CHRISTMAS LIGHTS AND POLITICAL PRISONER SOLIDARITY

On December 24, 2023December 25, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Basque Country, British imperialism, Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, irish history, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, Israeli Zionism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners, Song, Song in StruggleLeave a comment

Clive Sulish

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

Among Christmas shopping crowds in Dublin’s city centre, the calls for freedom of political prisoners rang out, while the Irish, Palestinian and Basque flags fluttered in the wind among festive lights and projected light-show.

The Ireland Anti-Internment Campaign was holding its annual political prisoner solidarity picket in the busy O’Connell street, supported by socialist Republican groups and independent activists.

*View of picket line looking southward.* (Photo: *Rebel Breeze*)

December is a traditional month in Ireland for focus on Republican prisoners. However, the IAIC campaign has always made a point of remembering political prisoners elsewhere too, with Palestinian and Basque flags erected on its regular pickets.

This year the Campaign had especially requested Palestinian flags and these were present, both the national flag and that of the Peoples Front for the Liberation Palestine, fluttering alongside Basque flags and the green-and-gold Starry Plough.¹

In addition, one of the IAIC’s banner displayed a large copy of an image depicting a Palestinian’s arm extended through prison bars to grasp the hand of an Irish Republican prisoner’s hand also from nearby bars, from the original by political cartoonist Carlos Latuf,.

A black banner had been rigged with lights to spell “Saoirse”, the Irish word for “freedom” and the picketers set up in a line with other banners and flags facing the GPO building.²

Political prisoners sometimes have their family visits cancelled as a punishment and during the Covid pandemic prevention period it was used as an excuse to prevent Republican prisoners’ family visits. (Photo: *Rebel Breeze*)

SHOUTS

A speaker using a megaphone informed passers-by that internment without trial had not ceased in Ireland and that Republicans were being charged and then refused bail by non-jury courts on both sides of the British Border, spending two years in jail regardless of their trials’ outcomes.

All the Republican prisoners, the IAIC speaker said, had been convicted in non-jury special courts. Palestinians were also being convicted in special courts, he said, military courts and many were in jail – in “administrative detention”, i.e interned without ever having been convicted or tried.

Over 3,000 had been arrested in Israeli Army raids since October 7^th,³ the speaker said through the megaphone, bringing the overall number of Palestinians in jail to over 7,000.⁴

The recent exchange of prisoners between the Zionist state and the Palestinian resistance had resulted in liberty for 240 Palestinians, of which 107⁵ were children and 68 women.

There was regular chanting from the picket line including: “From Ireland to Palestine – Free all political prisoners!” “When there is occupation – Resistance is an obligation!” and “Free political prisoners – Free them now!”

At one point some kind of religious procession was briefly enacted in front of the GPO building and an elderly woman in apparent religious garb approached the picketers shouting something at them which they largely ignored, maintaining their solidarity slogans.

In addition to interested people taking photos or filming video of the protest on their devices, some approached the participants to ask questions and to receive a leaflet, after which a number actually joined the protest line for a while (some until the end).

Occasional passing traffic also sounded their horns in solidarity.

*The pavement in front of the GPO showing shoppers and people queuing for food distribution*. (Photo: *Rebel Breeze*)

STATEMENT

As the end of the event’s allocated period approached, a representative of the IAIC asked the participants to gather around and spoke about how resistance brings repression and oppression brings resistance, resistance being the “crime” for which political activists are jailed.

The participants were thanked for their support, whether independents or activists of Ireland Anti-Imperialist Action and Saoirse Don Phalaistín organisations.

The event ended with the acapella singing of “The H-Block Song” by Diarmuid Breatnach, in an adaptation of the original air to the lyrics of what is “still a good song” he said, composed by a man who, along with his party, “no longer supported Republican prisoners”.⁶

The lyrics recall the struggle of Republican prisoners in the late 1970s against the removal of their ‘Special Category’ political status, which began with refusal to wear prisoner uniform. The struggle escalated to the “no-wash protests” and to hunger strikes in 1980 with ten martyrs in 1981.

As the protesters collected their flags and wrapped up their banners, the nature of current Irish society was underlined by the queues forming up across the road for free food being distributed by charitable organisations.

*Early view of picketers, looking northward*. (Photo: *Rebel Breeze*)

INDEPENDENT AND OPEN DEMOCRATIC ORGANISATION

The IAIC is “an independent organisation and open democratic organisation” of ten years’ existence and although it has held events for specific cases such as the framed Craigavon Two,⁷ its main activity has been regular public pickets in Dublin to highlight ongoing internment in Ireland.

The Campaign group encourages participation by democratic people in its regular pickets, regardless of political organisation affiliation or none and, according to one of the organisers, expects to hold its next one in Dublin in January or February.

The IAIC expects also to take part again in the annual Bloody Sunday Commemoration march in Derry on Sunday 29^th January 2024.

end.

*Unintentionally impressionistic image, photo taken from the east side of O’Connell Street* (Photo: *Rebel Breeze*)

APPENDIX: ANNIVERSARY OF HANGING OF IRISH REPUBLICAN

Though not mentioned in the discourse, the above event took place within days of the anniversary of the British colonial execution of an Irishman in revenge for his killing of an ex-Republican who had turned informer.

James Carey, in the midst of a ‘witness protection program’ provided as a reward for his betrayal of his comrades in giving evidence in court to ensure the jailing of some and hanging of five others, was killed in a gunfight with Pat O’Donnell.

Carey had been a leading member of the National Invincibles’ (a split from the Fenians) cell in Dublin, and had given the signal for the fatal stabbing of British Under-Secretary Burke and Chief Secretary Lord Frederick Cavendish in Phoenix Park on 6^th May 1882.

However, Carey turned “Queen’s Evidence” to testify ensuring the conviction of his former colleagues and even gloated in court at their fate. His reward, but for O’Donnell, would have been a new life with pension under an assumed name with wife and children in the South African colony.

O’Donnell was an independent Republican from the Irish-speaking Gweedore area in Donegal but had been to the USA, where he had cousins who were prominent in the “Molly Maguires”, an Irish-led resistance organisation among miners in the USA.

O’Donnell was hanged on 17^th December 1883 but is commemorated in the satirical song “Monto” and also in the serious “Ballad of Pat O’Donnell”. His home town of Gweedore also holds a monument in his honour.

end.

FOOTNOTES

1Flag of the Irish Citizen Army, the first workers’ army in the world, founded to protect workers from the police during the Dublin Lockout/ Strike of 1913.

2The General Post Office, iconic building on Dublin’s O’Connell Street, which was the HQ of the leadership of the 1916 Rising, left a shell by fire from British artillery bombardment but rebuilt later.

3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_detentions_in_the_2023_Israel%E2%80%93Hamas_war

4 https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/11/29/why-does-israel-have-so-many-palestinians-detention-and-available-swap

575% had not been convicted of any crime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_exchange_of_Israeli_hostages_for_Palestinian_prisoners

6Francis Brolly (1938-1920) of Provisional Sinn Féin, composed the song which was released in 1976. PSF abandoned the struggle in the imperialist-promoted pacification process towards the end of the last century and most of their prisoners were released under licence. However those who made public their disagreement with the colonial occupation and the pacification process were on occasion returned to jail while new “dissidents” were charged and refused bail in special no-jury courts, with tacit support of the PSF.

7Quoted from the FB page at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063166633467

ZIONIST GENOCIDAL BOMBARDMENTS IS BRINGING REVOLUTION CLOSER

On December 23, 2023December 24, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Genocide, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Israeli Zionism, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners, Popular Resistance, US ImperialismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 8 mins.)

There is no doubt that the genocidal bombing of Palestine has radically politicised people around the world, exposing the Zionist colonial state of ‘Israel’ and its US and other imperialist backers to a greater degree than ever before.

The effect has been hugely but not alone on the mass of people and especially the young, it has been felt also on democratic organisations, pushing them towards more revolutionary positions and actions. Even representatives of states have had to pay close attention to what they say and do.¹

There probably has not been a situation of anti-imperialist radicalisation to a similar degree around the world since the USA’s war in Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia – of which the death of Kissinger this month was a reminder, if one were needed).²

*Section of the march to the US Embassy passing through Baggot Street on Saturday* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

*(Photo: *D.Breatnach*)* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

Dublin saw thousands on its streets again at the weekend in a march towards the US Embassy, while Axa Insurance was occupied and picketed during the week for its investment in genocide. It seemed that every town across the land also saw a demonstration or picket.

