Tag: Palestine

POLITICAL BETRAYAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL RESPONSES

On By rebelbreezeIn Basque Country, Current Affairs Comment, History, Imperialism, Ireland, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, National Liberation, Palestine, peace processes, Popular Resistance, Socialist Revolution, Spanish State2 Comments

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 12 mins.)

Working people have experienced many betrayals in history and the struggle for self-determination of the Irish nation has been – and is being – betrayed also.

When such betrayals occur, a range of common reactions is evoked; thinking about those responses may help the betrayed at least to moderate the harm and turn the experience to some benefit.

Equally, some ways of handling the experience can magnify and deepen the harm already caused.

Betrayal is a difficult experience for the betrayed certainly but not without some cost to the betrayer too and each has a number of common responses. This applies to the personal as well as to the political but there are some differences.

The betrayers have their followers to different degrees and these too have psychological reactions to the betrayal — and to criticism of the betrayal. We can observe these reactions in a number of recent historical cases of high levels of resistance subsequently betrayed.

The most recent phase of high degree resistance in Ireland took place largely in the British colony of the Six Counties, beginning with mass struggles for civil rights before passing through protracted guerrilla war and intense struggles of political prisoners in the jails.

In the Basque Country, the corresponding phase began with ideological-cultural struggle and mass industrial actions against the Franco dictatorship, quickly developing into a guerrilla campaign combined with street battles, resistance to conscription and struggles around prisoners in the jails.

The leadership of the Irish struggle came to political agreement with the colonial occupier, disbanded and decommissioned its guerrilla forces and acceding to its right of conquest, joined the occupier’s colonial administration, concentrating thereafter on building up its electoral base.

A similar process took place in the Basque Country but with important differences: the imprisoned activists were not released and the movement’s political leadership was not even admitted into joint management of the colonial administration.

Each nation witnessed splits, recrimination, dissidence, repression on groups continuing resistance but also a range of psychological responses which at best did not assist recuperation and in fact often deepened the harm of betrayal by the leadership.

STANDARD RESPONSES BY THE BETRAYED

DISMAY is a common reaction: How could he/ she/ they? I never thought they would. We’re finished now.

BLAME is another also common response: It was that leader’s or leadership’s fault. We didn’t fight hard enough. Those comrades criticised too much.

SELF-CENSORSHIP And EXCESSIVE CAUTION: We can see the harm in some of the leadership’s actions but we must be careful not to step too far out of the movement, where we will be marginalised and unable to have an effect1.

DESPAIR: That’s the end of everything. There’s no way out of this. It was all for nothing – all those sacrifices, all that pain. I’ll never trust people or get involved again.

APATHY: So I/ we might as well forget about it all. Just think about ourselves/ myself/ family. Drop out. Drink. Take drugs.

DENIAL: We’ve not really been betrayed. It’s just another way to go for the same thing. This is the only reasonable choice. We couldn’t keep on that way any longer, this is just a change of method. We’re just having a pause. The leadership is clever and has tricks up their sleeves. This is just to fool the authorities. It’s just going to take a little longer to win than we thought.

Those are defensive constructions in emotion and, in so far as that takes place, in thinking. But defensiveness can turn to aggression – and frequently does. The betrayers – and often the duped also – resent being reminded of what and where they are. It makes them uncomfortable.

HOSTILITY: How dare those people criticise us/ the leadership? They don’t understand and just want continual conflict. They’re endangering our secret plan. Who do they think they are? They’re just wrecking everything, undermining our new plans. They need to be taught a lesson.

PERSONAL ATTACKS: That critic is no great activist. S/he hasn’t suffered as some of us have. They were always troublemakers. Jealous, that’s what they are. They’re not very bright; no idea about real politics. They are in fact traitors, helping our enemies.

MARGINALISATION: We are not going to listen to those critics. We will not allow them space on our media. We’ll try to make sure they don’t get venues in which to spread their poison. If people are friends with them they can’t be our friends too. Such people will not enjoy our hospitality or invitations to our events. People should not even talk to them. If the authorities attack those dissidents, we are not going to trouble ourselves about them – it’s their own look out.

