Category: Ireland

“SOLIDARITY WITH THE RESISTANCE” AND “DOWN WITH COLLABORATION OF THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY!”

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Genocide, Imperialism, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Israeli Zionism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Zionism1 Comment

Clive Sulish

(Reading time: 5 mins.)

A large Palestine solidarity march once again in Dublin included a Resistance Bloc, part of which also broke away to picket the Palestinian Authority’s Embassy, where collaboration and collusion were denounced in three languages.1

A section of the march has arrived in Molesworth Street in view of Leinster House but others are still arriving. (Photo: R.Breeze)

As Israel freed 200 of their Palestinian prisoners Saturday in exchange for four female Israeli Occupation Army soldiers, Dublin City Centre rang again to shouts of Palestinian solidarity and some banners of the Resistance Bloc saluted the Resistance and denounced the Palestine Authority.

The Resistance Bloc was organised by a broad front of organisations: Action on Palestine, Saoirse Don Phalaistín and Queer Intifada and was also supported by independent activists.

(Photo: R.Breeze)
(Photo: R.Breeze)

There had not been a major Palestine solidarity march in Dublin since 7th December, though they had been held pretty regularly every two or three weeks throughout the previous year. On Saturday, as Netanyahu stopped blocking it, the ceasefire and prisoners transfer agreement finally went ahead.

The Agreement is in three phases, each including prisoners of each side to be exchanged but also the removal of the IOF from Gaza in matched stages and the return of Gaza residents to the South also including the delivery of food, fuel and medicine. But they return to a rubble wasteland.

(Photo: R.Breeze)
(Photo: R.Breeze)

THE PA AND OSLO

The PA is a product of what was called the Palestinian Peace (more correctly called Pacification) Process and since it failed spectacularly to pacify the Palestinian people is more usually now called the Oslo Accords, from which the PA was established in 1994.

Reading a statement in Arabic outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

The Oslo Accords is one of a wave of imperialist pacification processes or agreements of the last decade of the 20th Century and in particular one of interrelated processes in three distinct regions: in chronological order South Africa, Palestine and Ireland.

The ANC2 of South Africa recommended it to the Fatah3 of the Palestinians; then Fatah and the ANC recommended to the Provisionals4 in Ireland. In no case was what they had fought for achieved, with the exception of universal suffrage in South Africa.5

Banner Dublin Footballers for Gaza on the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze) (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

Later, the ANC and Sinn Féin would also recommend it to the liberation movements of the Basque Country, Colombia and the Kurds of Turkey, always with disastrous results for the movements in fragmentation, confusion, collusion with imperialism and disarming in the face of repression.

The Palestinian Embassies represent in fact the PA and this is the case in Ireland too. Despite th. PA’s long history of treachery to the Palestinian people and their struggle, including repression of the Resistance, it is being officially “recognised” as the representation of the Palestine people.

On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

Not only the traditional State Government parties of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil uphold the PA but so also does the major oppositional party, the former Republican party of Sinn Féin. This is also the case with the major political parties in the EU, UK and US.

These also support the ‘two-state solution’ (sic) which would see the indigenous Palestinian people get less than 20% of their country, with the least water resources under the eyes and guns of the Israeli State. In any case it is considered unworkable by most experts and serious commentators.

“Smash the chains of Zionism” banner on the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
Howth Stands With Palestine banner on the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

In a recent statement on the ceasefire agreement in Gaza, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterrez, also promoted the ‘solution’ of splitting Palestine into two states as a way towards peace. The PA too upholds that same plan.

Major Palestine solidarity organisations like the IPSC in Ireland have no formal position on the PA or the Two-State plan. Standing on the base of Palestine solidarity, ‘neutrality’ on the question is not excusable, even on a kind of basis of ‘it’s up to the Palestinians and not for us to intervene’.

On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

The PA is an imperialist creation against the Palestine struggle; for years it has been periodically attacking the Resistance and has now stepped up that aspect in its 6-week siege of Jenin in the West Bank and even military assaults on the Resistance groups in collusion with the IOF.

True solidarity with the struggle of a people also entails solidarity with their resistance, whether in non-violent or violent form and it also entails opposition to individuals and organisations that are colluding with the enemy; the PA should be publicly denounced by the solidarity movement.

On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

THE MARCH IN DUBLIN

In Dublin on Saturday any fears that much support would have dropped away6 disappeared as large numbers marched through the city centre, some having come from Kerry or Limerick. Not far from the front marched the Resistance Bloc which had assembled earlier outside the Rotunda.

Flying the national flag of Palestine, the Starry Plough and flags of Palestinian Resistance factions Hamas and Islamic Jihad, along with the national flag of Syria, the bloc marched behind banners upholding the Resistance and denouncing the PA.

Placard and flags outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)
Banners, flags and statement reading outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

The usual chants of Palestine solidarity marches could be heard from the Bloc in call-and-answer but also included From Ireland to Palestine – Occupation is a crime! Saoirse don – Phalaistín! Resistance is an obligation – In the face of occupation!

Soon after the main march reached its destination, much of the Resistance Bloc marched away to Leeson Street Lower and soon after crossing the bridge over the Grand Canal into Leeson Street Upper, crossed the road to assemble in front of the “Palestine Embassy”.

One of the placards outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)
Reading translation of the statement in English outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

The breakaway march was closely followed by a number of Irish police patrol cars and a Public Order Unit Van which remained at the PA Embassy until the event concluded.

One of the organisers then presented a man to read a statement in Arabic, the translation of which she followed to read in English, which pointed to happiness at the freeing of Palestinian prisoners in the exchange with the Resistance – but sadness at the collusion of the PA with the Occupier.

A protester holds a placard denouncing the PA outside their Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)
Section of the crowd outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

The speech declared that Palestinians have been striving for over a century to achieve their independence and freedom in their struggle against Israeli occupation. This has cost hundreds of thousands of Palestinian lives and displaced nearly nine million Palestinians around the world.

