
3Josep Borrell, Foreign Minister of the EU Parliament who has described the EU as “a garden”. A Catalan member of the PSOE, hostile to Catalan independence who after five minutes stormed out of an English-language interview by Tim Sebastian on the German TV program Conflict Zone regarding the struggle in Catalonia.
4This is a reference not only to the social-democratic coalition government of the PSOE and Podemos but also of the Basque EH Bildu and Catalan ERC, the votes of which MPs supported the Budget.
5A reference not only to banning of parties, organisations and demonstrations but also to routine torture and the kidnapping and assassinations of the State-sponsored GAL of the 1980s.
6In the 1986 Referendum on whether the Spanish state should join NATO, the southern Basque Country gave a majority vote against, the only region to do so (though the vote against was high in some regions), the total vote being 52.54% in favour.
According to reports, a Dublin City Councillor and former Lord Mayor, Niall Ring, along with his son, were racially abused and assaulted in a pub in Fulham, a part of SW London in which the Chelsea FC stadium is located.
Ring recounted how, having a pint after watching a game at the Chelsea stadium, first his son was racially abused and then, as they tried to leave, each assaulted, requiring a hospital attendance for both.
Decades ago I was active in a building occupation for homeless families five minutes’ walk from the stadium as Fulham became gentrified and even then, though like many parts of London it had its Irish community with pubs and trad music, Chelsea FC was particularly known for its fascist ultras.
Whether affiliated to the National Front or its successor the British Movement, they took part in attacks on migrants and ethnic minorities, including the Irish and in particular on marches in Irish solidarity, when groups like AFA, Red Action and some Irish Republicans led the counterattack.
And the police usually restricted themselves to attack the Irish and antifascists.
Some years after that period in Fulham, I joined the Irish in Britain Representation Group and soon after was elected to the Ard-Choiste, which had meetings approximately monthly. Since the branches ranged from NE Lancashire to London, the meeting city venues were rotated.
Consequently I was often enough on a train journey between London and Manchester and on one occasion was unfortunate enough to share a carriage on a full train with a load of racist and fascist Chelsea FC fans returning to London.
I plugged my walkman leads into my ears to avoid getting into conversation with any of them but played no music so I could listen to what went on. In the course of that horror journey I heard racist chants against the martyred Bobby Sands and even against the population of Liverpool.
I also noted their use of the term “Fenians”, not at all common among the English, presumably learned from equally racist Rangers and Linfield FC fans. A white man walking through the carriage with a dark woman elicited hisses of “race traitor”.
This is the kind of scum that the boot-boys of fascism everywhere are and which are trying to get a foothold here in Ireland through the protests against refugees (which Ring referenced briefly).
2022 was a busy year for the anti-internment campaign organisation, involving, along with its public awareness-rising events, a reorganisation with a new constitution, a new name and expansion of membership.
Origins
The formation of an anti-internment campaign was sparked by the revoking of the licence of ex-political prisoner Marian Price in May 2011 for the “crime” of steadying the written speech of an IRA speaker during a windy Easter Rising commemoration in Milltown Cemetery, Belfast.
In addition to revocation of the licence under which Republican prisoners were released under the Good Friday Agreement, other activists were also being charged under “anti-terrorist” legislation and routinely being refused bail, if not granted it under severe restrictions.
The wait for a trial is often two years and regardless of the eventual outcome, the individuals had already spent two years in jail or at home, barred from travel or political activity and harassed by police visits to their homes.
Early banner-placard protesting the internment of Marian Price (Image sourced: Libcom.org)Front section of Anti-Internment March, coming into top part of Parnell Square, Dublin 2013. (Image sourced: IAIC archives)
These conditions were considered to be in effect the same as internment without trial and the campaign against internment was founded as an independent one, a status it maintained despite a number of attempts to take it over or to intimidate with threats and State harassment.
Throughout its history the Anti-Internment Campaign has organised the annual Newry event (not since 2021 unfortunately), many pickets (including in protest against Amnesty Ireland) and a march in Dublin, spoken at or participated in public events in Belfast, Cork, Derry, Glasgow and Wexford.
It has also organised and hosted conferences and public meetings, for example with speakers from the campaigns for the Craigavon Two, Munir Farooqi and Tony Taylor and about the Right to Protest with a speaker from the Irish Council for Civil Liberties.
Section of the annual Anti-Internment white-line picket Newry, August 2016 (Image sourced: IAIC archives)
Annual Anti-Internment, Newry, rallying after white-line picket, August 2019 (Image sourced: IAIC archives)
A busy year
As stated in the introduction above, 2022 was a busy year for the anti-internment campaign group, involving, along with its public awareness-rising events a reorganisation with a new constitution and a new name. The campaign organised nine public events and participated in more.