MANAGING THE BETRAYAL

PROMOTING LEADER ADULATION is a useful tool in shutting down the opportunities for criticism and in repressing them when they arise. “Who are we to criticise this great comrade’s thinking or actions?” becomes an implicit question, clearing the way for betrayal.

Leaders who have surrendered or compromised the struggle, L-R: Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness of the Provisionals, Arnaldo Otegi of the Basque Patriotic Left, Abdullah Ocalan of the PKK and Yasser Arafat of Al Fatah. The latter seemed to be attempting to to turn back from the path of betrayal when he became very ill (quite probably poisoned) and died.

SEEKING COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARY ALLIANCES is engaged upon so as to appear to its members to make the organisation’s influence greater, or to outflank and isolate more revolutionary tendencies and often ultimately to make the leadership acceptable to the ruling circles.

BEGGING FOR CONCESSIONS when the revolutionary path has been abandoned can often be observed, as in “we’ve abandoned our militant struggle, please stop repressing us”, for example, a frequent response to repression of the Basque leadership once it abandoned the revolutionary path.

COLLUDING WITH THE OCCUPIER becomes a new second nature to a leadership abandoning revolution, not only in abandoning armed struggle, for example but in destroying weapons and suppressing elements still in resistance.

PROVING THEIR READINESS TO COLLUDE FURTHER, revolutionaries turned collaborators denounce continued resistance, try to convince revolutionaries to desist (or threaten or physically attack them), promote the repressive arms of the State such as the police and so on.

INTOLERANCE OF CRITICISM becomes default position; such criticism tends to expose the contradiction between the original purpose of the organisation and its concrete actions in the present. Censorship, expulsion and misrepresentation become common.

MARGINALISATION OF CRITICS follows from intolerance of criticism – the individuals or groups must be made pariahs so as to nullify or at least reduce their influence. Association with them, socially or politically – even in agitating around civil rights – must be discouraged.

REPRESSION OF DISSIDENTS finally becomes necessary, whether by threats or by actual violence or, when admitted to governing circles, by use of repressive state machinery.

DEALING WITH BETRAYAL RATIONALLY

The first necessary step is to analyse how the betrayal came about: how was it organised? What were the conditions that made it possible? What were the early signs?

Then, proceed to: what could we have done differently? What WILL we do differently in future?

Electoral work

One common assumption here in Ireland, especially in Irish Republican circles, is that the rot began with standing in elections. This is not logical and it is in effect making a negative fetish of electoral work, a taboo to be avoided.

It is often useful to the revolution in many ways to have representation in the parliament and local authorities, for example in promoting or blocking practical or legislative measures, getting media air time, visiting prisons — all without ever promoting reformism as a way forward.

Certainly the prioritisation of electoral work over other aspects is a sign that something has gone wrong: the strength of the popular revolutionary movement is on the street, in workplaces, communities, places of education, rather than in parliaments and local authorities.

The drive towards electoral representation can encourage bland slogans of the soap powder kind (“new improved” or “washes even better”) rather than those with revolutionary content and also the promotion of more bourgeois individuals in preference to grass-roots organisers.

Anodyne election slogan in both languages for Sinn Féin.

But none of that means that representation in those bodies cannot be used to further the popular struggles or that such aberrations cannot be avoided. And in fact, the concentration on criticism on the electoral factor served to distract from a more fundamental error.

Of course, electoral work should never, for revolutionaries, be about entering government under the current socio-economic system, i.e sharing in the administration of the State.

Leader adulation & intolerance of criticism

If criticism is not tolerated when errors are committed, they can hardly be corrected. Again and again it has been observed that the party/ organisation faithful refuse to accept external criticism from non-enemies. Internally the leadership inhibits criticism by the members.

The cult of the leader also inhibits criticism and therefore correction of errors. And behind this image others can hide and also commit errors. Problematic as dead icons may be, living ones are many times more dangerous – deceased ones at least do not change their trajectories.

Such created living icons have been Mandela in South Africa, Yasser Arafat among Palestinians, Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness in Ireland, Arnaldo Otegi in the Basque Country and Abdullah Ocalan among Kurds (particularly in the Turkish and Syrian states).

Nobody knows everything or is always right. Bothersome as being criticised may be, its total absence is worse, allowing us no opportunity to question ourselves as activists and in particular as revolutionary organisations.