The US Ambassador to Ireland’s residence was also picketed on the occasion he had invited Irish politicians and “VIPs” to a meal.

On Tuesday the broad Saoirse Don Phalaistín group organised an occupation of the Israeli Embassy with a picket of about sixty people outside, of different groups and individual activists. Furthermore, it became clear that the State was reluctant to create ‘martyrs’ with arrests.

*Picket outside the Zionist Embassy Tuesday with some protesters in occupation before those were removed by Public Order Unit Gardaí* (Photo sourced: *Anti-Imperialist Action*)

THE “FREE PRESS”

The mass media is an integral part of the imperialist system and that too has come under huge criticism.

The western mass media, “the free press” of the western capitalist world, has undergone a huge exposure of its biased reporting (and censorship, particularly on social media). Every atrocity committed by Israel has been represented as ‘caused’ by the Palestinian attack of 7^th October.

On the other hand, the attacks of the Palestinian resistance have never been presented as what they truly are and have always been: responses to occupation, genocide, banishment, racism, murder, torture, land-theft and massive bombings by Israel.

Every lie of the Zionist administration and of its imperialist allies, including such patently ridiculous horror stories as ‘beheading of Israeli babies’ and ‘rape and mutilation of Israeli women’ has been repeated while entirely likely accusations by Palestinians have been treated as dubious.

Conversely, within the settler colony itself, some parts of its mass media have exposed the panicky reaction of its military to the October 7^th incursion, in killing hostages along with their Palestinian captors and the very recent killing of three escaped or released Israeli hostages.

THE “DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS”

The allegedly democratic state institutions have fared no better. The European Union was exposed in its voting and by words of its Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen, as a profoundly imperialist backer of Israeli Zionism (e.g fulsomely celebrating the anniversary of the state’s founding³).

According to reports, the EU last week failed even to call for a ceasefire, despite a large majority of states being in favour. The opposition of the minority was so strong that they decided to completely avoid formally discussing the matter at all!⁴

The United Nations was exposed as a profoundly undemocratic body in that the vast majority of its member states wished the Israeli bombing to stop but were unable to force the Zionist state to comply, even with formally registered votes.

Only decisions of the Security Council are compulsory on the 193 members and any Permanent Member of that Council can veto any resolution. There are only five of those: UK, France, USA, Russia and China — and the USA vetoed the call for unilateral Israeli ceasefire.

The USA has consistently opposed any resolution that went counter to what Israel intends and recently twice vetoed a resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire to allow food, medicine and water to reach the besieged and displaced Palestinians in Gaza.

This was countered last week by a massive majority of the General Assembly voting for such a motion, which however has no obligatory effect by UN rules, thereby exposing the inherent undemocratic nature of the institution but also isolating the USA from its clients and allies.⁵

In fact, the voting in the Security Council and in the General Assembly exposed fractures in European imperialist unity too, since the UK abstained and France voted for the ceasefire.

The allies of the USA fear that the actions of Israel are destabilising the Middle East and feel that the USA should be pressurising rather than backing the Zionist state.

When put under pressure reactionary alliances tend to strain and fracture and this too is a sign that events are developing along lines favourable to revolution.

The International Criminal Court, which a number of liberals and social democrats hope will try Israel for war crimes and genocide was also exposed, not only by its own record to date but by the biased actions of its Prosecutor Karim Khan on a recent visit to the Zionist state.⁶

Despite the overwhelmingly majority sympathy for and empathy with the Palestinians in many states, their rulers have not responded to anything like the degree wished for and demanded by their citizens, neither in states of the “western world” nor in those of the Arab or Muslim worlds.

The rulers of the German and French “democracies” have widened the gap by banning Palestine solidarity demonstrations and persecuting people wearing the keffiyeh (and in the case of France, previously outlawing wearing of traditional muslim dress in public places by women).

In Britain, the idea of banning the slogan “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free!” as “antisemitic” was proposed by the Home Secretary⁷ and a number of direct activists and even posterers on social media have been arrested under criminal and even anti-terrorist legislation.

The British imperialist Labour Party has been exposed too by the words of its leader Keir Starmer; denunciations during his visit to his party’s organisation in Scotland exposed not only Starmer’s unpopularity but his party’s too, along with the massive support for Palestine there.

THEIR ACTIONS MAKE THINGS WORSE FOR THEM

When the enemy’s repressive actions make things worse, rather than better for them, it is a sign that revolutionary opportunities are on the rise.

Direct actions are an essential component of revolution and such have been on the rise too, from occupations of Government offices and buildings complicit with Zionism in Ireland, for example, to occupations and blockades of arms companies in Britain and of shipments in the USA.

Whether these actions are motivated in part by frustration at the lack of progress by other means or through revolutionary understanding, they put the system under greater pressure and tend to isolate the reformists while the activists gain deeper education about the nature of the system.

The world has witnessed unity in action too, with Hezbollah⁸ missiles launched from Lebanon against the Israelis causing casualties; but 60 martyrs of the resistance organisation have also fallen to Israeli bombs and missiles⁹ and Lebanese non-combatants have also, including journalists.

Houthi attacks on shipping off Yemen have caused disruption and financial cost to several major freight companies – including MSC and Maersk – which have begun to sail around Africa instead.

About 15% of shipping traffic regularly transited via the Suez Canal, the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia. Combined, the companies that have diverted vessels “control around half of the global container shipping market,” ABN Amro analyst Albert Jan Swart told Reuters.¹⁰

Oil major extractor British Petroleum has also temporarily paused all transits through the Red Sea following the attacks over the weekend.¹¹

Most impressive of all however has been the unity and coordination of the Palestinian armed resistance itself.

The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades is Hamas’ armed wing and the party is a Muslim fundamentalist organisation, as are also Palestine Islamic Jihad. But the Lion’s Den, Jenin Brigades and Al-Nasser Salah al-Deen Brigades of the Popular Resistance Committees are mixed.

The Peoples Front for the Liberation of Palestine¹² and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine are secular, socialist organisations yet they and the Islamic organisations are fighting the Israeli state in unity coordinated through the Joint Operations Room.

PRISONERS, HOSTAGES, CIVILIANS

The current struggle has also brought to light the huge numbers and treatment of Palestinian prisoners of the Zionist state, including women and children, when some of the latter were exchanged with prisoners taken by the Palestinian forces in their incursion on 7^th October.

This issue also challenged the discourse about ‘rules of war’ regarding civilians about which politicians and media commentators made much in attacking the Palestinian incursion.

The question must be posed as to why the Zionist state can take “prisoners” while the Palestinians take “hostages”?¹³ Outside the US Embassy on Saturday, an IPSC speaker called Israel’s prisoners “freedom fighters” to loud applause, the first such public stance by the organisation.¹⁴

Here in Ireland it is a Republican tradition in December to focus on its members incarcerated in prisons within the Irish neo-colonial and British colonial states. The Ireland Anti-Internment Campaign held its annual event in front of the GPO on Thursday 23^rd including Palestinian flags.

Annual Prisoners’ picket for Christmas organised by the Ireland Anti-Internment Committee showing Palestinian and Irish flags (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

Sadly it was not only officials embedded in the system but also liberals and some of the Left who condemned the Palestinians for ‘attacks on civilians’, ignoring the fact that civilians and soldiers were being captured to exchange for the many Palestinian civilians behind Israeli prison bars.

Then too, rarely mentioned in the media is the fact that most Israeli men and women are military reservists. On the other hand, of over 20,000 Palestinians killed by Israeli bombing, at least a third are women and children, which shows who it is who really are attacking civilians.¹⁵

The draft requirement applies to any citizen or permanent resident, male or female fit to serve and who has reached the age of 18; many of the soldiers who complete their mandatory military service are later obligated to serve in a reserve unit in accordance with the military’s needs.¹⁶

IN CONCLUSION

The pain, loss and suffering inflicted upon the Palestinians is a horror almost too hard to grasp; it is intended to demoralise the Palestinians and destroy their resistance to colonisation and can create a feeling of helplessness in us, viewing it from afar.

But it is not destroying the resistance of the heroic Palestinian people who are teaching the world a lesson in resistance, an important attribute of humanity. We should not let our resolve be undermined either.

The oppressed people of the world are a step closer to revolution and liberation as a result of this struggle. Let us push forward together.

End.

