(Reformatted entire for publishing in Rebel Breeze from article of same title in his Substack
(Reading time: 6 mins.)
The saga of the Occupied Territories Bill (OTB) has been dragging on for years now. It was first put forward by Senator Frances Black in 2018 and was approved by both houses of the Oireachtas (parliament) but never enacted.
The Irish capitalist class that is resolutely on the side of the Israelis, despite the illusions of many and the odd PR stunt, dragged its heels on the issue, even boasting that it had effectively blocked it.
Simon Coveney who was the Minister for Foreign Affairs at the time said during a visit to the Zionist state in 2019 that:
We don’t believe that it is legally sound because trade issues are EU competence as opposed to national competence in Ireland. And because we don’t believe it’s legally sound we have effectively blocked the legislation from moving through parliament as it normally would…
It’s essentially frozen in the process and it isn’t making progress. And I don’t expect that it will make progress, either, unless the government supports it, and the government won’t be supporting it.1
A demonstration outside Leinster House, parliament of the Irish State recently. (Image chosen and sourced: by RBreeze on line)
This came as no surprise to anyone paying attention. Ireland is not an independent capitalist state; it is what Marxists term a neo-colony with 88% of all corporate tax paid by foreign companies and just three companies accounting for 38% of all corporate tax.
Foreign corporate tax in turn represents 29% of the total tax take in the country.2 It is entirely dependent on the US and also the British state.
Many months prior to Coveney’s boast, the then Taoiseach (prime minister), Leo Varadkar had written a grovelling letter to Joe Biden to apologise for the behaviour of Irish politicians who had voted for the bill. In it he stated:
The Government has consistently and strongly opposed the Bill on both political and legal grounds and will continue to do so… Can I take the opportunity to reiterate my deep appreciation for the strong bonds of friendship between Ireland and the US, including our growing and mutually economic ties.3
There is no world in which the Irish state will stand up to the US. It won’t stop US planes shipping arms to Israel through Shannon Airport, just like it allowed the US to use the airport during the Iraq war.
Putting the OTB to parliament was not a bad idea, believing that is how we would achieve something concrete was.
They are now attempting to water it down further and exclude services from its remit, limiting it to only goods. (Note: at the time this article was written campaigners were still fighting an attempt to limit the bill in that way – Rebel Breeze)
IBEC (the Irish Business and Economic Confederation) came out with a statement that it would harm the Irish economy to enact the bill, whilst paradoxically accepting that trade in goods with Israeli “settlements” in the West Bank only amounted to €240,000.4
On the radio the Government reminded us that we are a trading nation, as if any of us thought that everything we buy in the country was made here and we exported nothing.
The reason they can make these statements of course, is because of the limited scope of the bill itself and the intentions of those pushing for its enactment.
The Irish government was at great pains to say that it would only apply to the territories occupied in 1967 and not to Israel itself i.e. not to the territories occupied in 1948 during the Nakba and the foundation of the Zionist state.
If you accept the legitimacy of the state of Israel or if you are one of those liberals still prattling on about a Two State Solution then all of this makes sense. It could have even been argued when it was first proposed that it was a stepping stone to a wider boycott of Israel, not that any of them said that.
For those who believe in the two-state solution (sic) the map shows what’s available for a Palestinian State (sic). (Image chosen and sourced: by RBreeze on line)
Events have overtaken our liberal friends and they shudder at the consequences. There is no longer any case to be made for a bill that limits business dealings with modern Zionist invasions of the West Bank.
Francesca Albanese in her recent report made it abundantly clear that many companies doing business with Israel are profiting from or contributing to the genocide.5 Now is not that time for half measures. Israel, just like the Nazis is carrying out a genocide.
Asking for a boycott of goods from the Warsaw Ghetto, rather than Nazi Germany would have seemed stupid at the time and actual calls for a boycott of the Nazis were portrayed as anti-German.
Some Jewish organisations opposed the boycott and the US government response to violence against German Jews was that the
U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull issued a mild statement to the American ambassador to Berlin complaining that “unfortunate incidents have indeed occurred and the whole world joins in regretting them.” He expressed his personal belief, however, that the reports of anti-Jewish violence were probably exaggerated.6
We know how this ended. The Nazis in the face of the timorous and timid response from the US and other western powers would eventually enclose Jews in ghettos, then camps and then push six million of them through the ovens.
Now is not the time to repeat history but to be bold and decisive. Now it is equally ridiculous to meekly petition, those who grovelled to Genocide Joe in 2019, to restrict goods from the West Bank.
In the midst of a genocide there is only one option on the table: a complete and total severance of all trade, military and diplomatic ties with Israel. There are no “settlements” without the Nazis in Tel Aviv, without the Israeli military, without the companies that keep Israel going.
A Banner on the IPSC National March 19th April 2025 in Dublin, appearing to show a believed organic connection between the enacting of the OTB and ending the Zionist genocide in Palestine. (Image sourced and chosen: R.Breeze)
Total isolation of the entire regime is needed. Not an orange, not a single electronic component, not a kilobyte of software. Such isolation should continue not just till the acts of genocide have ceased.
They will cease when the repugnant reality that Israel has run out of Palestinians to murder comes to pass.
Israel should be isolated until all those involved have been tried, had all their assets confiscated, given lengthy prison sentences or hung until dead, depending on the actual degree of participation.
This is not an outrageous proposal, it is what was theoretically done at Nuremberg, though many of the businessmen were given back their assets after a number of years and only a handful of Nazis got the actual death penalty and most never saw the inside of a jail.
No such leniency should be shown to the Zionists.
Those campaigning on the OTB will never make such a call. They will continue to petition the government. They do have another weapon to hand in fighting the Nazis in Tel Aviv, but they won’t call for that either.
The Irish Council of Trade Unions denounced the government’s handling of the OTB and called on the Oireachtas to reject the “business lobby scaremongering” and to pass the OTB.7
Of course, the unions don’t need to persuade the Zionists who dominate the coalition parties, they could just have told their members in 2018 to refuse to handle all products coming from the Occupied Territories, or indeed the entire Zionist state and that would have settled it.
They would have to organise that and back all their members who engaged in such boycotts. But under no circumstances will the fat cat bureaucrats ever confront the government over this issue.
If they are not prepared to fight for decent wages, a proper health system, public housing etc, all of which directly affect their members, less still will they fight for Palestinians. They are traitors to their class and also betrayers of the Palestinian people, despite all their lofty statements.
The OTB was a nice propaganda measure whose time has passed. It is, in the midst of a genocide, no longer fit for purpose, neither is a solidarity movement which limits itself to half measures. We need to be bolder.
Both the USA and its proxy Israel carried out an unprovoked attack on Iran, both attacking nuclear facilities and Israel, as per their playbook, bombing civilians and their public facilities.
Iran targeted every category in Israel (generally not civilians) matching those the IOF bombed in Iran, assassinations excepted. And replied to the USA’s attack by hitting their most forward base in a Middle Eastern state, Al-Udeid in Qatar.1
The objectives of the US and of Israel were ostensibly to wreck Iran’s nuclear program. But more than that, to achieve a change of regime to one amenable to the western powers, such as is the case with most of the Middle Eastern regimes.
The regime change was to take place internally by subversion, terrorism and uprisings as it was fighting bombing by Israel.
Neither the US nor Israel achieved those listed objectives.
Iran’s objectives were to maintain its sovereignty and independence in general and, because of the US and Israeli public focus, defend its sovereignty with regard to uranium enrichment to improve its nuclear energy and by-products.
Iran achieved those objectives,2 at least for the time being and it will probably now leave the IAEA with justification3 so western powers will know very little of what is going one with Iran’s nuclear program, which is to Iran’s benefit.
Iran however also wanted the lifting of sanctions and it has not achieved that.
Once the Israeli attack started, Iran’s objectives were a) to recover from the initial external and internal assaults and assassinations; b) defend the state from internal subversion and terrorism and from Israeli bombing; b) strike back at Israel and punish it so thoroughly as to prevent repetition.
Iran successfully and quickly recovered from internal assaults and assassinations; b) put up a strong defence but was unable to down enemy planes other than drones, which was not a success;4 c) punished Israel very severely, to an extent that will become clearer as time goes on.
Scene of Iranian missile damage in ‘Israel’, June 2025 (Photo sourced: Telegram)
But the level of Iran’s attack was not enough to ensure Israel will never attack it again and the Zionist entity’s political and military leadership is probably even now concentrating on how to rebuild itself to strike again.
Once the USA attacked, Iran had to show that it was capable of eliminating US bases across the region and would do so if attacked again. The strike on its evacuated Al-Udeid base in Qatar was largely symbolic but in fact proved Iran’s point and willingness to go that far if necessary.
In that, Iran was resoundingly successful. No other state has attacked a Middle Eastern US base, albeit warned and evacuated at the time, without serious repercussion.
This conflict ended overall as a draw but with the preponderance of success on Iran’s side.
It is more difficult to assess the political wins and losses but in so far as there is any change in the overall political situation one would have to say it has shifted in Iran’s favour.