The revolutionary leadership, party or organisation is not the people

The revolutionary leadership, party or organisation does not have all the answers and is not the people. This might seem obvious but from the behaviour of such leaderships and their followers in the past it is clear that the opposite philosophy has been dominant.

Confusing the organisation with the people or with revolution itself, we assume that what is good for the organisation is also good for the people and the revolution. This however is not always so and leads to placing the perceived well-being of the organisation above the needs of the revolution.

Indulging this confusion leads to political opportunism and sectarianism, bad relations with other revolutionaries, ignoring all external criticism and placing the needs of the leadership higher than those of the membership and of the membership higher than those of the mass movement.

Internationalist solidarity

In internationalist solidarity work we build the unity of the people across borders and against the same or different enemies than those against which we are struggling.

One feature observed in a number of organisations where the leadership is moving towards betrayal is a reduction or elimination of such work.

To those in our ranks seeking an accommodation with imperialism and capitalism, those internationalist solidarity alliances are either a) unimportant or b) a hindrance to the alternative reactionary alliances to which they aspire.

The latter was very much the case with the Provisionals’ attitude to US imperialism. For decades, their leadership maintained apparently mutually-contradictory positions on what is the biggest imperialist superpower in the world.

On the one hand, for example, there could be involvement in solidarity with Cuba against the US economic blockade and, in the past, against US sabotage and terrorism against the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua.

On the other hand, the leadership sought the support of the US elite against British colonialism, which is occupying a part of Ireland and against which the movement was waging, in that colony, an armed and popular struggle.

Seeking support from the US imperialist elite entailed distancing from left-wing Irish USA and dropping support for even long-term inmates of US jails, such as American Indian Leonard Peltier and Black American Mumia Abu Jamal, arising out of popular struggles inside the US.2

Leonard Peltier, Native American convicted in 1977 in deeply flawed trial for murder of two FBI agents in 1975 shootout on Pine Ridge Reservation. Nearly 80 years of age now and with multiple health issues, even release on clemency grounds is constantly blocked. His is one of many campaigns in the USA which SF cannot support as they seek to remain friends with the Democratic Party elite there.
Black American journalist and activist, framed for the murder of a corrupt Philadelphia policeman in 1981 and sentenced to death in 1982, sentence commuted to imprisonment for life without parole in 2011. Mumia is nearly 70 years of age now with a number of health issues. Another of the type of injustice in the USA about which SF cannot campaign as they seek to stay close to the Democratic Party elite. Anecdotally, a SF Councillor who was regularly writing to him was obliged to desist on instruction from her party leadership.

Unprincipled alliances

Another warning sign is the founding of unprincipled alliances with other organisations in struggle. For example, although it is correct to have a position of support for the Palestinian people, that should not necessarily bind us to exclusively support the fighters of one organisation only.

The Provisionals made their alliance with the Al Fatah organisation to the exclusion of all others in Palestine but worse was to come, for Al Fatah shoved aside the idea of a free Palestine and the right of return in exchange for administrative partial autonomy and funding.3

From there, Al Fatah became so corrupt that the Palestinian people, that had long supported a secular leadership, voted overwhelmingly for an islamic fundamentalist party, Hamas4. The unprincipled alliance with Al Fatah and the ANC was used to ‘sell’ the GFA to Irish Republicans.5

In the Basque Country, the mass movement’s leadership developed close links with the leadership of the Provisionals and refused links with Irish Republican organisations that dissented from the Provisionals’ position or with Republican prisoners after the Good Friday Agreement.

That should have sounded alarm trumpets in the Basque movement but if it did, it remained largely without practical effect. Askapena, the Basque internationalist solidarity organisation did split from the main movement but did not go so far as to support ‘dissident’ Irish Republican prisoners.

LESSONS

On the basis of the preceding I think we can draw a number of primary lessons.

LESSON ONE: ANALYSE THE MISTAKES OF THE PAST AND SEEK TO AVOID REPLICATING THEM

The type of struggle, location, timing, peripheral situation, long, medium and short-term objectives, experience and expertise of personnel, resources … all need to be analysed, in conjunction with the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy.