FOOTNOTES

SOURCES

EU ceasefire call blocked by “minority”: https://www.irishtimes.com/politics/2023/12/15/eu-call-for-ceasefire-in-gaza-blocked-by-minority-despite-overwhelming-support/

https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2023/12/15/no-eu-call-for-gaza-ceasefire-despite-belgium-and-irelands-pleas

UN ceasefire blocked, then delayed: https://news.sky.com/story/un-security-council-vote-on-gaza-aid-delayed-again-over-talks-with-us-on-ceasefire-13034723

Accusation of bias towards Israel in International Criminal Court: https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/12/9/alarming-palestinians-accuse-icc-prosecutor-of-bias-after-israel-visit

Israel’s callup for reservists (with pro-Israel undertones): https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/10/israel-military-draft-reservists/

1This has been particularly the case with regard to the Irish State but not only there.

2Kissinger was a US imperialist strategist and chief advisor to US President Nixon but was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his steering the US out of their disaster in Indochina and thereby devaluing the Nobel Peace Prize forever hence.

3Without of course any mention of the 750,000 Palestinians expelled forever during the creation of the state.

4 https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2023/12/15/no-eu-call-for-gaza-ceasefire-despite-belgium-and-irelands-pleas

5 https://news.sky.com/story/un-security-council-vote-on-gaza-aid-delayed-again-over-talks-with-us-on-ceasefire-13034723

6 https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/12/9/alarming-palestinians-accuse-icc-prosecutor-of-bias-after-israel-visit#:~:text=While%20Khan%20ended%20up%20listening,months%20of%20a%20deadly%20war.

7Suella Braverman; she has since been sacked but not for that, rather for suggesting that the London Metropolitan Police have been “soft” on Palestinian solidarity demonstrators in contrast to their policing of the far-Right. The latter took advantage of her comments to stage a number of actions including some attacks on police and Braverman’s comments were widely criticised by politicians as having helped set that up.

8And, according to Wikipedia, also Islamic Jihad.

9Hizbollah casualties in Lebanon: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/hezbollah-says-2-members-killed-bringing-total-since-oct-8-to-60/3044699

10 https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/red-sea-attacks-force-rerouting-of-vessels-disrupting-supply-chains-1565940.html

11Ibid.

12According to Wikipedia, PFLP is the second-largest organisation in the PLO. However, the PLO has long been dominated by Al Fatah and, due to the latter’s collusion with Israel and imperialism, the PLO has come to lose much support. Hamas and the Islamic fighting organisations are not part of the PLO.

13There is a long Irish history of political prisoners of the English occupation which were often in the earlier centuries named “hostages” and a Republican prisoners’ newspaper

14Of course it may not be that but rather a personal position of the speaker.

15Nor does the figure include the over 8,000 missing, most of which may be dead or dying beneath rubble of bombed buildings. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/10/9/israel-hamas-war-in-maps-and-charts-live-tracker

16 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Israel

IRISH MEDIA WITH BRITISH & NATO PROPAGANDA

On December 21, 2023December 21, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Anti-War, British imperialism, Current Affairs Comment, History, Ireland, Mass Media Criticism, National Liberation, NATO, Political Analysis, US Imperialism2 Comments

News & Views No. 11 Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 5 mins.)

The Irish State is one of four of the European Union which are not also members of the US/NATO military organisation¹ but the Irish national ruling class keeps up propaganda to get its citizens to accept the “need” for membership.

The UK’s colony of Six Counties is included in NATO which means that over one-fifth of Irish land is already formally a part of the imperialist military alliance.² In addition, successive Irish State governments have long been collusive in permitting US military use of Shannon Airport.

The ruling class’s propaganda is emitted not only by politicians’ statements and pro-NATO conferences³ but also through media articles. In this article⁴ the headline clearly gives the impression that the UK is rendering Ireland needed protection from Russia:

“UK had to come to Ireland’s aid with Russian submarine hovering off Cork harbour”!

Image shows two RAF Typhoons sitting off of the wing of a Voyager tanker after taking on fuel. A multitude of Royal Air Force aircraft flew in-support of Exercise Joint Warrior 2020, most notably 617 Squadron F-35B’s who flew alongside US Marine Corps (USMC) VMFA 211 Squadron F-35B aircraft. (Image sourced: *Internet*)

WITH ‘PROTECTORS’ LIKE THAT …!

In fact, throughout the history of the existence of the Russian entity, whether as kingdom, empire, socialist or capitalist state, not once has it caused or even threatened the Irish people (and during the 1916 Rising and war of independence its leaders praised the Irish struggle for independence).

On the other hand, the rulers of England, being cast as our protectors, have invaded and colonised Ireland, stolen our natural resources, exploited and massacred our people, repressed our resistance, undermined language and culture, sabotaged our economy and finally partitioned our nation.

To obliterate that reality from Irish popular consciousness is far from easy but first the English and then the Irish national ruling class or bourgeoisie has been at work on that project for centuries.

In 1366, less than two centuries after invasion, the Statutes of Kilkenny sought to end the cultural integration of its colonists, whom the English rulers called “the degenerate English” and whom they accused of having “become more Irish than the Irish themselves”.

During the 16^th and 17^th centuries the English Crown carried out a number of wars in Ireland to force the indigenous Irish and many of its colonists to accept the Crown’s religion as their own and even exported Irish people as slaves to their American and Caribbean colonies.⁵

They also organised a number of settlement colonies on Irish land from which they had expelled the natives, requiring the settlers to be English-speaking, non-Catholics, to build house and town for defence and not to employ Catholics.

In the 1780s the English occupation created an Irish colonial chivalric order, the Order of St. Patrick, with a red saltire, to which Irish settlers and Irish were encouraged to belong. That saltire, along with St. Andrew’s, is worked along with the cross of St. George to make the Union Jack.

Towards the end of the 18^th Century the English founded the Orange Order to foster division between those of Catholic faith and adherents of the various Protestant sects; then repressed the Republican rising and instituted a reign of terror.

They followed that up at the turn of the Century by organising the dissolution of the Irish Parliament and repression of another Rising. Later that century they oversaw the elimination of a third of our population once again through starvation, disease and forced migration.

Their colonial education service spread the English language further, penalised Irish-speaking children and encouraged children to think of themselves as “English”: ‘Indeed, the following verse was to be hung in every national school:

“I thank the goodness and the grace
That on my birth have smiled,
And made me in these Christian days
A happy English child.“’⁶

In the early decades of the 20^th Century the English ruling class, by now of the UK, suppressed another rising and sent thousands off to die in imperialist war, outlawed an Irish popular democratic parliament and fought a war or repression and terror against the Irish people.

Following up on that, the Crown subverted a section of the nationalist movement and instigated a civil war against Irish Republicans, arming and clothing the army of the neo-colonial Irish Free (sic) State which executed formally and informally over a hundred Republicans.

During the 1970s British intelligence service agents and proxy militia terrorists carried out a number of bombings in Ireland, the one in 1974 killing 34 people (including a full-time foetus) in Dublin and Monaghan,⁷ the highest toll of any day during the whole three-decades war.

In the final three decades of the last decade the UK waged a direct military and proxy terrorist war against the Irish nationalist people in their colony.

MASS MEDIA PROPAGANDA

As noted earlier, the Gombeen (neocolonial) Irish bourgeoisie has been trying to obliterate the deep consciousness of that history by promoting equivocation and doubts through reactionary historical revisionism and even removing significant sections from the history curriculum.

The mass media is another important leader in this work. In the featured piece we see that it is the headline that delivers the NATO-and neo-colonial conditioning message, albeit without mentioning those and indeed by adding material that cannot be read in the actual text of the article.

*British nuclear submarine* (Image sourced: *Internet*)

“Security and defence analyst Declan Power said Britain often finds out about these things before we do.” Yes, we can be sure that it does!

“What exactly was the Russian submarine doing there? It should be looked at in the broader array of defence arrangements in that the Russians will be regularly testing the defence responses of Nato nations… in particular the UK.”

“Because the UK and the Scandinavian countries have responsibility for monitoring an area known as the Icelandic gap.”⁸ The piece concludes with a suggestion of threat to Ireland, stating that the incident occurred “south of the entrance to Cork Harbour.

Perhaps but over at least 12 miles away, so in fact it would’ve also been in a line west of Devon and Wales in Britain and line north-west of France! The article concludes by stating that “Russia has been regularly testing British air defences off Irish shores in recently (sic) years.”