One process of assessment is to investigate what the antagonists think:
Iran is celebrating nationally before turning to the funerals of their martyrs, in particular state funerals of victims of assassinations;
Israel is full of recriminations against its leadership but also against the US5 for not going further and imposing a ceasefire;
The USA leadership seems divided but opinion is increasingly mounting that Trump is mistaken in his assessment of ‘obliteration’ of Iran’s enriched uranium production sites.
Another measure is the relative financial expenditure and loss.
Although this picture is far from clear from either side we know of over 39,000 insurance claims in Israel so far6and the state spent $5 Billion in the first week of the war.7
They lost a prominent military science development site and lost or sustained damage to military and military intelligence sites too but it will be some time before the true level or even approximation will escape Israeli military censorship.
Israel also lost presumably a great deal of its Mossad-run sabotage and terrorist network in Iran which exposed itself as part of Israel’s attack, much of which is now under interrogation, on trial or already executed.
U.S. spending on aid for Israeli military operations in Gaza and elsewhere in the region between Oct. 7, 2023 – Oct. 7, 2024 was calculated at over $17.9 billion; spending on related U.S. operations in the region at over $4.86 billion.8
Iran produces missiles much more cheaply than Israeli munitions and has greater productive capacity; its greatest loss was the human cost (the disparity in civilian deaths shows who was really targeting civilians) and it lost a lot of scientists through Israeli assassinations.
On the political-psychological level, an extremely important one:
Iran emerged as a strong state with popular support in defence of sovereignty that cannot easily be defeated. Internally this has led to greater unity, at least for the moment.
Externally, Russia and China will see it not only worthwhile but important to support Iran and possibly even to part-arm them (which Pakistan too may do).
Iran’s western-friendly neighbours will be wondering whether US airbases brings them greater security or the opposite and also whether any alliance with Israel is a good idea, even though pushed by the USA and other Western powers.
Israel has seen its image of military superiority and even invincibility destroyed, internally by its war in Gaza and externally by its recent war with Iran and this process will increase as those from other areas view the damage in ‘Tel Aviv’ for example.
For a decade the state has been seeing a steady exodus of dual-nationality Israelis, particularly among its technocrat population and during this war mass evacuations by boat and land after the Israeli State closed its airports.10
The degradation of the IOF through mental fatigue, injuries and deaths (totalling more than 10,000 since their Gaza offensive), along with damaged armour, will continue in a deeply divided body politic.11
The USA’s population will continue to see protests not only against the wars in the Middle East and genocide in Palestine but also against the increasing decrees and police repressing free speech and the right to organise and participate in protests.
Western capitalist companies will continue to reduce or even end their investment in – or relationships with – the Israeli state,12 pushed in part by targeted protests and probably more largely by doubts about how financially safe Israel really is, even in the mid-term.
IN CONCLUSION
Iran is the overall winner, Israel definitely the big loser and the USA somewhat also (not forgetting that any Israeli loss is ultimately one for the US also). But the Zionazis will rearm and increase spying, sabotage and probably covert assassination operations in Iran.
Iran will rearm also, possibly even in nuclear terms and will intensify its intelligence war against subversion and spying and always viewing future attacks on it as inevitable.
The US will continue to view Iran as its primary adversary in the Middle East, in terms of its sovereignty and military capabilities.
Also viewing Iran as a necessary obstacle to remove before its future full confrontation with China, a state financially and economically already ahead of the US and a strong proponent of a multi-polar world against the existing unipolar version with the US as its head.
The world geopolitically-militarily will not be a better place as the result of the outcome of this 12-day war and may even be worse for it – after all, Israel and the US were permitted by the rest of the western alliance to bomb nuclear installations while continuing to support genocide in Gaza.
But with the weakening of US Imperialism and Israeli Zionism, it will offer opportunities for reversing damaged sovereignty, for anti-imperialist revolutions and for social progress.
4Sharmine Narwani on the Cradle podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PK8tYo3jdIk pointed out that none of the many Israeli photos taken from the air over central Iran could be ascertained as typically originating from IOF planes and were instead likely taken from drones. This raised the possibility that all the air-launched missiles of the IOF were all from airspace outside Iran (and we know that the Iraqi Government complained about the US violation of its airspace by opening it to the IOF). This also seems to answer a question that was bothering me: What happened in this war to the sophisticated radar that allegedly caused enemy planes to veer away from Iranian airspace in the attack last year, with some leaks alleged from pilots claiming that the Iranians were able to ‘see’ and target the latest stealth fighter planes. However ‘seeing’ fighters is not the same as ‘targeting’ them and may not even be possible at all with US B2 bombers – see interesting short presentation from this hostile source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz6cd9tHiyM No doubt scientists are working on the problem and technology will develop further so that stealth bombers may be detected and fighters and bombers targeted, with US technology developing technology to confuse the targeting and so on … and on.
5Including reported tweets and comments calling for Israel to bomb the US!
On Friday the ‘Israeli’ state launched an unprovoked and unjustified attack on Iran. Apart from any any liking or disliking of either attacker or attacked, this is a fact. And if this be acceptable, then it can happen to any country.
Of course, in this century and in the last it has already happened to many countries – and in general, it is imperialist states or their proxies who have been responsible. Also in the case of ‘Israel’ in Lebanon and Syria while practising genocide in Gaza.
The western mass media could not deny that Iran’s attack is retaliation to an attack by ‘Israel’, nor could they just omit that context in their reports. So instead, they called the Israeli attack a ‘pre-emptive’ strike,1 which usually means that one had to act first as was just about to be attacked.
But no, that is completely misleading; any time Iran has attacked ‘Israel’ it’s been in retaliation to an ‘Israel’ attack on them first. And in fact the Zionist regime was overdue a retaliation due to their attack on Iran in October last year.
There are many regimes around the world of which I do not approve and some which I detest but that does not give me or others justification for attacking their countries. Stopping genocide does provide justification and, according to international law, actual obligation but only Yemen acted.
Iranian retaliatory missiles striking Haifa (‘Tel Aviv’) 14th or 15th June 2025. (Image sourced: Online)
The ‘Israeli’ ‘justification’ for their attack is that Iran posed a threat to their state. This was based on the often-stated belief of the Iranian authorities that the Zionist settler colony is a threat to the whole Middle East and should be eliminated. But is an expression of an opinion a real threat?
It is not, unless followed by action (such as for example the genocidal and racist statements of Israeli Government ministers as the IOF carries out their wishes in practice).
And in fact the Zionists have themselves verified the correctness of the opinions of the Iranian authorities by their history since 1948 (and for some time before that too). But how was this alleged threat to be carried out? By Iran developing nuclear weapons, claimed the Zionists.
Netanyahu has been claiming over ten years, against all the evidence, that Iran is developing a nuclear weapon, despite numerous Iranian denials and official inspections. The Western powers are apparently also very concerned about the possible development of nuclear weapons by Iran.
Wait a minute! France, UK and the USA are concerned about Iran possibly having nuclear weapons some day? All of those are nuclear weapon-holding states! What gives them the right to decide who should and who should not have nuclear weapons?
We could ask too what gives the Israeli State, which has secret nuclear weapons, such a right?
Yes, the Zionist State has had nuclear weapons since the 1960s, although it keeps it secret and its nuclear weaponry is not open to any inspection. Israeli peace activist whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu, a former nuclear scientist, confirmed this to the British press in 1986.2
Vanunu was lured to Italy by Mossad, drugged, kidnapped and flown to the Zionist state where he was tried in secret. He has spent 18 years in jail, 11 of them in solitary confinement (despite there not being any such sentence in the ‘Israeli’ penal code) and is not permitted to leave the country.
Leaders of the USA have expressed the fear that Iran may one day develop nuclear weapons and attack Israel with them. This worry is being expressed bythe only state that has used nuclear weapons to attack another state – and did it not once, but twice!
In August 1944 US bombers exploded atomic bombs over two cities of Japan, with which the US was at war. One study estimates the number of dead, mostly civilians at 199,0003 but many continued to die from radiation poisoning in following years.
ALTHOUGH IRAN HAS THE RIGHT TO DEVELOP NUCLEAR WEAPONS – THEY WEREN’T DOING SO
Not only was there no evidence that Iran was developing nuclear weapons, and that they repeated many times that they were not and a number of observers and investigators had confirmed their statements – but the Supreme Leader of Iran had issued a fatwa4 against such development!
Trump in his many statements seemed to confuse the terms enrichment with nuclear weapon, using them alternately. Now we can see that it was never about nuclear weapons: it was the enrichment that the western allies wished to stop, in order to cripple Iran’s nuclear energy development.
What we are seeing in this conflict is international bullying in which threats, economic sanctions, assassinations, bombing and war (not to mention genocide) are fine with the western powers as long as they (or their proxies) are committing them.
This is the alliance that the Irish gombeen ruling class wants us to join, either through an imperialist EU ‘defence’ (sic) force or through NATO. And the supreme irony is that they will use the very wars they start as ‘evidence’ of the need for us to join them!
As I write, Iran is hitting back, completely justifiably. A number of waves of missiles so far, striking Zionist regime buildings and military establishments. Of course, it is not a sneak attack and most of leaders and ‘Tel Aviv’ residents are in bomb shelters.