Later: Given the current circumstances, Palestinians must resist the Israeli occupation and simultaneously confront the Palestinian Authority, which acts as an agent in killing and besieging Palestinians to defend Israel. The speech concluded in thanking the Irish people for their solidarity.

One of the banners outside the PA Embassy bears a slogan but also the name of one of the organising groups (Photo: R.Breeze)
Another view of the crowd outside the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

Another man spoke in part-Irish and part-English, congratulating people on having publicly confronted the PA with its collusion. This had only been done twice before in Ireland, once in Belfast when the “Palestinian Ambassador” had been addressing a Sinn Féin meeting.

There had been another outside the “Embassy” in Dublin some months earlier by a small gathering supporting a picket called by the Ireland Anti-Internment Campaign. He drew parallels between the PA and the treason to the Irish resistance that had led to Partition and a subservient state.

Next to the PA Embassy (Photo: R.Breeze)

Underlining the parallel in song, he sang verses of the Take It7 Down From the Mast ballad (against the Irish State during the Civil War 1922-1923), adapting a verse to call on the PA to Take it down from the mast Palestinian traitors ….. for you’ve (they’ve) brought on it nothing but shame.”

The picket concluded with thanks to the attendance and after a period of shouting slogans including There is only one solution – Intifada Revolution! From the river to the sea – Palestine will be free! Shame on you PA – Shame, shame, shame!

End.


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On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)
On the main march to Leinster House (Photo: R.Breeze)

FOOTNOTES

1Arabic, English and Irish.

2African National Congress

3The major secular Palestinian national liberation organisation at the time.

4Provisional IRA with its corresponding party, Sinn Féin, the major Irish national liberation organisation at the time.

5But no other social or economic progress; in addition, fragmentation of the movement and enlisting of the former liberation fighters as ‘enforcers’ of the imperialist agreement.

6Due to a possible but mistaken attitude of “the war’s over”.

7A reference to the Irish Tricolour: Take it down from the mast Irish traitors/ It’s the flag we Republicans claim/ It can never belong to Free Staters/ For you’ve brought on it nothing but shame. “The Free State” was the name adopted by those who agreed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty, including Partition.

USEFUL LINKS

@actionforpalireland

@saoirsephalastin

@queerintifada.ireland

Who are the political prisoners in Colombia?

On By rebelbreezeIn Colombia, Current Affairs Comment, Guerrilla Action, Human Rights, Imperialism, Ireland, Political Analysis, Political PrisonersLeave a comment

(Article originally written for the Political Prisoners Collective Asociación Arrakala)

Gearóid Ó Loingsigh January 19 2025 (Reading time: 6 mins.)

NB: Edited by RB from original article for formatting purposes

Who and what is a political prisoner is controversial, though it shouldn’t be. Once upon a time we all knew or recognised a political prisoner. It was obvious, evident.

But two centuries of legislative changes, the work of the press and more than one NGO seeking to please its master i.e. those who finance it, has disfigured the political prisoner and its corollary outside, the rebel, the dissident, the activist.

Before trying to vindicate the figure of the political prisoner we should be clear that the prison itself has not been a constant in history.

There have always been places of reclusion, but they were transitory, provisional, where the prisoner was held whilst they awaited their sentence, be it execution, or exile, the confiscation of assets or in the case to debtors’ prison, the payment of the debt or the taxes owed.

The idea of a prison as somewhere you serve a term of a number of years as a prisoner according to the gravity of the crime is novel. It is about 250 years old.

The seriousness of the crime and the proportionality of the sentence are not obvious. In many jurisdictions a bank robbery is more serious than the rape of a woman.

Historically, crimes against property were more severely punished than crimes against the person. There are exceptions to that but in general, in all judicial systems crimes against property are more severely punished.

Of course, murder usually carries a stiff sentence, but countries with long sentences or even life sentences usually consider such sentences for crimes against property and other crimes. In the USA that possibility exists in various states.

In a number of countries the crimes punishable by death include, blasphemy, adultery, prostitution, spying, bribery, corruption, drug trafficking, homosexuality.

Political crimes are also severely punished with harsh sentences and the death penalty, depending on the country. Such punishment for political crimes only disappeared where it was abolished for all crimes.

Political crimes

Margaret Thatcher the British prime minister (1979-1990) once declared that there was no political crime, only criminal offences. She said in relation to IRA and INLA militants in prison in Ireland that political murder, political attacks nor any political violence existed.

With this she aimed to ignore not just the long history of such crimes in national laws in many countries but also International Humanitarian Law.

The preamble to the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights recognizes rebellion as the last legitimate resort in the face of human rights abuses.

“Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind… if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.”[1]

The Geneva Conventions, the basis of IHL in common article 3 to the four conventions reads “In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions…”[2] 

And goes on to explain the provisions that apply. With this the Geneva Conventions acknowledge the existence of organised and armed rebellion against a state as something more than criminality. Otherwise, it wouldn’t attempt to govern the behaviour of the parties to the conflict.

Though it is worth pointing out that the IHL never clearly defined what was an internal armed conflict nor a war of national liberation. However, it is clear that it can’t be reduced to mere violence.

There are those that raise high the figure of Prisoner of Conscience, not just as the highest expression of a political prisoner but as the only one. According to Amnesty International such a prisoner is in jail for their ideas without having used or advocated violence.

It is an absurd definition. For years they praised Mandela as a prisoner of conscience, but Nelson Mandela led an organisation with an armed wing and ended up in jail for conspiracy to overthrow the state. He was no pacifist.

The definition Amnesty uses can be summarised as They who opine but do not act are political prisoners, those who think but do not apply their thinking are political prisoners.

This excludes great figures from Colombian history such as Policarpa or José Antonio Galán who were executed following their capture. According to this definition José Martí was a political prisoner when he wrote, but a criminal when he returned to Cuba to free it.

But this is not correct, a political prisoner may be a person who never even raised a rock, not to mention a rifle. They may even be pacifists. It is not necessarily a person linked to armed groups, though neither does it exclude them.

There are various types of political prisoners in Colombia.

· There are the militants of guerrilla groups, the majority of them in prison for armed actions, though there are those who played a political role in such groups, what the courts refer to as ideologues.