Yes, “testing BRITISH air defences” and the UK is no doubt doing the same to Russia. Britain, as the UK, is a member of US/NATO, which is not only opposed to Russia but has been encircling it for decades before instigating a proxy war against it.

Far from protecting Irish people, British military manoeuvres around and over⁹ Ireland, its bases in the Six County colony and US military uses of Shannon airport actually place us in great danger in any wide conflict in Europe or in world war.

And then of course, there’s the little matter of colonial occupation of a part of our nation and neo-colonial domination of the rest through our compliant national ruling class. The UK military is no friend of people anywhere — and least of all a friend of the Irish people.

End.

Footnotes

1The other three are Cyprus, Malta and Austria. As of yet nor is Sweden but the expectation is of joining very soon.

2There are 32 counties in the whole Irish nation and the names of all but three in English are corruption of Irish words (including all of the Six in the colony).

3 https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/06/24/anti-war-groups-in-ireland-disrupt-security-conference-at-cork-university/

4 https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/uk-had-to-come-to-irelands-aid-with-russian-submarine-hovering-off-cork-harbour-1563754.html

5Later also as indentured labour.

6 https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Protestants_in_Ireland_their_impact_on_society_and_the_family

7And injuring around 300.

8“responsibility” to whom? Presumably to US/ NATO!

9 https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/05/09/raf-jets-may-have-entered-irish-airspace-martin-says/

Sources

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nato-countries-maps-list-membership-requirements/

https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/uk-had-to-come-to-irelands-aid-with-russian-submarine-hovering-off-cork-harbour-1563754.html

Anti-war groups in Ireland disrupt security conference at Cork University

https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Protestants_in_Ireland_their_impact_on_society_and_the_family

The St. Patrick’s Saltire and Order of St. Patrick: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-36846914

HO, HO – FATHER CHRISTMAS!

On December 17, 2023December 9, 2024 By rebelbreezeIn Cultural Comment, Folk Custom, Ireland, Satire, Song, Traditions & Folk Custom2 Comments

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 6 mins.)

We now approach the festival called Christmas. A Christian festival, apparently, celebrating the birth of Christ, the baby Jesus. But are there darker aspects in its references?

Away in a manger
No crib for His bed
The little Lord Jesus
Lay down His sweet head

The stars in the sky
Look down where He lay
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hay

Such a sweet, holy image.

But actually, when we look around us, it seems more like a festival of the pagan gods: of Bacchus, the god of alcohol and of Mammon, the god of wealth. Bacchus, because in non-Moslem countries, drinking of alcohol will be for most a big component of the festival.

Whiskey, brandy, wine and beer will be bought to stock up the house. Alcohol will be drunk at Christmas parties (including office parties, where for months afterwards some people will regret what they did or said – or even what they didn’t do or say).

Alcohol will be not just drunk but also put into some of the traditional food and even poured over it.

Then Mammon. Well, you can see the retail businesses stocking up for weeks or even months ahead of the festival which, after all, was only supposed to be a one or at most a two-day event.

Giving and receiving gifts has now become part of the festival and in most cases, gifts have to be bought. Which is a really big gift to the retail businesses and thence, really a sacrifice to Mammon.

In the Christian gospels of both Matthew and Luke, it is written that one “cannot serve both Mammon and God” — which goes to show how little they understood capitalism, where Mammon IS God.

A theologian of the Fourth Century saw Mammon as a personification of Beelzebub, which in his time was another name for Satan or the Devil.

Interestingly, Protestant Christianity, which some credit as having invented capitalism, at the same time regarded Mammon, or said they did, as “one of the Seven Princes of Hell”.

*Cartoon depiction of Mammon, God of Wealth* (Image sourced: *Internet*)

*Sculpture representation of Bacchus, God of Alcohol, in California winery, USA* (Image sourced: *Internet*)

SANTA

Now, Santa Claus is also a big part of the Christmas festival, especially in western countries, a much more acceptable face than that of greedy Mammon and alcoholic Bacchus, right?

But originally, the Christians saw him a representation of St. Nicholas, 4^th Century Bishop of the Greek city of Myra, a location now in Turkey. He was he patron saint of archers, repentant thieves, sailors and prostitutes. The prostitutes probably had to be repentant ones too, of course!

The sailors, who probably had at least as much recourse to prostitutes as had any other calling, were apparently not required to be repentant – to be in danger on the sea was deemed enough.

But St. Nicholas was also the patron saint of children, pawnbrokers and brewers, so we can see how close he was getting there to the modern spirit of Christmas.

GERMAN TRAPPINGS

Now, the Christmas Tree, der tannenbaum, so much a part of the symbolism of modern western Christmas, came to us from Germany, as did the sled and the reindeer.

The reindeer are not autochthonous or endemic in historic times to Germany, so they must have been brought in their myths from Scandinavia from where originally, the Germanic tribes came.

In turn, the Christmas Tree, Yule Log, reindeer and sled were exported from Germany to England in the reign of Queen Victoria, by her consort Prince Albert, who was German.

And since the English ruled all of us in Victoria and Albert’s time, the Christmas Tree came to us too, to the cities first and then slowly spreading through the rural areas.

*A representation of St. Nicholas (before he got the red suit makeover) looking more like a pagan god of the woods.* (Image sourced: *Internet*)

***

When you think about it, this German-English worship of the tree was a bit ironic, since the English had wiped out most of our forests already and were still cutting down our remaining trees in Queen Victoria’s time.

***

And Victoria, through Albert, gave us the Santa Clause we know and love today. A jolly man, well fed, white beard, twinkly eyes, dressed all in red with white trim ….

IN RED?

Now, wait a minute! It turns out he wasn’t always dressed in red. Originally, he was dressed in a brown, or green cloak. He was, originally among the Germanic people, a god of the forests – hence the evergreen Christmas tree.

And like any sensible woodsman, he dressed in appropriate colours, brown or green. Neither Albert nor Victoria ever represented him as dressed in red. So how did it become so that we are incapable of seeing him today in any other colour than red?

Well, it turns out that Coca Cola is the responsible party.

Yes, although it was the cartoonist Thomas Nast in 1870s United States who first portrayed Santa in a red suit with a belt but it was Coca Cola, in their advertising campaign of 1931 and onwards who made his clothes red world-wide.

Coca Cola is a drink served cold and almost undrinkable when warm but who needs a cold drink in cold weather? I guess Coca Cola needed a warm image to make it still attractive in winter. So therefore the warm, jolly man dressed in red, with a bottle of Coca Cola in his hand.

1931, Santa Clause first appears in red, in Coca Cola advertisement, USA. (Image source: Internet)

Coca Cola brand is worth about $106.1 billion dollars today,¹ far ahead of any other cold drinks product. Which I guess brings us back to …. yes, Mammon.

You can mix the drink with a number of alcoholic beverages too, so tipping a nod – and a glass – to Bacchus.

Now, the German Santa Claus, this originally woodland god, is also thought to have been something like Thor, a god of fire and lightning. So can it be any coincidence that two of his reindeer are called Donner und Blitzen, i.e “Thunder” and “Lightning”? Nein – of course not!

*A starry night over desert hills, like the Nativity scene but without the Guiding Star.* (Photo source: *Internet*)

INVISIBLE

Although we see the image of Santa Claus everywhere and even pretend Santa Clauses all over our city streets, everyone knows that nobody sees the real Santa Claus. Children have to be asleep when he arrives to distribute his presents and somehow adults don’t see him either.

Which I suppose is a good thing ….

I mean if you found an adult intruder in your house at night, not to mention near your children, you’d be liable to whack him with a hurley (that’s an Irish cultural reference) …. or a baseball bat (that’s a U S cultural reference) …. or stab him with a sharp kitchen knife (that’s an international cultural reference).

It was bad enough when somehow that portly – not to say fat – man could somehow come down your chimney and go up again, without waking anyone … but now he can get in your house or flat even when you don’t have a chimney.

Which is at least creepy, if not downright scary.

Oh, let’s lighten the mood and sing together:

You better watch out
You better not cry
You better not pout
I’m telling you why

Santa Claus is comin’ to town
Santa Claus is comin’ to town

He’s making a list
He’s checking it twice
He’s gonna find out
Who’s naughty or nice

Santa Claus is comin’ to town
Santa Claus is comin’ to town

He sees you when you’re sleeping
He knows when you’re awake
He knows if you’ve been bad or good
So be good for goodness sake

Yes, lovely but wait …

“You better watch out, you better not cry …” — Is it just me, or is that not downright threatening? And he knows when we’re sleeping or awake? He has our children under surveillance? In some kind of list?