The Zionists cannot be paid back in their own preferred coin of leadership assassination. At the moment, it’s not certain where war criminal and child-murderer Netanyahu is but he did visit one of the sites hit by Iran from where he poured out further threats.
So far, Iran has not attacked US bases in West Asia although the US is clearly complicit in the attack on Iran, for which no further evidence is required than that the missiles came through Iraq’s totally USA-controlled air space. And Trump has been boasting about US involvement too.
Recent news is that the Genocidal State has asked for help from its allies in its defence against just retribution and that the UK responded positively. The western imperialist bloc is about to reveal its collusion with the genocidal state even more openly than recently.
What will happen next? How will the rest of the world act over the coming months? It is hard to predict but we can definitely say that the world is in a different place from now on.
WHERE DO WE STAND?
So far the population of most of Ireland has managed not to be recruited into the western imperialist bloc but the government of the Irish state continues to be complicit and the six-county colony is under UK occupation — and therefore officially part of US/ NATO.
Simon Harris, Tánaiste, Irish Government Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and for Defence was reported today saying that “Iran has consistently been a danger to the world.”5
Er … Iran? Not the aggressor (and genocider) Israel, which attacked Iran first, also attacking Syria and Lebanon and in the past Jordan, Libya and Egypt?
Not the USA (201 military actions in 153 countries after WW2)? Not the UK or France, colonial masters and currently major imperialist states?
I suspect that some socialists will find it difficult to stand in solidarity with the people of Iran; they found it impossible to do so with the people in the secular regimes of Libya and Syria – and Iran is a theocracy with many social regulations to which they would be strongly opposed.
On the other hand, Iran is being attacked by imperialist-backed Zionism because of its insistence on sovereignty and support for anti-imperialist struggles in West Asia. Apart from the Ansarallah regime of Yemen, Iran is the only state to stand up to Zionism in the region.
For genuine anti-imperialists and anti-Zionists then, for all democratic people, our stance and demand is clear: HANDS OFF IRAN!
End.
Footnotes
1Even this ‘background explanatory’ piece, which starts off recounting a decades-long list of ‘Israeli’ sabotage and assassination operations against Iran, later turns to defend ‘Israel’ by referring to the Hamas-led 7th October breakout and tenuously connecting Iran to that operation through their solidarity with Hamas. For context of that solidarity the journal would need to go back to all the attacks on the Palestinians by ‘Israel’ but of course it does not do. https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/timeline-of-tensions-and-hostilities-between-israel-and-iran-1773045.html
Like many others through much of the genocidal attack on Gaza since October last 2022, I’ve been attending pickets, demonstrations and vigils organised by others. I’ve also written some reports on those events and analyses of the solidarity movement.
But in addition, I’ve been drawing cartoon comments in a sketch book, most unpublished and I thought I would publish a selection here.
One of the poorest states in the world, Ansarallah is the only one to uphold its duty to prevent genocide, which it does by putting heavy pressure on the Zionist state’s economy through maritime blockade. For this, the UK and USA rain missiles and bombs down upon it. But it does not yield.This one is at least as much placard as it is cartoon but I never got around to making the placard. Ansarallah escalates to attack the ‘Israeli’ state directly, then again in response to Zionist airforce bombing of Yemen.The USA Navy sends two aircraft carriers to assist the genocidal state by attacking Yemen. Ansarallah attacks the US Navy, forcing the retreat first of one aircraft carrier followed by capitulation of the US which offers Ansarallah to end attacks on Yemen if they end attacks on US Navy. The deal makes no provision for defence of the Zionist state and is accepted by Ansarallah.Facing some of the most heavily armed forces in the world but somehow, it’s always the national liberation forces that must disarm. For the sake of peace, of course.The physical war against the Palestinians by the Zionist State was armed by a number of western imperialist states but also ideologically by the whole western media. In the face of real and ongoing genocide the WMM reported propaganda, repeated lies and framed its reports in the Zionists’ terms of reference – while courageous journalists reporting from the actual killing grounds were picked off by the IOF.The western imperialists promote the two-states solution (sic) and a Palestine colony of Israel as a ‘Palestinian State’. This would be run by Zionist proxies such as the Palestinian Authority with its Fatah boss, Mahmoud Abbas, who recently publicly insulted the national resistance fighters of Hamas, calling them ‘sons of dogs’.
NB: Edited by Rebel Breeze for formatting purposes
(Reading time: 6 mins.)
Kneecap, the Belfast Irish language rap group, have found themselves at the centre of what is an artificially contrived furore dreamt up by people with little sense of real moral outrage.
The basics of the story are well known. They finished off their act at the Coachella event projecting pro-Palestinian statements. Given the band’s history and well-known politics, it could hardly have come as a surprise. Perhaps it was more that the fans welcomed it that upset some.
They were denounced by the non-entity known as Sharon Osbourne, a reality star famous for being the wife of Black Sabbath lead singer Ozzy Osbourne and also the mother of another reality star, her daughter Kelly Osbourne.
Kelly to her credit did carve out a brief musical career on the back of her reality tv exposure.
Sharon as part of the wider Zionist attempt to silence all those who criticise the genocide called for their visas to be cancelled, which in effect happened following the decision by their promoter and sponsor to drop them.
She also called for them to be more like Bono. Kneecap responded with a humorously devastating comeback that they would rather be Rangers fans than emulate Bono.
Bono still has some credibility in certain parts, mainly where they haven’t a clue about the man’s actual politics and obviously amongst the clueless, witless, gutless glitterati like Sharon Osbourne. But what would it mean to be like Bono?
Is he actually some sort of reasonable counterweight to Kneecap?
Well, first of all, in relation to Palestine, Bono is a Zionist, so even before the genocide began, he, unlike them, was already on the wrong side of history. Not for the first time, mind you. Bono has a habit of cropping up where he is not wanted like an ugly cold sore (my apologies to the virus).
He has, as Harry Browne, the author of The Frontman: Bono in the name of power, pointed out dedicated a lifetime to the service of imperialism and was rewarded with a Presidential Medal of Freedom from Genocide Joe.[1]
I am sure it will go well on his mantle piece alongside his KBE (Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire), for which he was fulsome in his praise of Her Majesty’s Ambassador, as he put it, and grinned like a cheshire cat during the ceremony.[2]
The claims made by Blair and others about Bono’s achievements were exaggerated, of course. But he is, if nothing, an equal opportunities imperialist and will get around to doing his bit for the others.
The idea that Kneecap would prostrate themselves before the British king is laughable and they wouldn’t be the first artists to reject one, were the Brits ever to mistakenly consider them for it.
The late black poet Benjamin Zephaniah was offered the lesser award of OBE (Order of the British Empire) by the same Tony Blair. He turned it down stating:
I get angry when I hear that word “empire”; it reminds me of slavery, it reminds of thousands of years of brutality, it reminds me of how my foremothers were raped and my forefathers brutalised…
Benjamin Zephaniah OBE – no way Mr Blair, no way Mrs Queen. I am profoundly anti-empire…
If they want to give me one of these empire things, why can’t they give me one for my work in animal rights? Why can’t they give me one for my struggle against racism? What about giving me one for all the letters I write to innocent people in prisons who have been framed? I may just consider accepting some kind of award for my services on behalf of the millions of people who have stood up against the war in Iraq. It’s such hard work – much harder than writing poems.[3]
He also referred to his brother’s death in police custody and to Lizzie II as Mrs Queen, not Her Majesty. A display of dignity.
He pointed out that those who accept such awards, the Queen’s Shilling, though he didn’t use that archaic military expression for those who enlist in the British armed forces to put down uppity types in the colonies, always sell out.
However, calling Bono a sell-out, presumes he was ever anything other than a fan of empire. He tied his mast to the pro-British politics of the Irish chattering classes in the 1980s.
His song Sunday Bloody Sunday was always introduced with the line This is not a rebel song, lest someone think Bono actually had something interesting to say.
The song is quite vacuous though clear in saying he “won’t join the battle cry,” i.e. denounce those who had massacred 14 people on the streets of Derry. The British army is not mentioned once in the song.
You wouldn’t know who had done what, but you know not to point the finger “Cause tonight we can be as one”. John Lennon on the other hand, shortly after the massacre did not hold back.
Is there any one among you Dare to blame it on the kids? Not a soldier boy was bleeding When they nailed the coffin lids![4]
Bono couldn’t bring himself to condemn the British army for a televised massacre, so it comes as no surprise that he has little to say about a live-streamed genocide.
He hobknobbed with neoliberals such as Jeffrey Sachs, various presidents of the World Bank, promoted pharmaceutical companies in Africa and of course was on the side of Bush in the Iraq War, at least in practice and helped whitewash the reputations of many of those involved.
He hedged his bets a bit on Iraq, not wanting to seem too hawkish, saying the war was justified but the US should get UN backing for it. He then went on to endorse Clinton and Blair time and again. Jim Kerr from the Scottish band Simple Minds put it succinctly at the time.