In carrying out this kind of analysis on the Irish struggle, we see that we faced one of the military superpowers, also well linked into the western imperialist world. The Republican movement’s battle area was in total one-sixth of the nation’s territory and the location deeply divided.

The rest of the nation was ruled by a weak foreign-dependent ruling class.

Map of Ireland showing the British colony of the Six Counties. The Provisionals took on the British state, mostly confining their struggle in that deeply divided politically and culturally region shown in yellow.

A movement cannot choose when it has to step forward in defence but it can choose how it develops the struggle afterwards. It seems obvious that in order to be victorious, at the very least the struggle would have to be spread throughout the nation.

That in turn would entail putting forward social and economic objectives to attract wider support which, in turn, would mean taking on the Catholic Church hierarchy.

In addition, the question of effective external allies was relevant here but even more so in the Basque Country, located across the borders of two powerful European states.

The total population of the portion of the Basque nation within the Spanish state is far short of three million, that of the rest of the state over 44 million.

Clearly allies external to the Basque nation would be essential for victory and these would have to come from across most of the Spanish state at least.

Map showing the ‘autonomous’ regions of the Spanish State; the southern Basque Country is shown in pink at the top, including ‘Navarre’ shown in yellow next to it. Essentially, the Basque Patriotic Left without allies confronted the Spanish state from there.

Such an assumption would entail, in turn, outlining objectives to attract considerable numbers from across the Spanish state which in turn would mean creating alliances with revolutionary and other progressive forces across the state.

LESSON TWO: REFRAIN FROM PERSONALISING THE ISSUES

When criticism of the counter-revolutionary line put forward by individual leaders becomes personalised, the political essence of the criticism becomes lost or at least obscured. It can seem as though the critics have personal reasons for their hostility or even jealousy of the individuals.

Much of what one sees publicly posted by opponents of pacification programs in Ireland and the Basque Country often seems more about hostility to the personalities of MaryLou MacDonald, Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness or Arnaldo Otegi than about specific policies and actions.6

Crucially, focusing criticism on individual leaders serves to conceal other underlying causes of failure and betrayal that are usually more fundamental: problems in objectives, errors of strategy, in particular and also of tactics along with unhealthy organisational dynamics.

LESSON THREE: DEVELOP INTERNATIONALISM AND AVOID UNPRINCIPLED ALLIANCES

In the face of imperialist and other reactionary alliances, revolutionaries need internationalist solidarity, the basis for which should be revolutionary positions and action. Exclusive alliances are generally to be avoided as is uncritical support or unquestioning approval of all actions.

LESSON FOUR: CONTRIBUTE TO BROAD FRONTS WITHOUT SURRENDERING THE REVOLUTIONARY LINE

A broad front is essential not only for successful revolution but also often for defence against repression. Such fronts should be built on a principled basis with respect for the participating groups and individuals but without surrendering the revolutionary line.

At the same time, the possibility of betrayal, opportunism or sabotage and marginalisation by partners in broad fronts need to be guarded against and, if occurring, to be responded to in a principled and measured manner.

Broad fronts not only increase the numbers in resistance in a unified manner but also expose the activities of the constituent groups to the members of other parts of the broad front. Activists can then evaluate organisations and one another on the basis of experience rather than of reputation.

The revolutionary line should not be abandoned or concealed when in a broad front with organisations and individuals who have varying lines. At the same time, it is not necessary to be pushing the revolutionary line every minute.

LESSON FIVE: DON’T GIVE UNCONDITIONAL TRUST TO LEADERS

Of course, our leaders and activists must be trusted – but always in the knowledge that no-one is perfect or above the possibility of error. The shutting down of opportunity to voice criticism should sound alarm bells in any revolutionary movement.

There are of course “time and place” considerations in criticism; for example, the capitalist mass media, police interrogation or trial in court are hardly appropriate places to criticise a revolutionary movement’s leadership.

LESSON SIX: TOLERATE INTERNAL CRITICISM AND CAUCUSES IN BALANCE WITH COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY

The above touches upon this area too. People who follow us without question may equally do so with another.

The right to caucus, i.e to collect around a particular revolutionary trend or focus needs to be acknowledged and formalised. Like-minded people will naturally associate and it is far healthier to have this occur in the open rather than in secret.