· There are also those who are victims of frame ups, the majority of them militants of one or other unarmed Left group, social organisation, trade union etc. The state imprisons them through frame-ups in order to limit their political work.

· Then there are those who are prisoners for things related to their political activity i.e. people who in the midst of protests, strikes, occupations of buildings break some law and are arrested, such as those who carry out pickets that are not permitted.

Amongst this group there are also the youths of the Frontline of the National Strike. Yes, throwing a stone is a crime in and of itself but these youths threw stones in response to state violence during the protests.

But, what distinguishes political prisoner from a common prisoner? Brandishing weapons or throwing stones is done by lots of people from narcos to drunks on a Saturday night. Pablo Escobar attacked the state with weapons and car bombs, but he was never a political prisoner.

He was always a criminal.

The first point is the political prisoner is captured in the struggle for a better world.

They seek changes in society that benefit a broad section of the population when their struggle is national in character or large group when the struggle is local or in the neighbourhood with specific demands.

So, a right-wing paramilitary could never be a political prisoner because they seek the status quo, or even a worsening of the conditions of the people.

A political prisoner acts altruistically, seeking no personal benefit though they may end up benefiting from the changes they seek for peasants, youths or neighbours because they are from that community.

But they never seek personal benefit for themselves but rather for society or a particular group in society. Once again neither the paramilitaries, nor the narcos or the Uribistas could ever be political prisoners because what they seek is always for their own personal benefit or small powerful group.

So a guerrilla may be a political prisoner, as may be the youths from the National Strike and similar protests. The environmentalist that blocks the entry of a mining company’s machinery is also one, even if they commit a crime such as damaging or destroying the company’s installations.

In 1976 eighty intellectuals and figures from the world of culture met in Algiers and proclaimed the Algiers Declaration – Universal Declaration of the Rights of Peoples. The document is entirely political and does not have the force of law but was and continues to be a moral reference point.

In Article 28 it states:

Any people whose fundamental rights are seriously disregarded has the right to enforce them, specially by political or trade union struggle and even, in the last resort by the use the force.[3]

Political prisoners are those who comply with this article.

Though the methods used, whether they are violent or pacific may have some influence, they do not determine who are political prisoners.

Of course, in the case of guerrillas, a war crime may wrest credibility from their status as a political prisoner, but in general the use or not of violence is not what determines who is a political prisoner.

It is the demands and the selfless commitment of the militant to the cause that defines whether they are political prisoners or not. Those who deny this are the ones who benefit from the capitalist system.

Their denial is nothing more than publicity and public relations for Julio Mario Santodomingo, Juan Manuel Santos, Gustavo Petro and the large NGOs. Colombia is full of political prisoners and those who deny this also deny the reality of capitalism in the country.

End.
NB: For more articles by Gearóid see https://gearoidloingsigh.substack.com

NOTES

[1] UN (1948) Universal Declaration of Human Rights. https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/eng.pdf

[2] See https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/gci-1949/article-3?activeTab=1949GCs-APs-and-commentaries

[3] See Declaration of Algiers https://permanentpeoplestribunal.org/algiers-charter/?lang=en

PADDY HILL, THE BIRMINGHAM SIX AND THE CRAIGAVON TWO

On By rebelbreezeIn Britain, British imperialism, Current Affairs Comment, Human Rights, Ireland, Irish Diaspora, irish history, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

There were also others: the Guildford Four, Maguire Seven and Judith Ward, all innocent and all convicted in separate cases, mostly in 1974, in the same year that the Prevention of Terrorism Act was passed to silence the Irish community.

Yet others continue being framed, including the Craigavon Two.

There were also others: the Guildford Four, Maguire Seven and Judith Ward, all innocent and all convicted in separate cases, mostly in 1974, in the same year that the Prevention of Terrorism Act was passed to silence the Irish community.

Paddy Hill in 2017 outside the Dublin court where the Jobstown case was being tried (Photo sourced: Internet)

The agitation for civil rights for the community of Catholic background in the British colony of the Six Counties in Ireland began in the last years of the 1960s and very soon people in Britain were marching in solidarity with those facing violent colonial repression in the Six Counties.

The Irish were the most numerous and longest-established migrant community in Britain and had become active in many social, trade union and political circles with the potential to educate and strongly affect the host community.1 This was a problem for the British ruling class.

The jailing of so many people, in many cases obviously innocent, hundreds of arrests, thousands of detentions and interrogations with desertion by much of the British liberal and Left sector terrorised the Irish community so that many stepped away from solidarity campaigning.

That repression muted the Irish community’s solidarity actions until the 1981 Hunger Strikes brought them out again in thousands.

After his release in March 1991 Paddy Hill founded Mojo to campaign for framed innocent people and supported the campaign to free the Graigavon Two, another case that bears many of the hallmarks of a frame-up for political reasons, as famous barrister Michael Mansfield2 commented:

“There is nothing more particular about it (the Craigavon Two case) than in all the other miscarriages and the same features appear in all these things.”3

PSNI Constable Steven Carroll was shot dead by an AK47 bullet on 9th March 2009 in Craigavon, Armagh while responding to a fake crime call, the “dissident” group the Continuity IRA claiming responsibility.4 The arrests of John Paul Wooton and Brendan McConville followed.

Political cases in the Six Counties almost invariably are tried by the no-jury Diplock Court and the judge there refused both men bail. This might seem normal except that they did not go to trial until three years later – and kept in jail throughout the period.

Shortly before the eventual trial a man approached the PSNI saying he had seen McConville near the scene and on the evening of the killing of the Constable. This man was the only witness for the PSNI Prosecution but his partner, with him on the evening in question, refused to confirm his tale.

The night was raining and dark and the eyesight of the alleged witness was exposed as weak by the Defence. The coat he alleged McConville to be wearing was a different type, length and colour to that which the Prosecution was alleging McConville had been wearing on the night in question.

This ‘witness’ was also described by his father as having ‘a Walter Mitty character’ and the PSNI admitted paying him as an informant. An AK47 was recovered near the scene of the killing and the one fingerprint recovered from it did not match those of either Wooton or McConville.