How can Bono, having graced concert stages for over two decades, draped in the white flag of peace and screaming ‘No More War’ [sic] at the top of his lungs contemplate praising and back slapping Tony Blair? … I can’t believe that anyone could fail to identify that no matter what gesture Blair may make towards African debt relief, his slippery hands are currently dripping in the fresh warm blood of Iraqi men, women and children.[5]
Bono of course, could and did, and wined and dined with such hawks as Senator McCain. There were no depths to which he would not plummet, which brings us to Palestine.
Shortly after October 7th he endorsed the Zionist genocide by changing the lyrics of his song about Martin Luther King, Pride (In the name of love)[6]to “Early morning, Oct 7, the sun is rising in the desert sky… Stars of David, they took your life but they could not take your pride.”[7]
As part of the introduction to the reworked song he state “our prayers have always been for peace and for non-violence… But our hearts and our anger, you know where that’s pointed.” Not at the Zionist occupiers was the answer. Roger Waters lambasted him for it.[8]
Not only that, he was criticised by Irish singer Mary Coughlan for his links to Israeli companies.[9] He did not fly out to Gaza as he had done in Ukraine, nor did he have much to say.
When he eventually did mention Gaza, he was always careful to lay the blame on Hamas for starting it all, ignoring history since the Nakba in 1948.
A good example of that is his piece in The Atlantic after receiving his Medal of Freedom from Genocide Joe.[10] An exercise in saying nothing, whilst attempting to sound profound, something Ireland’s most famous poisonous dwarf never pulls off.
Kneecap on the other hand have been clear from the word go about their support for the Palestinian cause. It didn’t take a genocide for them to take note. They have consistently been on the side of the oppressed, in this case the Palestinians, against the oppressor the Zionists.
So, Sharon Osbourne should probably stick to what she knows best, which is precious little.
As for Bono, as Harry Browne points out, perhaps nothing sums him up quite so succinctly as a piece of graffiti in Dublin that appeared following the scandal when they moved one of their companies to the Netherlands for tax purposes, “Bono is a poxbottle”.
We need more like Kneecap who stand with the oppressed, and a lot less of Bono and the likes who can’t condemn the powerful ever.
At best you can expect some “We are all guilty type” of fudge, which was the preferred slogan of the Irish trade union bureaucracy when the British or their proxies in the UVF or UDA ever did anything, coming as no surprise that they have also done next to nothing on Palestine other than issue the occasional banal statements.
I fully expect them to turn up with Bono somewhere to chastise Kneecap.
An Irish Republican Easter Rising commemoration conducted on Sunday 20th April followed tradition in some aspects but departed in others. The event in Glasnevin Cemetery was organised by the Anti-Imperialist Action group.
As the 1916 Rising commenced on Easter Monday it is traditionally commemorated on various days around the Easter weekend. The actual date however was 24th April which a now-deceased socialist Republican activist publicly celebrated every year as Republic Day in front of the GPO.1
Taken from near rear of the marching columns approaching Cross Guns Bridge. (Photo: R.Breeze)
Among the commemorations organised by Irish Republicans around the past weekend was that by the AIA group on Sunday, rallying by the Phibsboro shopping parade for 1pm, before marching out to Glasnevin cemetry along the Phibsboro Road in two parallel separate lines.
This gathering in the past has been marred by the Special Branch, the political plainclothes police, harassing and attempting to intimidate those present, demanding their names and addresses under anti-terrorist (sic) special legislation. This time they were there but did not approach.2
Just after passing Crossguns Bridge over the Royal Canal, a flare was lit and the march stopped in the street.3
After a short pause the march resumed, led by the colour party,4 six men and women, each carrying a different flag with the Tricolour and Starry Plough in the lead, all dressed in black trousers, white shirts, black berets, sunglasses and lower face masked.
The images of each of the Seven Signatories of the 1916 Proclamation, all shot by British firing squads were on large placards were carried among the marchers: Tom Clarke, James Connolly, Patrick Pearse, Seán Mac Diarmada, Joseph Plunkett, Thomas McDonagh, Eamonn Ceannt.
(Photo: R.Breeze)
A variety of flags were also flown among the marchers, including the green and gold Starry Plough,5 Palestinian flag, Basque Ikurrina and red flags (with gold hammer and sickle emblem on at least one).6 The AIA banner carried at the front bore a quotation from Bobby Sands in Irish.
The march soon passed the main gates of Glasnevin Cemetery to their right but continued before turning leftward to then cross over the pedestrian railway bridge to the newer part of Glasnevin Cemetery and up to the monument to the Six armed struggles referred to in the Proclamation.7
Formed in two lines the attendance was welcomed in Irish and English by the event’s MC, calling also for the reading of the Proclamation of Independence, which a man stepped forward to do. The MC recommended a careful reading of the still-relevant document to attendees from abroad.
Section on the left of the attendance at the commemoration rally with another section to the right out of shot. (Photo: R.Breeze)
Following the reading, the MC commented on the important role of culture in the 1916 Rising8and called on an activist who he said has done much to promote traditional and folk Irish song, who proceed to sing Patrick Galvin’s Where Oh Where Is Our James Connolly? “with some changes”.
Next the call was given for those who wished to lay floral tributes while the colour party lowered their flags in homage to the fallen to commands in Irish, then slowly raised them again before responding to the command in Irish to stand ‘at ease’.
(Photo: R.Breeze)
Another activist was called to read the 1915 statement on the Irish Citizen Army by James Connolly in which the revolutionary leader outlined the police violence during the 1913 Lockout that created the need for the ICA and how it had gone beyond defence in assertiveness.
The statement declared its class allegiance and origins “Hitherto the workers of Ireland have fought as parts of the armies led by their masters, never as members of an army officered, trained, and inspired by men of their own class.”
Reading Connolly’s “To the Irish Citizen Army” (Photo: R.Breeze)
The PA amplification failed on the reader but she carried on in a strong voice reading Connolly’s words that the ICA sought alliance with all progressive forces but remained independent, not to be bound by the limits others set themselves and going further on their own if necessary.9
Another singer was called to perform Erin Go Bragh10 specifically about the 1916 Rising (by Dominic Behan, originally called A Row in the Town).
Singing Erin Go Bragh at the Monument (Photo: R.Breeze)
It is traditional for organisations to deliver a keynote message or statement of aims at 1916 commemorations and a statement was read on behalf of the Irish Socialist Republican Movement (of which the AIA is a part) restating the objectives of national independence and socialism.
In that context the struggles against the Irish ruling class putting the State into imperialist alliance and against the British occupation of the nation, also a NATO member, were greatly important and the Gardaí had broken a comrade’s foot in that struggle.
(Photo: R.Breeze)
Referring to the international context of the 1916 Rising and the international connections of the revolutionary movement in 1916, the MC read out a fraternal message to AIA from the People’s Front for the Liberation of Palestine,11 declaring that the struggles of both peoples are one.
The event concluded at around 2.45pm with a singer performing Amhrán na bhFiann12 (first verse and chorus) followed by an announcement or reminder of a public meeting organised by the AIA titled Rebuilding the Republic to take place at 4pm at a venue not very far distant.
End. Footnotes
1Easter is a religious festival and its date varies from year to year according to computations based on the lunar and solar calendars and cannot fall on the same date annually in the Gregorian calendar (or the Julian one). After the insurrectionary forces had taken possession of the building, Patrick Pearse with James Connolly by his side read the Proclamation outside the General Post Office (GPO) building on the first day of the Rising (after its rescheduling from the previous day, Sunday): 24 April 1916. Tom Stokes tried for years to have the date adopted as Republic Day and annually organised an event outside the GPO on that date. After his death others carried on commemorating the date but rather than outside the GPO, at Arbour Hill. The Republican movement continues to hold its 1916 commemoration events over the Easter weekend.
2Possibly because the dust has not yet settled on the Gardaí’s recent violent arrests on 23 peaceful activists in three different events over four days (See Rebel Breeze’s IrishState Ramps Up Repression) recently.
3This spot has a 1916 history: A group of Irish Volunteers walked from Maynooth on Easter Monday along the banks of the Royal Canal, meeting two Irish Volunteers guarding the bridge and that night slept in Glasnevin Cemetery. The following morning they continued their journey to the city centre. Later, as the Rising was being suppressed, the British soldiers placed a barrier on the Bridge and prevented most people from passing through. A local man who had been deaf from birth failed to heed the soldiers’ challenge and they shot him dead.
4The ‘colour party’ carries the ‘colours’, i.e the flags and usually marches at the front. The number and type of flags varies but Irish Republican colour parties always carry the Tricolour among them, usually followed by the Starry Plough of which for many years the white stars on a blue background version was the most common. Often a flag of each of the four provinces would also carried and the Gal Gréine (or Sunburst) of the Fianna and of the Fenians would be carried too. The Harp on a Green background was another flag that was often carried by Colour Parties.
5The original design of the flag of the first workers’ army in the world, the Irish Citizen Army, created in 1914. It is a plough following the form of the Ursa Mayor constellation with a sword replacing the ploughshare.
6This is usually considered a symbol inherited from the Bolsheviks, the sickle representing the agricultural workers and the hammer, the industrial workers, their conjunction symbolising unity of peasants and industrial proletariat.