At the same time, when a discussion reaches democratic decision, the minority whose positions were rejected need to present a common front with the rest of the organisation or movement.

Similarly, political and organisation criticism needs to be welcomed or at least tolerated within the organisation or movement because it may be correct and point an alternative way forward and even if it isn’t, the discussion around the criticism will help to clarify matters.

Such openess to criticism and discussion encourages a conscious and thinking membership which by that measure alone and organisationally makes it more difficult for some individual or clique to manipulate the membership.

End.

FOOTNOTES

REFERENCES

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/30/black-panther-radicals-still-in-jail

1“Outside the broad movement it is very cold”, said a Basque to me once. He was a member of a small Left group critical of the leadership’s approach but unwilling to completely rupture with them.

2https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/30/black-panther-radicals-still-in-jail

3With the Camp David (1978) and Oslo Accords (1993 & 1995).

4In 2006 (the most recent) Palestinian parliamentary elections, Change and Reform (Hamas) won 74 seats and Al Fatah 45. In Gaza Al Fatah rejected the result and tried to seize power but were defeated in a short battle, though Hamas did not battle their assumption of power in the West Bank. All dates for elections to Palestinian Parliament since have passed without polling.

5And since then, unprincipled alliances with Provisional Sinn Féin have been used by the main Basque organisation leadership and ditto with Colombia to ‘sell’ pacification processes in those countries (which have been even worse for them than has the GFA been in Ireland).

6As a historical note, it is said that some of the delegates who voted for the Anglo-Irish Treaty in January 1922 were moved to do so by the nature of the attacks of Cathal Brugha, for the anti-Treaty side on Michael Collins, leader of those for the Treaty. The majority of delegates voting in favour was only seven.

IMPERIALIST NARRATIVE IN ‘OBJECTIVE REPORTING’

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Imperialism, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time main text: 4 mins.)

“Palestinian gunman wounds two Israelis in Jerusalem shooting” proclaims the headline. We don’t have to worry trying to figure out whose side we’re expected to be on, who’s in the wrong and who in the right. It’s right there in the headline.

“Gunman” is a heavy clue and the fact that the two he wounded are just “Israelis” – we are led to believe just ordinary civilians – does the rest of the job. That is, if indeed we are not somehow already prejudiced against Palestinians and in favour of Israelis.

However, should we bother to read further, we find that two of the wounded were far from being harmless civilians but in fact an Israeli soldier and a security guard, certainly armed for their job (even Israeli Jewish civilians are routinely permitted to carry firearms).1

The2 report tells us that the soldier was a woman. Why is this relevant? Like male soldiers, she was a serving member of the Israeli Zionist occupation armed forces, misleadingly named “Defence Forces”. Zionist female soldiers are present at all levels and all theatres of war.3

It is difficult to avoid the suspicion that this is being inserted in order to mitigate the impact of revelation that it was a soldier who was shot, which might possibly lessen sympathy for the victims on that score.

Perhaps the fact that the Palestinian in question appears to have initiated the incident justifies the appellation of “gunman”? OK, when Israeli armed forces initiate an action, do we ever see “Israeli gunmen open fire on Palestinians”?

Scene of shooting of two Israeli Zionist armed forces on Saturday in Jerusalem, one fatally (Photo credit: PA Images)

Certainly not in mainstream western media. And not just because of bias towards state armed forces, because even when the shooters are Israeli Zionist civilians, they are never called “gunmen”. And such incidents occurred on a monthly basis recently.4

MOTIVE, BACKGROUND, CONTEXT

Moving away from the actual incident, what about the background and context? “Israel already has been carrying out daily arrest raids in the occupied West Bank since a series of Palestinian attacks last spring killed 19 Israelis” the report informs us.

So the Palestinian “gunman” could have had an understandable motive in responding to Israeli Zionist oppression and repression but in case we should sympathise with him, we are reminded that “Palestinian attacks last spring killed 19 Israelis.”

After conditioning with that paragraph, the report gives us more recent possible motivation for the attack (even then, note the attempted justification for actions of “Israeli forces” fighting “gunmen” and “militants”).

“Earlier on Saturday, the Israeli military shot and killed two Palestinian teenagers during an arrest raid in the Jenin refugee camp, the site of repeated clashes between Israeli forces and local gunmen and residents. The camp is known as a stronghold of Palestinian militants.”