HO! HO! HO! IN MORALITY PLAYS

Morality Plays were a genre of theatrical performances of the medieval and Tudor eras in which a character was tempted by a personification of Vice.

Now Vice (not unlike a lot of police Vice Squads), was often seen as the epitome of evil, corruption and greed – in other words, the Devil. The playwrights tended to portray the Devil as somewhat of a comical character, perhaps to keep their audiences entertained (or to disarm them).

So the character who played the Devil would announce his arrival with a stage laugh: “Ho, Ho, Ho!”

You can probably see where I’m going with this.

Nowadays, we tend to see the Devil portrayed in black but in earlier times, he was more often seen as coloured in red. The colour in which Coca Cola just happens to have dressed Santa too.

The German or Nordic Santa was originally a god of fire also, while even the modern Santa drives a magical chariot pulled by horned beasts and he is portrayed all in red. Traditionally, the Devil is seen as residing in Hell, a supposed place of eternal flames below ground.

What does Santa Claus give to children who have not been good? A lump of coal! In other words, a mineral from underground that can burn to make fire.

NICHOLAS

Santa Claus is supposed to be modelled on St. Nicholas …. and what is the popular abbreviated version of Nicholas, i.e the nickname? Yes, Nick.

And the common name for the Devil, Mammon, Beelzebub, Satan is ….. Old Nick!

We need to wake up! Guard our children!

HO, HO, HO!

End.

Footnotes

1 https://www.statista.com/statistics/326065/coca-cola-brand-value/

POLICING THE PALESTINE SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT

On December 8, 2023December 21, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Genocide, Imperialism, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Israeli Zionism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners, Popular ResistanceLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 8 mins.)

Demonstrations, like many organised activities, require a certain discipline: time and place set, conduct along the way, speakers and time allocated, dispersing afterwards. But just as discipline helps avoid dangers, its imposition also bring dangers.

I’ve been one of the organisers, or a steward on a number of public events over the years but more often a participant without any particular role.

Once, in London as a steward I was called “a State agent” as I moved to prevent a couple of people leading others out of an Irish demonstration to attack some British fascists and Loyalists who were chanting against us.

For us, the main objective was to hold an Irish solidarity demonstration in London from its start to its finish without giving the London Metropolitan Police and Special Branch the opportunity to disrupt it.¹ Attacking fascist jeerers was secondary to our objective on that occasion.

And if those guys really wanted to attack fascists, they should have been travelling parallel to the march (as the Red Action group often did, for example) instead of inside the march body. Then they could have attacked the fascists without any disruption of the march.

I have also been a party on a broad antifascist mobilisation to a refusal to organisers’ direction to march away from the fascists, instead heading towards them with others.² In those cases the organisers were, in effect, colluding with the State.

PALESTINE SOLIDARITY IN IRELAND

The main organisation for Palestine solidarity in Ireland for decades has been and continues to be the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Its steering group or executive committee is entirely unpaid and works with energy and determination over the years and at times more intensively.

Those intensive times have been with us again since last month in the horrific genocidal Zionist bombing of Gaza and the murderous ground attacks in the West Bank and the IPSC activists have organised large – sometimes huge – marches of solidarity in Dublin every week.

These have been combined with other events such as rallies, concerts and public meetings in the city and marches, rallies and pickets elsewhere to the south, the west and the north of the country.

No organisation however is perfect or right all the time and there are a number of areas and occasions that deserve constructive criticism for improvement.

I do believe that the cancelation of a Palestine solidarity march scheduled for 25^th November was a serious error tactically and strategically.

*Section of a midweek demonstration in persistent rain organised by the IPSC outside Leinster House, seat of the parliament of the Irish State in October.* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

In terms of strategy we must strive as far as is possible not to give ground in the public arena to fascists and other racists since as we vacate ground, they step forward to occupy it. To move the rallying point from the Garden of Remembrance³ made sense but the cancellation not at all.

Tactically, the absence of a Palestine solidarity march that weekend broke the momentum of large public Palestinian solidarity events occurring at least weekly throughout the capital city.⁴

WHICH SLOGAN?

The IPSC now calls for the expulsion of the Israeli Ambassador but earlier on in October it refrained from doing so. That was a mistake but what was worse was the attempt to influence others also not to do so, for example with regard to speakers from their platform.

During that period the presence of non-stop chant-leaders shouting the approved slogans, one after another, particularly near groups who might chant for the expulsion of the Ambassador seemed more than a coincidence.

It is good to hear now the ubiquitous “Israeli Ambassador – Out, out, out!” from the IPSC slogan-callers and, though perhaps not the IPSC’s choice, may the one stating that “There is only one solution – Intifada revolution!” be accepted in toleration.

WHICH FLAGS?

At the recent much-diminished Palestine solidarity march in Dublin⁵ – the first since the cancellation – I witnessed a man and woman acting for the IPSC organisers, they said, approaching a person with a PLFP⁶ flag, to ask not to fly any flag other than the Palestinian national one.

They were polite and not in any way intimidating; their manner was not the problem but the content of their message was.

*Palestinians participate in a rally marking the 52nd anniversary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), in Gaza City, December 7, 2019.* (Photo cred: *Hatem Moussa/ AP*)

There are issues where the IPSC should be giving a lead and are of course doing so but just as there are some where they should but are not, this is one where they seem to be attempting to impose a discipline and uniformity that is both unnecessary and unhealthy.

There are organisations that send sacks of their group’s flags and placards to demonstrations to be carried by random participants, swamping the event to make it appear as though their organisation is bigger and more prevalent than is the case, a practice I detest.

It is not as though people are flooding the demonstration with PFLP flags or, indeed, Irish Tricolours and Starry Ploughs, though it seemed that they were not as worried about the latter two.

There are people who support different organisations in Palestine and why should it be a problem for them to fly the flag of the organisation of their choice?

Why should it be a problem for people to realise that there are many Palestinian organisations of struggle in opposition to the one of collusion?

In a demonstration for Irish independence would we demand that only the Tricolour⁷ could be flown? Or for Catalan independence, only accepting the display of the Senyera?⁸

WHAT KIND OF PALESTINIAN STATE?

The IPSC is formally neutral on the issue of what kind of Palestinian state to which to aspire, which in some respects is fair enough since that is a matter for the people there to choose. But it is not OK to be neutral on whether the ‘two-state solution’ (sic) is acceptable, never mind viable.

Yes, we know that the imperialists of the EU, USA and UK support that ‘solution’. We know that their allies do, including the Irish Government. We also know that the collaborationist Palestinian organisation⁹ and most Arab states’ leaders also support that arrangement.

BUT

The two-state solution is one where the settler-occupier gets to keep what he robbed and murdered to get while the indigenous receives less than 40% of her original land and the worst of it, with the least water and, furthermore, under the constant guns of the robbers and murderers.

*The diminished part of Palestine being offered to Palestinians under “the 2-state solution”* (Image sourced: *Internet*)

MOST PALESTINIANS POLLED IN PALESTINE REJECT IT.¹⁰ And you can guarantee, without polling, that the vast majority of the exiled Palestinian refugees reject it too, since it would close for ever any hope for a return to Palestine for most of them.

The IPSC supports the slogan “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!” This is, one might say, an implicit rejection of the two-state proposal since it must mean a free Palestine from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean and Red Seas. But how many understand that?

In a world where imperialism is the main support of the European Zionist colonial (and genocidal) project, it is essential that the mass of people understand for what it is that the Palestinians are fighting and what we support, as distinct from what the imperialists want to foist upon them.

PALESTINIAN POLITICAL PRISONERS

In the struggle for independence and for social justice, right across the world, many people are taken by those in power and put in jail. Solidarity with those prisoners, objections to their conditions and demands for their release have been an important part of those struggles.

This has been well-illustrated in Irish history too and in Britain, the First International (Workingmen’s Association) founded by Marx, Engels and others campaigned in solidarity with the Fenians incarcerated in English jails.

The “blanket protests” and in particular the hunger strikes in colonial jails in Ireland a little over 40 years ago drew huge attention and wide support not only in Ireland but across the world.

All the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails are there as a result of the European Zionist occupation of Palestine and the natural resistance of the indigenous people.

When Hamas recently obtained the release of 180 prisoners from Israeli jails, most were women and children. Furthermore, many had not even been convicted in the Israeli military courts but were held in “administrative detention”, in effect, interned without trial.