71798 and 1803 (United Irishmen), 1848 (Young Irelanders), 1867 (Fenians), 1882 (Invincibles group within the Fenians), 1916 (IRB, Irish Volunteers, Irish Citizen Army, Cumann na mBan, Fianna Éireann)
8Irish language revival, national theatre groups, national sports, poetry, music and song all contributed to an atmosphere conducive to resistance and uprising.
9However it may be for others, for us of the Citizen Army there is but one ideal – an Ireland ruled, and owned, by Irish men and women, sovereign and independent from the centre to the sea, and flying its own flag outward over all the oceans. We cannot be swerved from our course by honeyed words, lulled into carelessness by freedom to parade and strut in uniforms, nor betrayed by high-sounding phrases.
The Irish Citizen Army will only co-operate in a forward movement. The moment that forward movement ceases it reserves to itself the right to step out of the alignment, and advance by itself if needs be, in an effort to plant the banner of freedom one reach further towards its goal. https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1915/10/forca.htm
10The slogan Éirinn (or Éire) go brách (“Ireland for ever”) was rendered in English spelling as Erin go bragh.
11 A socialist and secular resistance Palestinian resistance organisation; its armed wing is Brigades of the Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa which has been part of the armed resistance throughout the period, often in coordination with other groups.
12In a reversal of the usual sequence, the lyrics of this song by Peadar Kearney and Patrick Heeney were first composed in English but later translated to Irish, that being the most popular version of the chorus today.
A packed picket yesterday evening protested plans of the Irish Government to sidestep the “Triple Lock” in the Irish State’s Constitutionin order to proceed to committing the State’s armed forces to a western imperialist military alliance.
Contrary to the belief of many, the Irish State is not constitutionally bound to neutrality but there is a constitutional defence against a Government making an executive decision to send its armed forces into a foreign conflict and it is this that is known as the “Triple Lock”.1
As things stand at present, in order to send more than 12 Irish armed forces on a military mission abroad (e.g. as peacekeepers), the conflict response would need to be approved
not only by the Irish Government but
also by the Oireachtas (the Irish Parliament)
and by the United Nations.
However legislation of the Cabinet is being drafted to change the number from 12 to 50 which many see as the thin edge of a wedge to gradually widen the gap through which the Armed Forces can be employed in conflicts abroad alongside imperialist forces of NATO or the EU.
I joined the protest yesterday evening for a little over an hour. Most of the participants were packed behind banners on the southern side of the main gates of Leinster House so that photos don’t perhaps give a true impression of the numbers.
The main and very long banner bore the slogan We serve neither King nor Kaiser, recalling the words on a banner displayed on the Irish Transport and General Workers’ HQ, Liberty Hall, in 19142. More problematic were the United Nation flags waved by a few, some also wearing blue berets.3
In addition there were a number of Palestinian flags and, indeed, the politicisation and drive to activity of the Palestine solidarity movement does seem to be having a spill over into other issues in Ireland. Surprising perhaps was the number of flags of the Social Democrats party.
Another banner called for “Peace keepers, not military groups”. “Peace-keeping” in UN deployment can often mean stabilising the imperialist status quo in regions and the inaction of the UN leadership in response to the genocide in Palestine by some of its members has been shocking.
On the northern side of the gates there were two protesters in hospital scrubs, displaying a Palestine national flag and a large placard bearing the image of Dr. Abu Safiya, Director of Kamala Adwan Hospital in Gaza who was taken from there on 27 and January and disappeared for a time.
Dr. Abu Safiya was later traced to the notorious Sde Teiman Detention Centre in Israeli custody, then Ofer Prison where his lawyer finally gained access to him and reported recently that the Doctor has a number of broken ribs and was being refused treatment for his heart condition.4
On 25th March Dr. Abu Safiya’s sentence of six months administrative detention, effectively internment without trial, was confirmed by an Israeli Court on the basis of alleged documentation that, as is the rule in such cases, neither Dr. Abu Safiy nor his lawyer were permitted to see.5
On 25th October Dr. Abu Safiya’s 15-year-old son Ibrahim was killed by an Israeli drone strike on the hospital’s entrance.
One can only imagine the furore to which such a case would give rise if the detaining authority were one of which the Western Powers did not approve: A Doctor? Head of a Hospital arrested? Broke his ribs? Sent him to jail without a trial or allowed to see the evidence?Murdered his son?!
Vigil in hospital scrubs presumably for Dr. Abu Safiya’s safety and release. Also numbers of Gardaí in response to the main demonstration. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
No doubt many who would have joined the health workers in solidarity protest were in the other group protesting an attempt to have the Irish state join imperialist war ventures.
JOINING NATO
The crowd were kept lively with songs, speeches and a series of caller-and-response chants of which I can only recall the following:
Caller: From Letterkenny to Killarney — Crowd: We don’t want your EU army! Caller: From Dublin, Cork or Donegal — Crowd: No to NATO, No to War!
Caller: You can’t fool us with your lies — Crowd: We won’t send our kids to die!
TD6 Paul Murphy of the People Before Profit – Solidarity party addressed the crowd at one point. Among the songs performed by Jimi Cullen were You Fascists Bound to Lose and his own We Are All Palestinians and I sang Pearse’s verses of Gráinne Mhaol, the crowd joining the chorus.
Jimi Cullen performing his We Are All Palestinians; in the background Fae Clarke who also sang. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
The Government, some other politicians and the media have for some time been building up a propaganda picture depicting Ireland as vulnerable to invasion by the Russian Federation and this has intensified with the USA’s Trump Administration’s comments about its contribution to NATO.
Even the blowing up of the Russian Nord Stream gas pipeline to Germany7 – clearly an action that most benefited the USA, which also had the most opportunity and means to achieve — was used by the media to whip up fears of Russian (!) attacks on subsea cables to and from Ireland.
The war in the Ukraine was also used not only to drum up support for the US/NATO proxy Kyiv regime but to whip up fear of the Russian Federation and to suggest that rather than defending itself against US/NATO encirclement, the aim was to gradually invade all of western Europe.
The presence of a Russian Trawler in the Irish sea was also used in this regard with the assumption that it was spying on Ireland. If indeed spying, why could it not have been on the UK? Anyway, we are being intensely spied upon daily by at least the UK and USA as it is.
The irony of seeking to join the Irish State with NATO, of which the UK is a prominent member, seems to have escaped the intelligence of the Irish elite: a state which has been at war with the Irish people for 800 years and is currently in armed occupation of one-sixth of its territory.
The only Starry Plough flag I observed, here held by myself. ((Photo taken by a participant)
Indeed it may occasionally occur to some that Ireland could easily be thought of as Ironyland as on-line Irish-based media The Ditch not long ago revealed that the Irish Government secretly agreed to have the UK’s Royal Air Force patrol Irish skies for the State’s protection.
The Government refused to confirm or deny this even to an FOI request by a Senator Craughwell, who sought and was granted leave on 18 March to challenge that refusal in the High Court, despite an Irish Government defence that boiled down to: We don’t have to tell if we don’t want to.
More will come to light on this as time goes on and perhaps also about another Ditch revelation, i.e about arms for the genocidal Zionist state being flown through Irish airspace. And of course there is the open secret scandal of US military flights being refuelled at Shannon International Airport.
Another view of a section of the protest showing how closely they were packed. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
EU INSTEAD OF NATO?
The softer option to NATO might seem to join some European joint military organisation but the EU is dominated by imperialist states such as Germany — which is second supplier in quantity of arms to ‘Israeli’ Zionism’s genocide in Palestine — and France has colonies in parts of the world.
In addition, France, Spain, Italy and the UK contain other conquered nations which have at various times agitated for greater or total independence and it is standard practice since Imperial Roman times to send troops from different areas to quell unrest in regions.
Irish troops in an EU joint force could be sent to put down uprisings in Catalonia, the Basque Country or Sardinia, while Spanish, French or Italian troops might be deployed on our streets in protests upon which Irish soldiers might be reluctant to fire.
Or all could be happily deployed together against the oppressed people of the Middle East, Africa or Asia, in all of which most EU states, if not all, have economic, political and strategic stakes.
This struggle against the incorporation of the Irish State into western imperialist armed forces has been going on for years, alternating between greater and lesser periods of intensity but it may that for reasons in the international arena it is once again entering an intense phase.
At last week’s Wednesday evening’s protest there were less than 20 participating throughout; last night there were a couple of hundred present, some at quite short notice. The organisers announced tthat they intend these protests to take place daily for the near future.
End.
View northward close along the protest. (Photo: D.Breatnach)
While Article 29.4.9° does not explicitly mention a referendum, the constitutional framework as a whole ensures that the government cannot join a common defence system without the consent of the Irish people, as expressed through a referendum.
2The Irish Citizen Army was photographed in 1914 drawn up in front of Liberty Hall beneath the banner reading: We serve neither King nor Kaiser but Ireland.
3The United Nations is a profoundly undemocratic and imperialist-dominated institution. Its only enforceable decisions are those made by five Permanent Members of the Security Council: the UK, France, United States, Russian Federation and China, each of which can nullify a decision by use of its veto. Its failure to act to prevent the genocide in Palestine, in which two of its members, the UK and USA are directly assisting, has been a disappointment to many.