Craigavon Two

Brendan McConville and Paul Wooton, taken in 2017. (Photo sourced: Petition for the release of the Craigavon Two)

There was no evidence against either man of having even handled the weapon never mind fired it, no evidence placing either at the scene apart from the dubious testimony placing one of them nearby. Incredibly, it might seem, nevertheless they were found guilty on 12th May 2012.

McConville was sentenced to 25 years and Wooton to ten. Their appeal two years after conviction in May 2014 was unsuccessful and in fact the Prosecution used it to add another four years to Wooton’s sentence.

Paddy Hill of the Birmgham Six and Gerry Conlon of the Guildford Four, both sadly deceased, both innocent but served long years in jail, both supported the campaign of the Craigavon Two. (Photo sourced: Internet)

Paddy Hill was not the only former framed prisoner to support the campaign to free the Craigavon Two. Gerry Conlon was asked to examine the case and became a convinced and dedicated campaigner for the men, speaking out about it as late as a week before his untimely death.5

Paddy Hill and the rest of the Birmingham Six were framed by the British system and served 18 years in jail. In May this year McConville and Wooton will have reached their 16th in jail. For how much longer will they and their close ones be tortured?

End.

Footnotes

1The Irish diaspora in Britain had provided the British working class with its anthem (The Red Flag), its classic novel (The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists) and two leaders of its first mass movement, the Chartists (Fergus O’ Connor and Bronterre O’Brien) and had also formed a strng section of the First International Workingmen’s Association led by Marx and Engels. In 1974 people of Irish background were estimated to form up to 10% of the population of some British cities.

2Mansfield led the appeal cases of the Birmingham Six and of the Guildford Four.

3Quoted in the campaign petition https://www.change.org/p/ccrc-the-craigavon-2-deserve-justice-now

4The same organisation had claimed the killing of two British soldiers at the Massarene Barracks, also in Co. Armagh, only days previously.

521 June 2014, a few months after his 60th birthday.

Further information and petition

Click to access JFC2FINAL.pdf

Petition: https://www.change.org/p/ccrc-the-craigavon-2-deserve-justice-now

FRAME-UP OF THE CRAIGAVON TWO HIGHLIGHTED ACROSS IRELAND

ZIONIST DUBLIN EMBASSY CLOSES TO REGRETS AND CELEBRATIONS

On By rebelbreezeIn British imperialism, Current Affairs Comment, Imperialism, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Prisoners, US Imperialism, Zionism1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

The Zionist state announced the closure of its embassy in Dublin, accusing the Irish Government of being anti-Israel.1 The broad Palestine solidarity movement celebrated the announcement while Harris for the Irish Government expressed regret.

The Zionist Embassy at 28 Shelbourne Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin has been without an Ambassador since she left Ireland last May in protest after the Irish Government, along with the Spanish and Norwegian governments, officially recognised the state of Palestine.2

D.B cartoon drawing of celebrations outside the block in which the Zionist Embassy was located (and under 24-hour Garda protection). Many of the other users of the building will be relieved at the departure also.

However the Irish State’s recent decision to join South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice3 seems to have prompted the closure of the Embassy and led once again to allegations of “anti-semitism” in Ireland which the President called a “gross slander”.4

Simon Harris, Taoiseach (prime minister equivalent) of the outgoing Irish Government5 expressed his regret at the ‘Israeli’ decision while at the same time rejecting vigorously the allegation that the Government is anti-Israel. He is absolutely correct in doing so.

Irish Governments have consistently been pro-Israel and colluding with Zionism, in contradiction to Irish popular opinion. The outgoing government6 has allowed military supplies for ‘Israel’ to fly through Irish airspace and the US military to land and depart from Shannon Airport.

One of the participants outside the Israeli Embassy yesterday celebrating its imminent departure. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

The Irish Government has also held up for years the relatively mild UN-compliant Occupied Territories Bill. These points were well made in an Al Jazeera Inside Story7 program by Mícheál Mac Donncha, Sinn Féin Dublin City Councillor and by Zoe Lawlor, IPSC8 Chairperson.

Both did well outlining the general attitude of the Irish people to which the government was – to an extent – responding and in refuting the slur of anti-semitism on the Irish people. Lawlor pointed to the Irish history of resistance as a motivator but appears unaware that we once supported Israel.

This is important (and I have written about it9) because it shows that we are capable of changing our position to a better one when presented with the evidence of the need to do so, which task the Zionist themselves carried out for us.

However both speakers failed to answer the interviewer’s question of why the Irish government did not go further.

This is an essential question for us and the answer makes sense of the current political landscape with crucial import beyond the issues of Palestine and Zionism. Mac Donncha seemed to avoid the question entirely and chose instead to talk about actions that the Government should take.

The interviewer however put it bluntly to Lawlor that the reason was a reluctance to offend the USA, though presenting it as a fear of putting off US corporations’ investments. Lawlor correctly replied that corporations make decisions based on profit but avoided giving the political answer.

The Irish ruling class is a neo-colonial one and responds to requirements of its masters. These have been firstly the UK, followed by the US and more recently the EU. All of these are imperialist states and bound up with the interests of the colonial fort in the Middle East which is the Zionist State.

(Photo: D.Breatnach)

I am sure that Mac Donncha is aware of those facts and pretty sure that Lawlor is too but both declined to provide the explanation being asked for. One must suspect in Mac Donncha’s case the reason is that his party, Sinn Féin, is busily making itself acceptable to that very ruling class.

And Lawlor probably wants to keep the clean image for the ruling class which the IPSC leadership has been at pains to develop, particularly during this current genocidal offensive.

While the IPSC leadership has played an important role in mobilising national demonstrations much of the activism has been and continues to be by organisations on the ground. The Embassy itself was invaded some time back by such groups and has seen militant blockades.