*Palestinian prisoner solidarity protest in Nablus 17 April 2023* (Photo credit: *Jaafar Ashtiyeh /AFP*)

Though the IPSC has highlighted the number of children in Israeli jails and those in administrative detention, it does not have a position of overall solidarity with the rest of the 100,000 Palestinian prisoners nor in calling for their blanket release.

The organisation has however covered the release of prisoners in the recent exchange and shared reports of the brutality inflicted upon many, particularly after the Hamas offensive on 7^th October. One must hope that this process will be extended to solidarity with all the Palestinian prisoners.

Solidarity with political prisoners does not necessarily imply support for their previous actions or for their organisations; what it does is to recognise that all liberation struggles produce martyrs and prisoners due to the repression of resistance to colonialism and occupation.

The existence of the prisoners is a direct result of the colonial occupation and if we oppose that occupation we should stand in solidarity with the prisoners, agitate around their conditions and demand their freedom, along with the departure of the colonists.

IN CONCLUSION

All organisations and movements need to instil some discipline around their activities. All also commit errors from time to time and it is crucial to learn from those in order to improve their effectiveness and to bring nearer the objectives for which they strive.

In their attempt to mediate between the different pressures upon them it is necessary to distinguish between what the dominant system wants or would like and what the movement’s supporters wish, between what is most welcome and what is most necessary.

*Rally after large IPSC march 10 October 2023* (Photo sourced: *Internet*)

The IPSC is an important and valuable organisation in Ireland doing crucial work in the area of solidarity with the Palestinians and, in doing so, contributing to an atmosphere of internationalist solidarity which is essential for the advance of humanity.

While I have not for some years been part of its Dublin organisation I will of course continue to support its marches, rallies and pickets as I have been doing for decades, both in promotion and in attendance.

End.

FOOTNOTES

1The police used attacks by fascists and resistance to them on Irish solidarity marches as opportunities to disrupt the march and to arrest march participants.

2The Communist Party of Great Britain despite the history of many of its members in the 1930s, did not wish to physically attack fascists from the late 1960s and tried to steer demonstrations away from direct confrontation, often leading them away from where the fascists were gathered.

3That place is less than 100 metres from the scene of the attack on the children and the march began there the participants would have to pass by the site.

4It also left exposed to attack any small group that went ahead with Palestine solidarity or anti-racism pickets, as some did, in the city centre.

52^nd December 2023.

6Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

7There is nothing wrong with the Tricolour but some Republicans and socialists prefer the Starry Plough, signifying a more socialist republicanism and also a separation from the State, which has appropriated the Tricolour.

8The original flag of Catalan independence, red stripes on a yellow field — but on Catalan demonstrations the Estelada Blava, including a blue triangle surrounding a white star, for left Republicans, is much more common and the Vermella, with a red star on yellow instead of the white one on blue is quite common also, especially among revolutionary socialists.

9The Al Fatah-dominated PLO from which a number of Palestinian resistance organisations are excluded. They also dominate the Palestinian Authority which has not held elections since Hamas won them in 2008.

10 https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/new-polling-and-legacy-oslo-accords

SOURCES

Cancellation of march: https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41276554.html

Polls on two-state ‘solution’: https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/new-polling-and-legacy-oslo-accords

Israeli Palestinian prisoners: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/24/who-were-the-palestinian-prisoners-israel-released-on-friday

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/11/29/middleeast/palestinian-prisoners-israeli-judicial-system-west-bank-mime-intl/index.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/10/21/number-of-palestinian-prisoners-in-israel-doubles-to-10000-in-two-weeks

IRONIES MOUNT IN THE STORY OF THE RACIST RIOTS

On December 1, 2023December 1, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Anti-Fascism, Current Affairs Comment, Human Rights, Ireland, Political Analysis1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 5 mins.)

As more information emerges — without any great help from the mass media or the political class – it completely undercuts the platform of lies constructed by the fascist manipulators of the recent rioting mob in Dublin.

The story in fact is replete with ironies – not unusual in the country called by some ‘Ironyland.’

As most people will know, the immediate story began with a stabbing attack on three children and a worker who intervened to save them outside a Gaelscoil¹ creche in Dublin City centre. Riding the crest of the horror story ran a footnote alleging that the attacker was a migrant.

A recent view of the steps to *Scoil Mhuire BÁC* (Photo credit: *Gareth Chaney/ Collins Photos*)

The fascist manipulators and their far-Right followers quickly boosted the footnote into the main – almost ONLY — story and mobilised on social media for the next few hours. By that evening, they had gathered a few hundred in the city centre, burning police cars and public transport.

Well, the alleged target of the riots were migrants and that was certainly the message being put out by the fascist manipulators and high-profile racists. And precisely here is where we see the emerging ironies and undermining of the racist memes.

For it quickly emerged that of those who intervened against the attack on the three children and the creche worker, two — possibly three — were themselves of migrant background, with another an Irishman.

All the injured were taken for medical care to hospitals where, of course, many of the workers at all levels are also migrant workers. No doubt they too would have been targeted except that such is one step too far even for the racist foot soldiers. Up to now, anyway.

As usual, the fascists and other racists spread lies about the circumstances of the attack, alleging the perpetrator was an illegal immigrant and motivated by Muslim fundamentalism.² For although of migrant background he had been legally 20 years in Ireland and had mental health issues.

Nothing particularly ironic about that since lying comes naturally to fascists.

But then, what is not surprising to any except racists perhaps is that one of the injured children is from two migrant parents, each from a different region. And they sent their child to an Irish-speaking creche, probably to prepare for Irish-language schooling anon.

So racists whip up anti-migrant hatred around an attack on children, one of whom is herself a child of parents of migrant background, in an incident in which two out of the three who come to the victim’s assistance are migrants and the children are treated in part by migrant health workers.

And then the racists were at it again on social media, trying to reduce the heroic roles of the people of migrant background, counterposing the heroic acts of the people of Irish background against the others, implying that promoting the role of migrants was some kind of ‘woke’ propaganda.

FASCIST USE OF “WOMEN AND CHILDREN“

The call to “protect our children, our women” is a common trick to whip up emotions without any moderating thought. It is in fact a call hearkening to the Neolithic, when such things were real needs and often enough, sadly, since then in many parts of the world.

States have used the trick to get people to join armies to kill one another on battlefields while the masters of those states are far from “where the fast bullets fly” and, when the war is won or lost, may well sit down together draw up deals, to chop up and trade lands and markets.

But the fascists use the slogans and the underclass of the city allow themselves to be used, mouthing the slogans and talking about “undocumented migrants” “of military age”, parroting their lines.

The irony here too is that fascists want to protect women only if they stay in the kitchen or at least ‘know their place’. And the children of course will be fodder for capitalist exploitation or for fighting in foreign wars, against others of their class.

And increasingly with every war, women and children form the larger part of the casualty lists, not to mention widows struggling to get by and care for their bereaved children.

When Naoinrí³ managers, workers and children’s parents were demonstrating outside Leinster House for help with a sector struggling so badly that some have closed and others are considering doing so, were these elements called there by their fascist manipulators to support the protests?

Of course not!

A protest on March 29th this year about the lack of Irish Government support for the Irish language in education, including in the Irish-language creche services. Of course no support from the fascists and far-Right for improvement in these services for “our children”, not to speak of our national language! (Photo sourced: *RTÉ*)

But we have not exhausted the ironies yet, there are some still to go. The Gardaí, who have drawn their batons and struck at Republicans, water protesters and anti-fascists often enough, were afraid to do so while their patrol cars burned as they awaited the arrival of the Public Order Unit.

Which has led to irrelevant calls from some quarters to reform GSOC investigations and more recruitment for the police.

Mary Lou McDonald is absolutely correct in saying that the rioting was easily foreseeable and that the fascists and their followers had been active in recent years threatening and harassing people and so they had: migrants, refugees, LGBT people and some politicians.

But there is irony here too because McDonald’s party, once the largest revolutionary opposition to the State did not at all mobilise against those fascist and far-Right thugs, not even when one of their youth wing was knocked unconscious by National Party supporters on Custom House Quay.⁴

But wait, this piece of irony is a real beaut! The Garda Commissioner, Drew Harris, is only three years out of his previous job as Assistant Commissioner of the sectarian colonial armed police force, the Police Service of Northern Ireland (formerly the Royal Ulster Constabulary).