4On 11 February 2025, Abu Safiya was allowed to meet his lawyer in Ofer Prison, located in the occupied West Bank. During their meeting, he reported being subjected to various forms of torture and abuse, including being forcibly stripped, tightly shackled, and forced to sit on sharp gravel for hours. He also endured violent physical assaults, such as beatings with batons and electric shock sticks. Abu Safiya described being held in solitary confinement for 25 days, during which he was subjected to nearly constant interrogation for 10 days. Despite multiple requests for medical care, Israeli authorities denied him treatment for his heart condition.[12][13]
Both Sinn Féin party leaders, Michelle O’Neill (First Minister of the British colony) and Mary-Lou Mac Donald, TD and party President, have publicly declared that they will not attend the White House on St. Patrick’s Day this year.
What made Michelle O’Neill decide not to to go to the White House shamrock fest, she tells us, were President Trump’s words about turning Gaza into a desirable beach-front property development once the Palestinians had been removed. This, she told us, was a question of principle.
“The decision not to travel to the White House has not been taken lightly, but it is taken conscious of the responsibility each of us as individuals have to call out injustice. We are all heartbroken as we witness the suffering of the Palestinian people and the recent comments of the US President around the mass expulsion of the Palestinian people from Gaza, something I cannot ignore.1
“… At moments like this, whenever our grandchildren ask us what do we do, whenever the Palestinian people were suffering in the way in which they are, I want to be able to say that I stood on the side of humanity so this decision for me is very much the position of principle and I think it’s the right thing to do.”2
In January, Trump made those statements about the intention of ethnically cleansing Gaza of its population and the relocation of Gazans to Jordan and Egypt (the regimes of both have clearly stated their opposition to such plans) for the creation of “a Middle Eastern Riviera”.3
Prior to that, Joe Biden’s US Presidency was not only backing Israel’s accelerated genocide for 15 months financially and politically but supplying the IOF with the very weapons to carry out that genocide. Without SF feeling the need to break with him. But a few words from Trump …!
According to Brown University’s “Costs of War” project, the U.S. has spent at least 17.9 billion dollars in military assistance to Israel since October 7 2023, which is more than U.S. military assistance to Israel in any year since the U.S. began to assist Israel militarily. 4
And it vetoed a ceasefire resolution three times at the UN Security Council, against the will of a majority of member states. 5
In mid-March 2023 when O’Neill and MacDonald attended the White House shamrock fest, in spite of many calls not to go, including that of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Biden had been feeding the IOF’s accelerated genocide for over five months.
O’Neill’s reason for her intention not to attend this year (if indeed she were invited)6 clearly had nothing to do with opposition to genocide, solidarity with the Palestinian people, common humanity nor anything of the sort and we must look elsewhere to explore her possible motivation.
Mary-Lou Mac Donald also indicated she wouldn’t be going to browse the blood-soaked shamrock, including an acknowledgement of the degree of US imperialist penetration of the Irish state’s economy:
“I have followed with growing concern what is happening on the ground in Gaza and the West Bank and like many other Irish people have listened in horror to calls from the President of the United States for the mass expulsion of the Palestinian people from their homes and the permanent seizure of Palestinian land. Such an approach is a fundamental breach of international law, is deeply destabilising in the Middle East and a dangerous departure from the UN position of peace and security for Palestine and Israel and the right of Palestinians to self determination.
“… The US is a valued friend to Ireland. Their work in helping to achieve the Good Friday Agreement stands as a clear example of successful U.S. foreign policy. They are an important partner for peace and play a strong role in Ireland’s economy.7
For genuine anti-imperialists, Irish Republicans and socialists, the correct attitude is clear. Indeed it should be so for any democratic people or even for people just opposed to genocide.
‘Israel’ is only able to commit genocide through the assistance of US Imperialism and therefore we should endeavour to isolate any of its governmental expressions and most of all any that lay claim to our special support, on one of our national days and with one of our national symbols.
The kind of action in the USA real Palestine supporters should be backing instead of backing the ruling class support for the Zionist genocide: Palestine Action activists taking action against Elbit arms manufacturer in Cambridge, Massachusetts USA. (Photo sourced: Internet)
“CAN’T WIN”?
There may well be a ‘damned if we do, damned if we don’t’ response from the SF faithful to the type of criticism in this article. They won’t actually analyse the reasons upon which the criticisms are based – no, of course not.
This party likes to claim credit for events that seem favourable, dodge criticism over errors or just nasty actions while at the same time whingeing that they can never win, that they will be criticised whatever they do, an eternal victim attitude from a party aspiring to government rule.
So, could SF have done anything in this regard of which their critics would have approved? Yes, they could. They could have admitted their error of last year, apologised for it and called for a St. Patrick’s Day White House boycott at least until the USA stops supporting genocide.
No need to worry about my sanity, they won’t, of course nor did I imagine for one minute that they would.
IMPERIALISM AND SF SUPPORT
The USA is a world imperialist power and still the one dominating the world, though it is under serious challenge and its days appear numbered. The ruling class of the USA, a European settler state, practised genocide and exploitation on the indigenous people and on imported slaves.
It also ruthlessly exploited the immigrant working class and its descendants, along with the emancipated slaves. It fought attempts to organise labour and legal trade unions with billy clubs, pistols, machine guns, arson, laws and regulations, jail and the hangman’s noose.
The fact that a section of the immigrant Irish in the US support Sinn Féin is in part due to the socially conservative background of both groups of people and also to SF’s never seriously challenging the imperialist nature of the USA.
And how does this obeisance supposedly benefit Ireland? Will the US support an Irish revolution against British colonial occupation? It refused to do so even at the time of its greatest hostility with the British, when the latter actively supported the Confederate states in the Civil War.8
No, for the major imperialists of the US, the lesser imperialists of the UK are occasional competition but much more fundamentally, allies and it is not going to undermine its fundamental external power base.
Mary-Lou Mac Donald stated very clearly that Mícheál Martin should attend the shamrock fest. What was that about? Possibly she was indicating to Ireland’s Tánaiste (Prime Minister), that she would not be taking political advantage of his attendance at the White House to denounce him.
But she was also clearly indicating that the Sinn Féin leadership are ‘responsible’ potential representatives of an imperialist-dependent Gombeen ruling class, who understand how there are times to put aside any principle in order to attend at the Court of King US Imperialism.9
Through her statement Mary-Lou MacDonald represented her party as a safe pair of hands to run the State for the Gombeen class in the future.
Should the current representatives of the Irish neo-colonial ruling class be invited, they will of course attend, bearing the shamrock tribute, knowing that they are safe at least from the criticism of SF, the largest opposition party in Leinster House (the parliament of the Irish State).
US and Zionist military flights can continue to stop over at Shannon and otherwise fly through Irish airspace. On the international stage, the Irish State will continue to align itself with the western imperialist bloc and continue to open its markets, resources and networks to imperialist plunder.
If O’Neill does indeed say what she claimed she would to her grandchildren about her reasons for not going, she will be lying to them. But then, at least the grandchildren will come to know they were not alone – the party’s supporters and the whole country were being lied to also.
If there was anything other than rank opportunism behind the statements of the SF (Stoop Further) party leaders, such as solidarity, it certainly wasn’t with the Palestinians; solidarity with EU imperialist elites and with the genocidal Democratic Party elite, perhaps.
6There is every likelihood that she would not have been; SF is in government only in a colony of the UK and furthermore in the USA is strongly connected to Trump’s political rivals, the Democratic Party – and he is not known for kindness towards his political enemies.
8The USA under General Ulysses Grant, who was of part Irish descent, arrested Fenians and in 1866 prevented the support forces from crossing the St. Lawrence River to support the advance invasion forces which had emerged victorious from two engagements against British forces in Canada.
9And O’Neill displayed her responsible credentials in managing the colonial occupation also, stating that she would not criticise the colony’s Second Minister, Unionist Emma Little-Pengelly, if she were to attend.
Recently Donald Trump scandalised much of the world with his suggestion that Gaza could be turned into an attractive location after its inhabitants, the Palestinians, were removed.
Was this a serious proposal? If so, could the US and Israel manage it? What are the chances?
Firstly, a quick look at the territory envisaged and its recent history.
GAZA
A strip of land 365 km2 (141 sq mi)1 on the eastern coast of the Middle Eastern land of Palestine, bordered by the State of ‘Israel’ and the State of Egypt, with an estimated Palestinian population of 2.1 million in 2024 (since hugely depleted by genocide and removal).
Gaza had been settled mainly by Palestinian refugees expelled from Zionist-occupied Palestine in 1948 and by those fleeing Israeli Occupation Force persecution and harassment in the West Bank in subsequent years added to of course by their descendants born and growing up there.
The strip was occupied after the 1967 War by around 5,000 Zionist settlers – illegally even by international law — who took up around 40% of the land there but after the Second Intifada,2 left in 2005, as did the Israeli Occupation Army.
In the 2006 elections in Gaza and the West Bank, Hamas won, ousting the Fatah party which had won the previous elections. However, Fatah refused to accept the results and had to be physically removed in Gaza in 2007, though Hamas stepped back from doing the same in the West Bank.