Most of those public events were awareness-raising pickets with placards, banners, flags and leaflet distribution. Usually the pickets alternated between the Henry Street/ Liffey Street junction and at Crown Alley by the square in the Temple Bar area, both areas busy with shoppers and tourists.
Anti-Internment picket in Henry Street, November, Dublin 2022 (Photo: IAIC)
The campaign carried out pickets in Henry Street on 9th April, 6th August and 19th November and in Temple Bar on 5th March, 21st May, 2nd July and 27th August. On 22nd October, with a special focus on Palestinian prisoners, we were on the iconic Ha’penny Bridge.
It has always been of particular interest to the campaign group to reach working people and large numbers of that class of all ages pass through those areas. Of interest also are people from other lands and the Basque and Palestinian flags alongside the Irish ones often stimulate discussion.
In September the campaign attended the Peter Daly commemoration in Wexford and provided a speaker at the Dublin meeting to re-launch the End State Repression campaign which our group had supported in the past but which had waned over the Covid epidemic period since.
Our campaign group also took part in the planning of and participation in the joint prisoner’s solidarity picket in Dublin on 17th December 2022.
Reorganisation
It had been clear for some time that the organisation was in need of reorganisation to facilitate expansion but the process had been difficult.
Eventually in July the decision was taken to close down the Anti-Internment Group of Ireland and to reform under another name. This was done and, after democratic consultation process a new constitution was agreed, with the Ireland Anti-Internment Campaign as the new name.
According to agreed decisions, a new banner with the organisation’s new name was commissioned (though it would take some time to come to fruition). A new Facebook identity for the group was constructed with a statement explaining the development.
The new constitution, more explicitly democratically-based than had been previously the case, was published.
Anti-Internment picket in Temple Bar, Dublin, March 2022 (Photo: IAIC)
Year planning
In the reorganisation process, the IAIG lost one member but gained three new activists and the return of two lapsed members. With renewed energy, members began planning for the rest of the year, to conclude with participation in the annual Bloody Sunday March for Justice in Derry.
Issuing a statement to explain the reorganisation, commissioning a new banner, scheduling a number of pickets in Dublin and organising the annual Prisoners’ Solidarity Picket in Dublin December were part of the planning and most of the target actions were completed.
In December and in good time, the campaign’s members organised to purchase, sign and mail Christmas cards to all Irish Republican prisoners, also a number of non-complying Basque political prisoners and the Catalan jailed revolutionary Catalonian rapper Pablo Hasel.
The proposal to organise the annual Prisoners’ Solidarity picket in December jointly with the Irish Republican Prisoners’ Welfare Association and with Ireland Anti-Imperialist Action was agreed and the joint event went ahead on 17th December with around 40 participating.
Section of the joint AICI, AIA and IRPWA Republican Prisoners’ solidarity picket 17 December 2022, O’Connell Street, Dublin 2022 (Photo: IAIC)
The picket with placards and banners, including the illuminated words of the IAIC’s “SAOIRSE” (“Freedom”) attracted attention and passers-by, both Irish and from abroad engaged leafleters and other participants in discussion. A speaker from each group gave a short statement.
The year’s programming ended with the specific scheduling of participation with a new banner in the annual Bloody Sunday March for Justice in Derry.
New Banner Aired at Bloody Sunday March for Justice in Derry
The new banner got its first public airing at the annual march in Derry, commemorating the massacre of unarmed civilians by the British Army in Derry in January 1972 and was carried as part of the march from the Creggan, through a large part of Derry and down to Free Derry Corner.
The marchers in different political parties, campaign organisations and independent individuals marched trough cold rain and strong wind-gusts through the nearly 5-kilometre walk. The members of four Republican Flute Bands played bravely throughout.
The new banner of the Ireland Anti-Internment Committee carried in the Bloody Sunday March for Justice in Derry in January 2023. (Photo: IAIC archives)
The IAIC will shortly begin its year-planning for the rest of the year, its calendar again probably ending at 2024’s Bloody Sunday March for Justice and meanwhile organising events to publicise the on-going undemocratic jailing of activists without trial both sides of the British Border.
The IAIC considers that the jailing of people without trial by both administrations is, in addition to political repression, a significant assault on civil rights and a threat to all opposition groups and that it is in the interests of all to unite in opposing the practice.
The Campaign welcomes the active support of all democratically-minded individuals at its public events.
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