Why is that an irony, you ask? Well, in his previous job, Harris would have been fully au fait with the biggest collection of far-Right bigots, racists and drug-dealing violent fascists to be found in Ireland, i.e the ‘Ulster’ Loyalists, the enforcers of the Orange Order.

*Garda Commissioner Drew Harris being congratulated on his appointment by his former colleague in the PSNI, Asst. Commissioner Hamilton.* (Photo sourced: *Internet*)

Did he think that the Dublin variety was as easy to control as those in the Six Counties, or that he had a similar “understanding” with them?

So what now? Well the final irony of all. The Gardaí are going to get better tooled up which of course, they will not be using primarily against the fascists and their far-Right followers at all but rather on the anti-fascists, anti-racists and Republican campaigners and protesters in general.

But they were incapable of having a Garda presence at the school a few days later when, according to reports, parents found a drunken man who had urinated himself on the steps of the school building. Prevented from attending by fear of GSOC reports??!!

End.

FOOTNOTES

1School teaching through the medium of Irish language, usually all subjects except other languages. The one in question was adjoined to the primary-level Scoil Mhuire which in turn is connected to the Secondary-level Coláiste Mhuire. There is as yet no totally-Irish-language university although there are streams and some university courses taught through Irish.

2Irish-language creches or nursery schools.

3On 20^th August 2020; he was there with friends and not part of a SF contingent https://rebelbreeze.com/2020/08/31/there-will-be-another-day/

SOURCES

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/dublin-stabbing-victim-is-from-migrant-family-3nw0fsppv

https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/190000-euros-raised-for-brazilian-who-saved-kids-in-dublin-stabbing-1556510.html

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41277331.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Dublin_riot

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/politics/unforgiveable-no-garda-presence-outside-school-at-centre-of-dublin-knife-attack-dail-told/a1492199036.html

HERE, BUT THERE

On December 1, 2023December 1, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Creative writing, Creative writing, Current Affairs Comment, Human Rights, Ireland, National Liberation, Palestine, Poetry, Popular Resistance, ZionismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Ireland, Palestine)

Here, the leaves are dying,

There, the people are dying;

Here, the leaves are falling,

There, the bombs are falling.

Here it is the turn of season,

There, genocide’s the only reason.

The tree seems as though it died

It is not dead but now asleep;

Retreated to its living roots

Underground stretched down deep.

In the Spring new buds we’ll see;

It is not easy to kill a tree.

Hard to kill a people too

As they rise up to resist anew.

November 2023

*Centre: Birch tree, Dublin City North, November 2021* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

THOSE AMBASSADORS

On November 29, 2023November 30, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, History, Human Rights, Imperialism, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Popular Resistance, ZionismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

Ambassadors generally don’t represent people but rather states. They report to their home state on attitudes at different levels in the country where they are based and on friendly and not-so-friendly contacts also.

Two ambassadors have been in the news recently and they are both from the same part of the world – one is Israeli and the other is Palestinian.

Individually ambassadors may be nice and friendly or, like the Israeli one, arrogant and aggressive but all that is really not the main thing to remember about them, which is that they represent the state that sent them. What you do or say to them, you do or say to their state.

The Israeli Dana Erlich is in the news because a number of political parties have tabled motions in the Irish Parliament for her expulsion.¹ She is representing the Israeli State, a racist, Zionist colonial state which is at present carrying out a genocidal bombardment on the Palestinian people.

Dana Erlich, Israeli Ambassador to the Irish state (Photo sourced: *Internet*)

Wahba Abdalmajid is the Palestinian Ambassador in Ireland and, in the news mostly because she was warmly received at the recent Ard-Fheis (annual congress) of the Sinn Féin political party. A look at her “Embassy’s” website gives little indication of a people struggling for freedom.²

WHOM DOES THE PALESTINIAN AMBASSADOR REPRESENT?

Despite there existing formally a Palestinian state, in reality its people have been actively prevented from creating one. Wahba Abdalmajid’s real employer may be said to be the Palestinian Authority which functions somewhat like a state – but under the control of the Israelis.

*Wahba Abdalmajid, Palestine Ambassador to Ireland, photographed recently* (Photo sourced: *Internet*)

In a recent interview, Norman Finkelstein commented that Israel had a great many spies in Gaza, most of them former employees of the Palestine National Authority, i.e the administration of which Al Fatah lost control when beaten in the 2006 legislative elections by Hamas.³

In the wave of imperialist pacification processes (incorrectly called “peace processes”⁴) that swept through anti-imperialist conflicts around the world, the Palestinian variant in 1993 seems to have been the first, which then spread like a virus to South Africa, Ireland, the Basque Country⁵ …

In the Oslo Accords of 1983, the leadership of the PLO recognised the ‘legitimacy’ of the Zionist colonial state of Israel and agreed to the idea of a Palestinian state on a part of Palestine, with the worst land and least water, forever to be under the guns of Israel.

No arrangement was made for the descendants of the 700,000 Palestinians expelled by Israel when the Zionist State was created in 1948, forbidden by Israel to return.

The attraction for the PLO’s leadership was getting to run their own administration and with that went a spiraling of the already-existing corruption and nepotism. And accompanying that, repression of dissent through the use of their ‘security force’ where they were in control.

Financial aid comes from the European Union and USA to the PNA (to the total of US$1 billion in 2005) and, despite 2006 elections won by Hamas, the funds are paid to the West Bank HQ, i.e to Mahmoud Abbas’ offices.

Mahmoud Abbas, imperialist and zionist stooge, glued to the presidential seat of the Palestinian National Authority. (Photo sourced: *Internet*)

The dissatisfaction of Palestinian youth and of much of society with Al Fatah and their agreement to the Oslo Accords broke out into the Second Intifada 2000-2005 and since then Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation has been led by other organisations.

At a Tokyo meeting of foreign affairs ministers,⁶ USA’s envoy Blinken indicated that after Israel’s hoped-for defeat of Hamas (and cowing of Palestinians) they would favour the Palestine Authority administering Gaza again, to which PNA President Mahmoud Abbas indicated agreement.

Meanwhile, elections have not been held for the PNA since 2008, despite promises a couple of years ago. The reason is obvious: Al Fatah would again lose. Nevertheless, the western imperialist bloc recognises the PA as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people!

The same bloc and the Irish State also supports the “2-state solution” which was no solution even when being mooted back in the 1970s and is visibly risible now⁷; furthermore surveys show that most Palestinians do not want that option.⁸

So who does represent the Palestinian people? Difficult to see how that question can be answered at the moment. There are a number of resistance organisations that can legitimately claim to represent sections of the Palestinian people while the PA can only represent collusion and repression.

End.

FOOTNOTES

1Unsuccessfully, so far, with the Government and its allies in opposition.

2And the most recent entry in the Embassy’s news section is dated 14 August of this year!

3That was the last election held for the PA, which remains under the control of Al Fatah, which did not accept the election results. In Gaza in 2007, Hamas had a short fierce conflict with Al Fatah and took the administration to which they had been elected but refrained from doing so in the West Bank.

4Inaccurate because they do not address the central issues and therefore do not at all bring peace.

5Also Turkish Kurdistan, Colombia … The only one where the people gained anything was South Africa, which got universal suffrage but under a neo-colonial corrupt and repressive regime whose police in 2012 murdered two score striking miners.

6Earlier this month.

7Also supported by Sinn Féin in Ireland and by the Chinese Government.

8Gallup poll found “24% of Palestinians support a two-state solution, down from 59% in 2012.” Also, a Pew Research poll showed only 35% of Israelis think “a way can be found for Israel and an independent Palestinian state to coexist peacefully.”

SOURCES

https://news.gallup.com/poll/512828/palestinians-lack-faith-biden-two-state-solution.aspx

Israelis have grown more skeptical of a two-state solution

BRITISH NAVY CONFRONTATION IN DUBLIN – GOMBEEN STATE RAIDS ON ACTIVISTS’ HOMES

On November 22, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn British imperialism, Civil Rights, Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, Israeli Zionism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine1 Comment

The following is a compilation by Rebel Breeze of recent short communiqués from Anti-Imperialist Action on the confrontation with a British warship in Dublin and the raids on activists’ homes and arrests under the Gombeen State’s “terrorist” legislation (Offences Against the State Act).

Armed British Terrorists Confronted in Dublin.