The Western powers, those bastions of the democratic way of doing things, refused to acknowledge the Palestinian popular will and blocked Hamas from all aid, which went instead to the undemocratic Palestinian Authority, which the Fatah party control.
‘Israel’ blockaded Gaza from then onwards, keeping the population at a marginal level of existence and regularly attacked it, what they called “mowing the lawn” in 2008/9, 2012, 2014, 2018/19, 2021 until the Palestinian breakout and counter-attack of October 2023.3
In October 2023 Hamas and Islamic Jihad broke out of their concentration camp, overran the ‘Israeli’ armed forces overseeing them and seized captives to exchange for the many Palestinian captives in ‘Israeli’ jails. Other groups and individuals also poured through the gaps in the wall.
The IOF besieged Gaza, cutting off its supplies of food, clean water and other supplies. It dropped 85,000 tonnes of explosives4 on that highly-concentrated population, killing an estimated 46,000 (with another 10,000 buried in rubble)5 and injuring at least 110,265 (one in every 20).6
The IOF destroyed nearly all wells and rooftop water tanks, along with desalination plants,7 destroyed totally or in part 90% of residential buildings,8 at least 27 hospitals and 12 other medical centres,9 along with schools, higher education buildings, mosques and churches.
Some 1.9 million people have been displaced, 90% of the population, with many of them forced to move repeatedly.10 “Nearly 1.9 million people in Gaza are internally displaced, of which nearly 80 percent are living in makeshift shelters without adequate clothing or protection from the cold.
“UN agencies estimated that nearly half a million are in flood-prone areas. Authorities in Gaza said about 110,000 of the 135,000 tents being used as shelters in the Gaza Strip are worn out and not fit for use.”11
PROPOSERS OF ETHNIC CLEANSING
The USA – In March 2024 Jared Kushner, property developer, senior policy adviser and son-in-law of Donald Trump (then former US President and now President again) commented that Gaza after the removal of the Palestinians would make a great site for a beach-front property development.12
Donald Trump, after being re-elected, commented in somewhat similar lines and bluntly proposed the expulsion (‘voluntary relocation’) of Palestinians from Gaza. But to where? Well, to Jordan and Egypt in particular, whose ruling regimes would accept them, he assured.13
The Democratic Party wing of the US imperialist ruling class expressed horror at such crass statements of ethnic cleansing but had supported the ‘Israeli’ state in maintaining the siege, periodic bombing attacks and in demonising Hamas along with the whole Palestinian resistance.14
‘Israel’: Prime Minister Netanyahu and a number of his cabinet made statements supporting the plan.
REACTION OF ARAB & IRANIAN STATE LEADERS
The leaders of Arab states and of Iran have opposed the ethnic cleansing plan, all of them concerned at further destabilisation of the Middle East (and threat to their regimes). Most (excepting Yemen and Iran), advocating instead Gaza as part of a Palestinian state (sic) alongside the ‘Israeli’ one.15
WHAT EUROPEAN STATE LEADERS SAY
All of the leaders of European states that have commented have opposed the plan, all of them concerned at further destabilisation of the Middle East and, with regard to Palestine, advocating instead Gaza as part of a Palestinian state (sic) alongside the ‘Israeli’ one.16
All of the main political parties in the European states have also opposed the ethnic cleansing and advocate the “two state solution” (sic).
RUSSIA & CHINA also oppose Trump’s plan as do many states in AFRICA and in LATIN AMERICA. The top levels of the United Nations also oppose Trump’s idea.
WHY MOST STATES OPPOSE THE PLAN
Those objecting to the ethnic cleansing of Gaza and transporting Palestinians to other destinations may well have moral objections to that plan but their political and practical reasons for objecting are much stronger.
Lebanon already has a Palestinian refugee population of 60% and in 1975-’90 a war there saw fascist Lebanese forces combined with the IOF fight Palestinian and Druze forces with massacres of refugees as “Beirut” became a byword in urban destruction, invasion and ethnic conflict.
The Jordanian regime is heavily foreign-dependent and vulnerable to imperialist pressure but it also knows that it walks a tightrope and can’t afford to add to the economic, social and political pressures by taking in a large influx of Palestinians forced out of Gaza.
Nearly 25% of Jordan’s population is composed of Palestinian refugees and their descendants.17
The King of Jordan, an imperialist stooge trained in the UK, nervously attended the meeting with the real king, Trump, to which he was summoned, evidencing his unease with a nervous tic taking over his face. He agreed to take 2,000 injured children, not at all the same thing as Trump wanted.
Egypt, a bigger power though also US-dependent (especially its military) has its own economic, social and political reasons for rejecting a proposal to integrate a large population of forced Palestinian refugees into its society and economy and declined an invitation to meet Trump.
US ally Saudi Arabia, which has not been pressured to the degree of Egypt and Lebanon, nevertheless has reasons to reject the plan and that is the de-stabilization of the whole Middle East by a further expansion of the Zionist State and growing population of stateless refugees.
That is the other and fundamental reason why the Saudi ruling class is opposed to the expulsion of Palestinians and they have stated it in terms of the need for a ‘Palestinian state’ – within the framework of a two-state ‘solution’ (i.e. a partitioned Palestine with about 20% for Palestinians).
The Saudis have also proposed to rebuild and set up Gaza with the Palestinians remaining there but in the course of which they intend to have somebody other than Hamas – whom the people elected, let’s not forget – administer the area.
The Palestinian Authority (sic) despite its role as proxy policeman for the Zionist State and US Imperialism, would not welcome the loss of a large part of its possible fiefdom and certainly could not politically afford to agree to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
Macron, for the French imperialist ruling class, has welcomed the Saudi proposal. It is not beyond possibility that the US ruling class will approve and it may even have been part of its plan to frighten everyone and make such ‘solutions’ as that of the Saudis more generally accepted.
UAE is not vulnerable internally to anything like the degree of Egypt and Jordan and on the other hand is at times in contention with Saudi Arabia for influence in the region but also ally of the USA is nevertheless opposed the Trump ethnic cleansing process.
Qatar, home of Al-Jazeera news channel and much more in contention with Saudi Arabia and also the UAE, is also an ally of the USA but opposed to removing the Palestinians from Gaza.
The elites of the WesternEuropean states, from imperialist to lesser capitalist states wishing to coexist with imperialism, including the colonial and neo-colonial states of Ireland all oppose the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, saying it threatens the ‘two state option’.
That option would copper-fasten Israeli occupation of around 80% of Palestine and control over the remaining 20% as a client state. They would hope to isolate the Palestinian resistance under collaborator rule and help and assist in the stabilisation under imperialism of the Middle East.
A DIFFERENT BASIS FOR OPPOSITION
The ruling elites of IRAN and YEMEN18 see ‘Israel’ as an important foothold for US and other Western imperialism in the Middle East and also as an aggressive colonial force in its own right. Therefore they are fundamentally hostile to any kind of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
That too is the position of Hezbollah, a major political and military force in Lebanon.
IS THE ZIONIST ARMY CAPABLE OF ETHNICALLY CLEANSING GAZA?
The Israeli Occupation Army is unlikely to welcome being sent back into Gaza to fight the Palestinian resistance there once again. And signalling that, rather than an inadvertent slip, may have caused the admission of very high combat fatality figures by the IOF’s commander.19
Eyal Zamir, ‘Israel’s’ new Chief of Staff, referred in a recent interview to the “5,942 of bereaved families”20 since October 2023, terminology only used by the IOF to refer to the families of their soldiers killed and also noted that some families likely lost more than one member.
Those numbers, apart from being around six times those previously admitted by the IOF, are not such that can be replaced in the short term.
Furthermore, the Palestinian resistance in Gaza (and presumably Hezbollah in Lebanon) targeted officers whenever they could resulting in a high attrition rate among higher ranks engaged in combat. These take longer to replace due to their experience, training and skills.
It has long been suspected in many quarters that Israel was concealing its war casualty numbers by imposing press censorship, installing IOF officers to answer queries at hospitals and issuing untrue statistics for foreign and home consumption.
Zamir also stated that 15,000 soldiers were suffering from physical or mental injuries.21 As early as December 2023, the ‘Israeli’ publication Haartez, quoted their Health Ministry figures of a staggering 10,548 injured as opposed to the 1,593 stated by the IOF.22
“In October 2024, Haaretz also reported that around 1,000 wounded soldiers were admitted to rehabilitation centres each month, along with new injury claims associated with past incidents.
“The report stated that the rehabilitation division estimates that by 2030, around 100,000 Israeli soldiers will be classed as disabled, and almost half also experience some form of psychological challenge.”23
Statistics show a military age population in ‘Israel’, male and female, of around three million24 of which some are already serving, many exempt from recruitment due to specific occupation or studies, pregnancy, general health or ability, criminal status or psychological unfitness.
This is without taking into account the Haredi, formerly exempt from service due to religious studies but since June last year eligible to call-up. However this has led to Haredi protests and only 10% of those called actually presenting for service — and also strains Netanyahu’s coalition.25
On the other hand, there is general agreement among commentators that the Resistance, in particular Al-Qassam Brigades (Hamas military wing) have already replaced their fallen across the ranks. The survivors are likely to be for the most part battle-hardened, motivated and confident.