Jimi Cullen yesterday performing his composition “We Are All Palestinians” during a modest celebration outside the Zionist Embassy. Cullen has been performing outside there for an hour every Wednesday afternoon for 41 weeks. (Photo D.Breatnach)

Axa Insurance has been picketed frequently and occupied at least once and the Foreign Affairs Department was splattered with red paint while the Department of Transport was occupied. The US Embassy was picketed for three days in a row by organisations from Galway without IPSC support.

Only one IPSC march since October last year had the US Embassy as destination and on that occasion the march was led up quiet suburban streets to the stage set up next to police barricades blocking access to the Embassy gates and the main road into Dublin.

Section of the crowd yesterday afternoon celebrating its imminent departure outside the Zionist Embassy. (Photo D.Breatnach)

The general Irish public and in particular of course the activists in solidarity with Palestine can justly celebrate the departure of the Zionist Embassy. It is their symbolic victory.

However, there is no doubt that the Irish ruling class needs to be put under much heavier pressure than has heretofore been the case, if we are to shut down the collusion of the Irish Gombeen state with the Zionist genocide of Palestinians.

Outside the Zionist Embassy yesterday, an Irish healthworker calls for more effective solidarity with the Palestinians, in particular with the healthworkers being targeted by the IOF in Gaza. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

End.

FOOTNOTES

1https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/15/israel-to-close-dublin-embassy-after-ireland-supports-icj-genocide-petition

2https://www.gov.ie/en/press-release/71936-ireland-recognises-the-state-of-palestine. While the decision of those states has enraged the Zionist state, it is not as progressive as may seem at first glance. The ‘state’ that is being recognised is a) in addition to the state of Israel, i.e “the two-state solution” (sic); b) grants the Palestinians around 20% of Palestine which would be under the constant eyes and guns of the Zionists and c) is widely considered not realisable due to the proliferation of Zionist settlements and their special roads connecting them. Currently the only ‘government’ of such a state is the undemocratic, repressive and corrupt Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority.

3Again this decision too has its deeply negative side since the Attorney General of the Irish State in his submission to the Preliminary Hearings on Genocide at the ICJ repeated the many times debunked Zionist propaganda of “mass rape by Hamas” during its breakout attack on October 7th.

4See Sources for link to the report,

5The elections of 29 November did not return any party with an absolute majority and discussions on forming a coalition government have been ongoing since the election results were confirmed.

6And many previous Irish governments too.

7See Sources for link to the program.

8Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

9https://villagemagazine.ie/opinion-ireland-and-palestine-a-late-love-affair/

SOURCES

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/15/israel-to-close-dublin-embassy-after-ireland-supports-icj-genocide-petition

https://www.aljazeera.com/program/inside-story/2024/12/16/why-is-israel-shutting-its-embassy-in-ireland

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/politics/arid-41538359.html

WHAT OUR TRADE UNIONS COULD DO FOR PALESTINE

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Human Rights, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Trade unions, ZionismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

Irish trade unions could play a significant role in Palestine solidarity but they are not doing it. They are well-placed to do so by virtue of the crucial role of their members in production and distribution.

Union members are also members of families, neighbourhood communities, sports fans, social groups, clubs ……………

Every trade union or joint unions in a workplace could form committees to plan and organise Palestine solidarity activity both within their workplaces but also more generally, forming links with community solidarity groups where these exist or helping to create them where they do not.

Every workplace trade union notice board – which employees are entitled to have installed – should carry updated information on the genocide and on solidarity actions such as boycotts, marches, pickets etc.

Every union could mobilise its members to support Palestine solidarity actions and in the case of demonstrations, marches etc., to organise strong contingents to attend, marked out by banners, flags and in some cases by clothing (hi-viz vests, surgical scrubs for health service workers, etc.)

INFORMATION, PROPAGANDA, MEDIA

The trade unions in the media could help the campaign against genocide by countering the dominant western propaganda narrative, e.g. that “Israel has a right to self-defence”, that the Palestinian resistance are “terrorists”, that the “Hamas rampage” (sic) on 7th October 2024 started the genocide.

Those unions could take protest industrial action, pay for advertisements in the media, produce their own database and news detailing media misrepresentation and censorship and update their members on the reality of the situation in Palestine through a newsletter or social media group.

Their members could hold pickets protesting against disinformation, Zionist propaganda and censorship and in solidarity with the almost two hundred of their counterparts murdered by the Zionist military in Palestine in a little over a year.

SUPPLIES, DISTRIBUTION, BOYCOTTS

Unions involved in transportation and deliveries could refuse to transport goods from or to the State of Israel, as well as maintaining a database of products and companies identified as boycott targets.

Pickets could be placed on centres of sale of boycotted goods, such as supermarkets and chain stores, also of distribution centres at haulage firms, docks and airports. Pickets on chain stores in local areas would attract local people to support and widen the net of active solidarity.

Irish healthcare workers in solidarity with healthcare workers and people in Palestine, marching in an IPSC national march on 31 August 2024. But where is their trade union? (Photo: D.Breatnach)

MOBILISATION

Every union national HQ or regional HQ, or Palestine solidarity committee could mobilise its union members to support Palestine solidarity actions and in the case of demonstrations, marches etc, to organise strong contingents to attend, marked out by banners, flags or hi-viz vests,

Health workers could march in solidarity with Palestinian health workers who are threatened and prevented from reaching victims of IOF bombing or shooting, other health workers shot or bombed, ambulances targeted, health workers kidnapped to the terrible ‘Israeli’ jails and possibly tortured.

Education workers could march in solidarity with their counterparts in the bombed universities and schools of Gaza, of the teachers and students bombed and shot. Athletes and sport workers might identify their solidarity with Palestinian athletes bombed, shot or maimed for life.

Construction workers might be organised to express their solidarity with Palestinians’ destroyed homes, roads and facilities, while civil defence and municipal workers march in support of their counterparts in Palestine, deliberately targeted by the IOF.

The destruction of Palestinian olive groves, fruit trees, farms and grow-tunnels could be protested by union members in agriculture and food processing. Workers in fishing and fish-processing might protest the blockading, harassment and even shooting of Palestinian fishermen.