On Sunday afternoon, members of Anti-Imperialist Action Ireland along with members of Saoirse Don Phalaistín, carried out a direct action against a British warship in Dublin port.

The protest was called to highlight the ongoing British Occupation of Ireland and to make clear the complicity of British Imperialism in the ongoing Zionist Occupation and Genocide in Palestine. The protest made clear the links between the National Liberation Struggles in Ireland and Palestine.

*British Military confronting protesters in Dublin* (Image sourced: *AIA*)

In a militant protest, the activists, chanted ‘From Ireland to Palestine, occupation is crime’ and Britain Out of Ireland and Palestine.’

During the course of the protest, the Republican Activists present confronted Armed British soldiers who appeared on the deck of the ship and a stand off ensued on the gangway.

End the occupation! End the genocide!

Free Palestine!

Free Ireland!

*Solidarity picket outside the Dublin courts (*Image sourced: *AIA*)

In a series of coordinated raids in Dublin this morning, a number of Republican Activists have been arrested and detained under section 30 of the Free States “Offenses against the state act”.

These arrests come as the state is increasingly fearful of the growth in Revolutionary Irish Socialist Republicanism and of Anti Imperialist Action Ireland in particular.

The arrests are timed to coincide with the leading role AIA has been playing in support of the Palestinian People and Resistance across the 32 counties and at a time when our members continue to confront and resist Imperialism across Ireland.

AIA condemn the raids and arrests by the Drew Harassers on Republican Community Activists and we call for these activists to be released back to their families and communities immediately.

Harassment, Raids, or Arrests will not stop AIA and Republican Activists from our work to rebuild the struggle for National Liberation and Socialist Revolution, resisting Imperialism or from taking a stand for Palestine.

The Republican Community Activists raided and arrested in Dublin yesterday have been released without charge.

The operation by the Drew Harassers, no doubt at significant cost, was designed to intimidate the growing membership and support base of AIA across Ireland, but it has failed, as all such operations will fail.

AIA welcome home these activists to their families and communities, where they belong. Republicans are not criminals. We will continue to promote the legitimate demand of rebuilding the Republic of 1916 at every opportunity. We will not be deterred and ultimately we will win.

Yesterday’s arrests are only further proof that the Free State fears the message of Revolutionary Socialist Republicanism, fears the growth and levels of support for AIA, fears our support for the Palestinian Resistance and fears our continued legitimate direct actions to confront and resist British, North American, European and Zionist Imperialism in Ireland.

We won’t be going away!

Free Ireland!

Free Palestine!

Also on Saturday, after the giant Palestine solidarity march in Dublin, according to another communiqué, members of AIA, Saoirse Don Phalaistín and Palestinian Solidarity Activists picketed the Leonardo Hotel on Parnell St.

The Leonardo Hotels are owned by Fatell Hotels the largest hotel group in ‘Israel’ and strong supporters of Zionist terrorism and genocide.

In response to the picket, the hotel has decided to enter lockdown, refusing to open the doors for guests.

End items.

ESTIMATED 20,000 IN PALESTINE SOLIDARITY MARCH IN DUBLIN

On November 20, 2023 By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Genocide, Human Rights, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

Many thousands wound their way in Palestine solidarity on Saturday through the streets of Dublin City centre, crossing from north to south of the river, filling the streets with solidarity slogans that have now become very familiar.

*Section of the march in O’Connell Street crossing the river, the rest behind not having left Garden of Remembrance/ Hugh Lane Gallery area*. (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

The national march called by the Ireland Palestine Solidarity campaign took nearly an hour to pass through Dublin’s O’Connell Street, Palestinian colours mixing with those of political party or group and some education trade union flags and banners – and the green and gold Starry Plough.¹

*And still they are coming* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

*Graffiti on the Spire in O’Connell Street* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

The weather was a welcome change from the heavy rain of the night before and, in contrast to recent cold days, was mild and autumnal. The trees by roadside and in parks, except for the berry-laden hollies, were losing their leaves but those remaining shone russet and gold.

Those political parties whose TDs² voted for sanctions against Israel on Wednesday³ were present: Social Democrats, that had sought the expulsion of the Israeli Embassy and Sinn Féin, who wanted the Government to refer the Israeli Government to the International Criminal Court.⁴

That included also the People Before Profit/ Solidarity, which for weeks had been calling for the Ambassador’s expulsion and the Labour Party.

Left-wing, feminist and animal liberation groups participated, along with local Palestine solidarity groups. In a change from recent marches, Irish Republican groups could be observed participating but were very few.⁵

An Ghaeilge, the Irish language, had a presence on the march in a small number of placards and a big banner proclaiming Saoirse don Phalaistín,⁶ the latter also shouted as a call-and-answer slogan, to merge with the now-familiar ones of Palestine solidarity, along with denunciation of genocide.

Other slogans included: 1, 2, 3, 4 – Occupation no more! 5, 6, 7, 8 – Israel is a terrorist⁷ state! Netanyahu, you can’t hide – We can see your genocide! There is only one solution – Intifada revolution! In our thousands and our millions⁸ – We are all Palestinians!

The “Ceasefire Now!” demand could be seen on some placards and heard on occasion but not as much as before. This slogan has come under some criticism as theoretically binding the Palestinians to cease resistance and leaving the Israeli army in possession wherever they are.

Despite the necessary problems caused to vehicular traffic, a horn blowing from a passing car or van called out often in solidarity to a cheer from the marchers in reply. In contrast to the early decades of the Irish state, the population has become overwhelmingly pro-Palestinian.

*Some appropriate decoration of the Irish Dept. of Foreign Affairs* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

A LONG MARCH

The route of the march followed the same as the previous Saturday’s but instead of stopping at the Dept. of Foreign Affairs, continued on eastwards and then into Merrion Square south where the rally was to be held but significant numbers had left without waiting for the speeches.

Eastward of there, many Garda vehicles could be seen in Merrion Street lower, probably in case people decided to bring to the Fine Gael party HQ their disgust at State collusion with Zionist genocide. Of course nowadays, Fianna Fáil and the Green Party HQs might feel the need for the same protection.

As people turned towards various destinations in the City Centre, to pick up their vehicles or to connect with public transport, most entered to proceed through the Merrion Square Park and, finding gates locked on to Merrion Square West road, headed for the next exit – but in vain.

All gates were locked until one, several hundred metres along Merrion Square North, finally allowed weary marchers to exit the park and turn west again towards the city centre. There was much much muttering about this deliberate inconveniencing of people in a public park.

Passing the corner of Merrion Square West, with the former home of the Wilde family on the right, a large Garda prisoner transport was parked at the corner with other police vehicles around and some Public Order Unit police standing around.

This march had been the 5^th weekend one in Dublin since the Israeli offensive, with a rally in the middle of each week also. And still the Israeli death-toll rises not just daily but by the hour. And still neither the UN Security Council nor EU will call for an end to the bombing.

And still the Israeli Embassy sits in Dublin with its staff free to spy and report on the population of the Irish State, even to insult the national feeling of solidarity and the President of the State for his comparatively mild demands that international law statutes be followed.

Indeed, those same rules, often violated by the western superpowers, lie now exposed in shreds and tatters in Palestine. If there ever was reason to believe in imperialist states ruling the world in common humanity, that belief too lies in tatters that cannot be stitched together again.

End.

*Front of march in O’Connell Street* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

*Some trade union banners on the march* (Photo: *D.Breatnach*)

FOOTNOTES

1 The flag of the Irish Citizen Army, the first workers’ army in the world, formed to defend the workers from the attacks of the Dublin Metropolitan Police during the 1913 Lockout, who later fought in the 1916 Rising too.

2 Teachta Dála, Irish State equivalent to MPs (plural Teachtaí Dála).

3 The motions in Leinster House (seat of the Irish parliament) were defeated through the Coalition Government’s TDs voting for an amendment that pulled all the teeth from the original motions.

4 The SF party flags were absent from earlier demonstrations after their leadership stated they would not be calling for the expulsion of the Israeli Ambassador but once the leadership, no doubt facing a revolt of their members changed that position, they were out in force, some of them even stewarding the march. One wonders whether those members understand that the ICC has in a decade only tried 30 cases and convicted only ten, not one a state or an individual close allied with the Western powers.

5 Undoubtedly, more Irish Republicans participated as individuals or as members of local solidarity groups.

6 “Freedom for Palestine.”

7 A version occasionally heard substituted “fascist state” for the words “terrorist state”.

8 A different version heard that day called In our millions and our billions …