‘Israel’ fought the war in Gaza largely from the air through bombing and missile strikes along with artillery at a distance or a little closer by tanks. The IOF Merkava tanks have been severely depleted due to roadside IEDs (bombs) and Resistance-developed or modified RPGs.
The IOF generally did not take the Resistance on in soldier-to-soldier combat and when they did, were generally defeated. IOF snipers were often themselves sniped or they and their spy-posts eliminated by a rocket with thermobaric warhead.
Gaza still contains a vast network of sophisticated tunnels of which the IOF know very little nor, when an entrance is discovered, do the IOF go in there to fight. The IOF-created rubble landscape with rarely any building for the IOF to hole up but no way of spotting tunnel exits.
As demonstrated in the prisoner handover events, Hamas is not short of weapons, though level of ammunition stores is an unknown factor. Given the huge amount of unexploded bombs dropped by the IOF, possibly as high as 15% the Resistance will not be short of explosives either.26
CONCLUSION
Whether Trump was serious about the plan to ethnically cleanse Gaza or was merely soft-soaping Netanyahu and his most fascist Zionist supporters remains to be seen. Equally, the US may have wanted to scare Palestinian Arab neighbours to step forward to police Gaza for them.
Let us not forget that Brett McGurk under Biden’s administration discussed the need to consider how to manage Gaza “the day after” the war there ended and that a revamped Palestinian Authority might be able to do the job27 – Abbas rushing to assure his masters that the PA was indeed ready!
Proving themselves ready for Gaza management was probably the reason for the PA’s siege of Jenin and then participating in attacks upon the Resistance there alongside the IOF. However, it is unlikely that the imperialists have much faith in the corrupt PA’s ability to take on running Gaza.
The ethnic cleansing of Gaza, whether it was ever really contemplated by Trump or not, will not happen in the near future because none of the regional stakeholders – other than the blindest fascists of the Israeli Government – can afford to agree with it.
Also because the only ones reasonably available to attack Gaza again, the IOF, got really badly chewed up in their fifteen months of genocidal warfare there. But then perhaps the whole threat was scare-bait to get Arab states to collude even further with ‘Israel’ in managing post-war Gaza.
On the other hand, an unthinkable idea has been thought of and widely publicised. And when the unthinkable becomes part of public discourse, it breaks the taboo around it and makes it easier to put into practice at some point in the future.
Resumption of and constant bombing of Gaza is therefore not totally beyond possibility but it seems unlikely the master, the USA (Trump variety) wants that and, while that is the case, it cannot happen.
2The 2nd Intifada (uprising) was against the ‘Israeli’ occupation but also against the Oslo Accords, the perceived sell-out by the ruling Fatah party of Palestinian self-determination and the right of return for Palestinian refugees.
14Since the IOF pulled out of Gaza and the election of Hamas by the people, five US Presidencies have supported ‘Israel’s’ actions and supplied them with the financial and military means to carry them out: George Bush Jnr, Barrack Obama, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Donald Trump (again). Two individual Presidents have been Democrats, two Republican; two Presidencies have been Democratic and three Republican.
18And seems to reflect the opinion of their countries’ masses also.
19Given the secrecy around the real statistics he may have been not only signalling disapproval of resuming the war in Gaza but also feeding information ammunition to others who might also be opposed to that return.
Gearóid Ó Loingsigh Feb. 23 NB: Edited by Rebel Breeze for formatting purposes
(Reading time: 5 mins.)
When the genocide in Gaza began, no one thought it would go on for so long.
But it has, and along the road many challenges have come up for governments, social movements, Arab countries and political parties and nearly all of them have been found wanting on the issue.
In Ireland the annual cringe fest that is St. Patrick’s Day in Washington threw up a problem for Sinn Féin last year. Should they go or not go?
Last year the Irish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign issued a call for all political parties, including government parties, not to go.
Sinn Féin broke that call for a boycott and were swiftly pardoned by the IPSC which swiftly invited them to address a Palestinian solidarity rally in Belfast one day before Mary Lou McDonald and Michelle O’Neill First Minister of Northern Ireland set off for the USA.
There they swanned around with Biden, imbibing of whatever liquor was on offer on the day. Supping the devil’s buttermilk as some of their unionist colleagues might put it.
At the time Sinn Féin said it was going, as it was important and that they would raise the issue of Palestine with Biden. One month before flying out to Washington a Sinn Féin spokesperson stated:
We will use every political and diplomatic opportunity and influence that we have to be a voice for Palestine, to demand an end to the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, for Palestinian statehood and for a permanent ceasefire now.[1]
In the end they did no such thing. In fact, the then Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Leo Varadkar was more forceful than Mary Lou or Michelle who made even more tepid statements and quaffed what was put in front of them and enjoyed the jollies.
They could have been forgiven for thinking that it would be all over by 2025 and this situation would not arise again. Well, we should be gentle on them, many of us underestimated the Israeli bloodlust. But here we are again.
Trump continues with Biden’s genocide and announces his intention to commit two war crimes e.g. the mass expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza, a war crime under Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and profit from the looting of their assets a further war crime under Article 33 of the same convention.[2]
The SDLP was the first out of the hatches saying it would not go, reaffirming their position of the previous year.
It is ironic that Sinn Féin supporters used to refer to the SDLP as the Stoops, a play on their initials, Stoop Down Low Party, which probably means Sinn Féin (SF) should now be known as the Stoop Further.
As is common with the Stoop Further, they are fond of speaking out both sides of their mouths. They announced that they would not go this year, though not official invite has been issued to them, and at the same time urged the Irish government to go.
A case of wanting to have their cake and eat it too.
Mary Lou McDonald stated Trump’s plan “represents a marked escalation in the very complex conflict situation for the Palestinian people.”[3] Really? Expulsion is an escalation from genocide?
To be very clear, there is a specific genocide convention and genocide is a Crime Against Humanity, under that convention, and is so at all times and in all circumstances.[4] There are no ifs or buts to that.
Expulsion and profiteering are war crimes. In legal terms, they are egregious crimes but less so than genocide. There is no escalation here. Both Biden and Trump have been complicit in the genocide, Trump however has put the blood-soaked icing on the cake with his proposal.
Donald Trump US President in what is no doubt one of his favourite photos (Photo sourced: Internet)
Except it is not his proposal. It has been official US and Israeli policy since 2007.[5]
In other words, a plan that began under Bush and continued during the eight years of Obama’s presidency when Biden was the Vice-President, Trump’s first presidency and of course Biden’s four demented years as President.
Mary Lou McDonald seeks to draw a line under her support for the US. There is some mythical line in the sand between the Democrats support for murder, genocide, torture and Trump’s.
In refusing to go to the Blood Fest in Washington she stated that Sinn Féin would not be in a position to challenge Trump’s statements at the Blood Fest (she doesn’t describe it as such, to be clear that is my accurate description).
This is surprising as last year, she said that they would challenge Biden on his support for Israel.
Before they went off on their junket last year, two days before the St Patrick’s Blood Fest they issued a tame communiqué asking Biden to play a more “constructive role” in Palestine,[6] whatever that is supposed to mean.
In fact, part of their public rationale for going was that they could influence US government policy. So, what is different now? Have they concluded that their junket last year did not produce the results they hoped for?
Well, they had no expectations that Biden would end US complicity in the genocide and as I already pointed out, when they went their statements were way weaker than the Irish government’s official statements. So, the answer is no.
This year they have said they won’t go, but have said the Taoiseach should go.
We absolutely believe that he needs to go and, furthermore, when there, set out unambiguously the Irish position in respect to all of these matters and to push back directly against any threat or goal for the mass expulsion of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, the annexation of that land.[7]
If, as last year under Biden, they believed they could influence policy in the same way they now expect the southern Irish government to do, why don’t they go? The answer is one of political expediency.
They have calculated that this time round there is no political cost amongst their reactionary base in the USA to boycotting a Trump event and by calling on the Irish government to go, they continue to signal that they are a “reasonable partner” that the Irish state and Trump can do business with.
Michelle O’Neill stated that she couldn’t go this year because
I couldn’t in all conscience make that trip at this time. I just think that there are times whenever we’ll all reflect, and certainly whenever my grandchildren ask me, what did I do whenever the Palestinian people were suffering, I could say that I stood on the side of humanity.[8]
Except of course, she didn’t. Whilst Biden gladly and gaily supplied Israel with all the military hardware required to carry out a genocide, she did not nothing.
In the waning days of Biden’s support for genocide, on January 4th of this year he notified Congress of an additional US $8 billion arms sale to Israel.[9] Yeah, Michelle can tell her grandchildren what she likes, but she supped with the Devil.
She took part in a genocide through her endorsement of Biden. Her sudden hypocritical distancing from the same policies under Trump is meaningless.
It is not an ethical position; it is not one based on some internationalist concept of solidarity with the oppressed or even a liberal opposition to genocide and war crimes as they have previously shown no such solidarity or real opposition to such acts when Biden was the war criminal in charge.
No matter how low you think Sinn Féin can stoop, they will always surprise you and Stoop Further.
rebelbreeze 