Sanitation and water supply workers could increase public awareness of the deliberate destruction of those types of infrastructure in Gaza, while workers in telecommunication might protest regular cutting of access to the Internet and also the weaponisation of handheld communicators.

Banners of two main Irish trade union contingents marching in solidarity with people in Palestine, in an IPSC national march on 20 July 2024. But FÓRSA has a membership of “88,000” and SIPTU of “around 200,000” — it does not appear as though these unions made any attempt to mobilise their members to support the march. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

OBJECTIONS

There might be some – and not only among the paid officials of the trade unions — who would say that internationalist solidarity is all very well but that it’s a distraction of from domestic bread-and-butter issues, or fighting closures of workplaces, casualisation of work contracts etc.

Others might object to anything that might smack of illegality, such as industrial action of a solidarity nature or ‘political’ actions by a trade union. They might also point out trade unions in Ireland are much reduced in membership and strength.

Indeed. Unions did not come into being without facing anti-union laws, or indeed police batons, courts and jail. Collusion with the system exemplified by twenty years of Social Partnership has weakened the unions to the degree that many workers do not even understand their relevance.

History teaches us that solidarity work does not weaken organisations, least of all militant ones. It makes them stronger. And visibly active and fighting trade unions will surely attract the interest and appreciation of lapsed or as yet non-unionised workers.

The Irish trade unions on the whole, with some exceptions such as primary school teachers, are not doing this Palestine solidarity work. But are people of Palestinian solidarity minds organising in their trade unions to bring any of that work forward? If they are not to do it, then who?

The founding of workplace Palestine solidarity action committees is probably the place to start, the first small step with many and bigger steps to follow.

End.

Cartoon by D.Breatnach depicting the general inactivity in Palestinian solidarity by most Irish trade unions, despite traditions of internationalist solidarity and the daily genocide by the Israeli Zionists.

AWARD-WINNING DOCU-DRAMA LIFTS THE LID ON IRISH STATE CENSORSHIP

On By rebelbreezeIn Censorship & Witch-hunting, History, Ireland, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, Mass Media CriticismLeave a comment

Clive Sulish

(Reading time: 5 mins.)

FEW CAN SEE – Censoring the Conflict was screened last week (Wednesday 4th night) in the Irish Film Institute to a moderately-sized audience, followed by questions of film-maker Frank Sweeney and Betty Purcell by​​​​​​ Ruairí McCann from Belfast.

Sweeney took a look at state censorship during the three decades’ war in Ireland which was effected through the introduction of Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, the sacking of the entire RTÉ Board of Directors and the jailing of a journalist.

Henceforth, self-censorship was the rule.

Specifically, the State ban applied during this period in refusals to interview any member of the IRA (Provisional or Official) and was later extended to Provisional Sinn Féin. It was enforced within RTÉ by management including members of the Workers’ Party1 who also led one of the unions.

Docudrama Few Can See focused on the application of the ban to spokespersons of people in the occupied Six Counties and of a number of campaigning groups: Gays Against the H-Blocks; Concerned Parents Against Drugs; the Gateaux bakery strike in Finglas (factory closed 1990).

Gay rights activists in Cork also campaigned against the H-Blocs and were subjected to censorship under Section 31. (Photo sourced: ICCL website)

Frank Sweeney said he had been intrigued by Betty Purcell’s memoir of her time producing programs for RTÉ and her battles with censorship there2. Conducting interviews with people about their experiences of being censored, he then worked the material into a script.

The format was of a 1980s studio with a program presenter in the style of the times and smoking, intercut with grunge-style footage, electronic interference noise and visuals, then narrowing to interviews with actors playing the parts of victims of the ban at the time.

If the intention was to show how ridiculous it could be to apply a political ban aimed at alleged terrorists instead to community struggles against oppression and the heroin epidemic, the struggle of gays around legality and health and a bakery strike, it succeeded.

The ‘RTE presenter’ in the docudrama screening (Photo: R.Breeze)

However, the issues of whose interests the State was representing in that period of heavy censorship and why it felt threatened were not teased out. Nor why it was able do what it did.

Had those issues been addressed we might have observed a vulnerable neo-colonial ruling class during a high point of struggle against the very colonial and neo-colonial nature of the state and the colony of its imperial neighbour, which also imposed censorship on broadcasting at home.

An aspect of such censorship which might not occur to one but which was discussed in the documentary is the effect of censorship not only on struggles of the time but also on the lack of available footage for archives in the future, leaving history the poorer in material.

Few Can See film has been screening around the world this year and has won some awards including the  Tiger Short Award at International Film Festival Rotterdam and is due in Barcelona next year, hopefully to be screened in Ireland again, followed by a fuller discussion.

Film maker Frank Sweeney (centre) speaking during post-screening discussion at the IFI with Ruairí McCann (left) and Purcell (almost out of shot, right). (Photo: R.Breeze)

In addition to exposing the State-led censorship of the past, Sinn Féin might benefit from the film as those who were being gagged were either members or were thought to be supporters of the party. However, SF has its own history of censoring critics both within the party and outside.

And as one member of the audience was heard to remark: “It’ll be the dissidents, not SF that will be getting censored now.” True, though no longer enforced by the State, rather voluntarily by program makers, editors and by the reporters themselves, as with the genocide in Palestine.

Indeed both Sweeney, Purcell and a member of the audience alluded to ongoing censorship around that subject. But it is not only suppression of the truth which is the problem but also the obligatory insertion of the false narrative that everything began on 7th October with the Palestinian raid.

BACKGROUND: THE BROADCASTING BAN MECHANISM

Section 31 of the Broadcasting Authority Act 1960 empowered the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs to issue a ministerial order to the government-appointed RTÉ Authority not to broadcast any material specified in the written order.

The first order under the section was issued in 1971 by Fianna Fáil Minister for posts and Telegraphs Gerry Collins. It instructed RTÉ not to broadcast

any matter that could be calculated to promote the aims or activities of any organisation which engages in, promotes, encourages or advocates the attaining of any particular objectives by violent means.

Collins refused clarification when RTÉ asked for advice on what this legal instruction meant in practice and RTÉ interpreted the Order politically to mean that spokespersons for the Provisional and Official IRA could no longer appear on air.

The following year, the government sacked the RTÉ Authority for not sufficiently disciplining broadcasters the government accused of breaching the Order.

RTÉ’s reporter Kevin O’Kelly had referred to an interview that he conducted with the then Provisional IRA Chief of Staff, Seán Mac Stíofáin, on the Radio Éireann This Week programme. The recorded interview was not itself broadcast, nor was Mac Stiofáin’s voice heard.

Premiere balladeer Christy Moore (right) marching with Provisional Sinn Féins Joe Cahill (Photo sourced: Internet)

Mac Stiofáin was arrested after the O’Kelly interview and charged with membership of the IRA, an organisation listed as illegal by the State.

Soon afterwards O’Kelly was jailed for ‘contempt’ at the non-jury Special Criminal Court because he refused to identify a voice on a tape seized by the Gardaí as that of Mac Stiofáin. However Mac Stiofáin was convicted anyway in the “sentencing tribunal” of the SCC.

O’Kelly appealed to the Supreme Court and a fine was substituted as a means of purging O’Kelly’s alleged contempt. O’Kelly declined to pay the fine but it was said to have been paid anonymously and O’Kelly was released.

In 1976, when Conor Cruise O’Brien  (Labour) Minister for Posts and Telegraphs amended Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, he also issued a new Section 31 Order. This censored spokespersons for specific organisations, including the legal Sinn Féin political party, rather than specified content.

That prevented RTÉ from interviewing Sinn Féin spokespersons under any circumstances, even if the subject was unrelated to the IRA campaign in Northern Ireland conflict.

Visually impacting and clever punning in placard parade protest against Section 31. (Photo sourced: Internet)

Bizarrely even a call-in show on radio about gardening was interrupted once because a caller was a member of Sinn Féin. 

The changes undermined the relatively liberal interpretations by RTÉ of its censorship responsibilities under the original 1971 Order and encouraged a process of self-censorship and illiberal interpretation.

However in 1976 O’Brien attempted to extend the censorship to newspaper coverage of the conflict, targeting in particular The Irish Press, revealing his thinking in an interview with Washington Post reporter Bernard Nossiter, naming as a possible target Press Editor, Tim Pat Coogan.

Nossiter immediately alerted Coogan, who then published the Nossiter-O’Brien interview in the Irish Press (as did The Irish Times).

Due to public opposition the proposed provisions were amended to remove the perceived threat to newspapers.

But Fine Gael and Labour were not to be left out as the 1973-77 Fine Gael/ Labour Coalition Government also tried to prosecute the Irish Press for its coverage of the maltreatment (not to say torture) of republican prisoners by the Garda ‘Heavy Gang’, with the paper winning the case.

SOURCES

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_the_Republic_of_Ireland

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt34242057/

1The Workers’ Party grew out of Official Sinn Féin which was declining after the split which led to the creation of Provisional Sinn Féin in 1970 and later another split, resulting in the 1974 creation of the Irish Republican Socialist Party. The WP was extremely hostile to the IRSP and PSF, in particular the latter.

2Inside RTÉ – a memoir, Betty Purcell, New Island Books (2014).

Ho, Ho, Ho – Father Christmas

On By rebelbreezeIn Cultural Comment, Ireland, Satire, social commentary, Song, Traditions & Folk CustomLeave a comment

(Reading time: 6 mins.)

Republishing this now as we approach again 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 as a representation of St. Nicholas, 4th Century Bishop of the Greek city of Myra, a location now in Turkey. He was the 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 horned and 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.

A Victorian England representation of St. Nicholas (Image sourced: Internet)

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

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

ELECTIONS 2024: RUNNING BANK ROBBER AND STAYING OLD REGIMES – News & Views No. 15

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, IrelandLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time:three mins.)

The elections in the Irish state are over and nothing much has changed — or looks likely to change — with regard to parties in power or with government policy. Crises will continue in housing, health care and the environment.

The state will continue its slide towards full EU/US/NATO militarisation. And of course, with the colonial one-sixth of Ireland continuing under direct UK occupation and control, administered by a Unionist/ Sinn Féin administration.

Since no party won the magic 88 overall majority number of seats, a coalition government will be formed (as has been every government since 1981).

It was overall quite a boring election which is a bit disappointing. Given that we’re not being given much bread, the least we are entitled to expect is a good circus. And aren’t elections the high point of our wonderful democratic state and processes?

Over 40% of those eligible to vote didn’t seem to think so and didn’t attend the show – even though tickets were free — a continuing fall in the circus-going public and lowest since 1923, a great worry to the authorities. New acts might awaken more interest but the prospect looks slim.

RUNNING ‘BANK ROBBER’

The one real piece of entertainment was the entering the ring at the Big Top of alleged bank robber (and other things) Gerrard Hutch, currently on 100,000 bail on charges in Lanzarote, Spanish state, of money laundering for criminal purposes. He ran out of it on polling day too.

Gerard Hutch jogging from the counting station, media frenzied shoal following.

Gerrard’s family has been engaged in a literally murderous competition with another inner-city family, the Kinehans, with deaths on both sides.

Hutch failed election due only to insufficient transferable votes in Ireland’s electoral system of proportional representation – but he received 3,098 first preference votes — one in ten in the constituency, in competition with outgoing Government party candidates and the SF President.

What does it mean that so many people voted for an alleged bank robber and gangster? That the voters are gang members too? Or that they consider those in government to be thieves or representing thieves, speculators and robber-bankers versus a less disguised bank robber?

OTHER RESULTS

Sinn Féin continued to be one of the top three parties, exceeding government party Fine Gael by one elected Deputy but was in turn trumped by also Government party Fianna Fáil with an excess of nine TDs (Teachta Dála, Irish Parliamentary representative, also known as “Deputies”).

Fianna Fáil, we may remember, was founded out of a split in the anti-Anglo-Irish Treaty Sinn Féin led by De Valera, which went on to have the longest track record in representing the Irish Gombeen capitalist class in government, an objective on which the current Sinn Féin has set its sights.

The Green Party retained only one of its 12 seats, which was disappointing – I mean, disappointing that they kept any. Every time they’ve been in coalition Government they have disappointed their voters and got kicked out at the next election, only to try the same again at a later date.

Another party that has played the same game – and suffered the same subsequent electoral consequences — has been the Irish Labour Party. A question of some but limited interest is whether they’ll join the Government coalition again now or remain in opposition.

Conservative Aontú and (far?) right-wing Independent Ireland got more votes than seems healthy for the country. The electoral Left lost Joan Collins of Right to Change and PBP Solidarity lost Gino Kelly and Mick Barry, though Ruth Coppinger got back in for them after a 4-year break.

Gino Kelly of PBP Solidarity who lost his seat.

The only government composition likely on the numbers if Sinn Féin is to be excluded, as seems certain despite Eoin Ó Broin talking to others, is a repeat coalition of Fine Gael-Fianna Fáil with another three or so TDs and the old firm might go for independents rather than a junior party’s TDs.

Are there any independent TDs so low in self-respect and principles as to accept such an offer? For a Ministerial salary? What do you think?

For decades FG and FF have each been in opposition when the other was in government but will be in government together again for the second term running. This undermines the whole illusion of choice and of democratic representation but what can one do?

People who voted for SF, largely working class and younger people according to profiling by opinion polls, will be disappointed that the party did not a) get an absolute majority (but that was never likely) and b) that it will not be considered for coalition government with FF or FG.

Sad though that reality is, they would have been predictably sadder and more disappointed had SF actually got into coalition government, when their crumpled and discarded principles would have been under merciless public view. On the other hand, perhaps that’s what is needed.

Just as it’s business as usual for the ruling class and its board of management – i.e. government – so it is for the revolutionaries, in terms of the task to build a broad anti-imperialist, anti-racist alliance under socialist (i.e anti-capitalist) principles and with consequent objectives.

Hopefully not the business as usual of separating socialism from national liberation and upholding sectarian principles and methods of organisation. We can hope. And work.

End.

SOURCES

Election results: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpdnlv8n758o

Electoral participation: https://www.irishtimes.com/politics/2024/12/01/voter-turnout-in-decline-despite-public-campaign-by-electoral-commission/

Gerard Hutch votes: https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/how-gerry-the-monk-hutch-34230688

Gerard Hutch careerl: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Hutch

NEITHER ELECTING ONE DALY NOR FIFTY

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Environmental, Housing, Human Rights, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Irish Left, Palestine, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners, Zionism1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

Clare Daly stood for election in the 2024 elections of the Irish State, in the Dublin Central parliamentary constituency, one with a tradition of independent representation going back to Maureen O’Sullivan and Tony Gregory before her.

Daly was standing as one of the loose Left coalition of Independents for Change in a heavy competition for the four-seat constituency.

Clare Daly has a track record as elected public representative and socialist political activist, also as a prominent Socialist Party activist, with which organisation she partedcompany in August 2012.

She was elected MEP for the Dublin constituency from July 2019 to July 2024, TD1 for Fingal from Feb. 2016-July 1999 and TD Dublin North Feb. 2011-2019; in recent years Daly has been better known outside Ireland due to her public interventions in the European Parliament.

Daly and her partner Wallace were both vilified by pro-imperialist liberals and ‘Left’ for publicly opposing US/NATO/ EU imperialist campaigns against Islamic regimes and the Russian Federation, being subjected to a host of unfounded allegations contrary to their actual record.

Tik Tok clips of Daly’s biting attacks on the EU’s complicity in the US-backed ‘Israeli’ genocide provided relief for many around the world from the Zionist sycophancy and insincere and ineffective concern for the victims of that daily genocide prevalent in the EU Parliament.

And who can forget Daly’s calling German politician and EU Commission President Ursula Van Der Leyen out as ‘Frau Genocide’ in the European Parliament in December last year!2

While an MEP, Daly also intervened in the discussion around the Irish Gombeen3 class’ attempt to push us towards NATO, further undermining a quite tattered Irish neutrality. And while a TD, she and her partner Mick Wallace TD were arrested protesting the foreign militarisation of Shannon.

To their credit both risked jail by refusing to pay the fines imposed but the Gombeen ruling class decided to restrict the damage of its exposure of collusion with US imperialism by also reducing the punishment of both to a few hours in captivity.

Daly has been one of the few TDs prepared to speak in public against the repression of Irish Republicans and to visit some of the consequent victims in jail.

In the EU Parliament, Daly also denounced the Spanish State’s police invasion of Barcelona and violence against voters there on 1st October 2017 during the referendum on Catalunya’s independence.

2024 Dublin Central election poster for Clare Daly.

In Ireland today

In her election flyer here Daly highlighted representation independent of political party for her electoral area, housing, health service, cost of living, Palestine, the endangered climate and Irish neutrality without any indication of how these issues might be effectively addressed.

Daly’s election flyer did not mention capitalism or imperialism, nor did she campaign on a platform of overthrowing the current neo-colonial and neo-liberal capitalist system in force, instead indicating her wish to “hold to account the people who’ve got us into this mess.”

“Holding to account” is something to which Daly is accustomed doing and does it well, eloquently, with passion and fluently, scarcely having to refer to her notes while doing so. But like ‘speaking truth to power’, it has little effect on those who are in control of the political-social system.

It can indeed have an effect on the victims of the system but we are left with the question of what to do about the situation. Refreshing as it may be to hear her again in Leinster House, neither voting Daly in — nor fifty Dalys — is going to change any of the conditions under which we suffer.

BY THE WAY,

in case anyone’s interested, I gave my first preference vote to Daly and hope she does get elected.

End.

1Teachta Dála, the title of a public representative elected to the parliament of the Irish State.

2Imperialist politician and proven plagiarist in her doctoral thesis.

3Vernacular term in Ireland for huckster, carpet-bagger-type capitalists, derived from the Irish language gaimbíneachas, profiteering, nowadays used to describe the neo-colonial Irish capitalist class.