Body of 16-year-old Palestinian Ahmad Daraghmeh killed by Zionist Israeli soldiers carried in protest mourning. Also killed with him were Mahmoud as-Sous, 18. (Photo credit: Agence France Press)

“Palestinian officials said soldiers entered the camp early on Saturday and surrounded a house. In videos circulated on social media, exchanges of fire could be heard. The Palestinian Health Ministry reported two dead and 11 wounded, three of them critically.”

And let’s put that “killing of 19 Israelis” last spring in context too: Last year, “as a result of the violence, at least 256 Palestinians, including 66 children, were killed … In Israel, at least 13 people were killed, including two children”5. A search of any year will find a similar or worse story.

SOME OF THE TRUTH

Occasionally, we are supplied with truth, as when the report informs us that “Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed the area in a move that is not recognised internationally.”

“It considers the entire city, including east Jerusalem, home to the city’s most important holy sites, to be its capital. The Palestinians claim east Jerusalem as the capital of a future state.” Nor is East Jerusalem the only area occupied by Israel judged illegally by “international law”.6

But even this is partial truth because, whether “recognised internationally” or not, the whole territory of the state of Israel is an occupation by force of Palestinian land by European settlers in 1948, backed by some world superpowers and a constant source of conflict there ever since.

MAKING SENSE OF CONFLICTS

Context is crucial to understanding events but justification is a moral and practical judgement7 according to the standpoint of those doing the judging and evaluation. Clearly the standpoint of an occupier and a person displaced — an occupier and the oppressor – can never be the same.

It follows that those who support the occupier and more certainly invest in its support, are going to be biased against the displaced, the oppressed and repressed. The world’s biggest superpower, the USA, supports Israel hugely militarily, financially and politically.

The states of the world and their controlling elites are well aware of the balance of power and, for the moment, most support the superpower. This is even more so in the case of the geo-political area designated “the West”, location of most mainstream media agencies’ headquarters.

The bias is clear if we take the trouble to analyse and we’ll find it not only in the reporting on the Israeli Zionist state and the Palestinians but on all other conflicts, to greater or lesser degree. What stand we take depends on whether we align ourselves with the oppressor or the oppressed.

End.

FOOTNOTES

1See “Gun-carrying for Israeli citizens” in Sources.

2She has since died and headlines are now including her gender.

3“ … today women make up only about 40% of conscript soldiers and 25% of the office (sic officer?) corps.” This despite Orthodox Jewish men objecting to serve in the company of female soldiers https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/israel-defense-forces

4See “Absence of “gunman” when an Israeli Zionist civilian is the shooter” in Sources. Note that all these reports were taken from media sources one might suppose not sympathetic to Israeli Zionism; a quick search of Reuters only brought up a 2012 reference to such an incident and of Associated Press, not even one on the first search page.

5https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Israel%E2%80%93Palestine_crisis#:~:text=As%20a%20result%20of%20the,were%20killed%2C%20including%20two%20children.

6Syria’s Golan Heights are one such as are the settlements on lands grabbed after the founding of the Israeli state: https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/03/israels-55-year-occupation-palestinian-territory-apartheid-un-human-rights

7Moral, as in do we think it wrong or right according to moral principles; practical as in whether we can show it works.

SOURCES

The report being analysed: https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/palestinian-gunman-wounds-two-israelis-in-jerusalem-shooting-1374673.html

Gun-carrying for Israeli citizens: https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/israel-has-successful-gun-control-policy-gun-control-p-248-251-1992

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/9/12/israels-eased-gun-laws-palestinian-fear-over-new-gun-permits

Absence of “gunman” when an Israeli Zionist civilian is the shooter: https://www.dci-palestine.org/israeli_settler_soldier_shoot_and_kill_palestinian_boy

Israel settlers shoot Palestinians near Ramallah

https://english.wafa.ps/Pages/Details/130104

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/palestinian-boy-shot-dead-israeli-settler-east-ramallah

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-palestinians-israel-violence-idUKBRE84P0BE20120526

Female Israeli Zionist soldiers: https://www.lawfareblog.com/female-service-idf-challenge-integrated-army

Recent background to current incident report: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-62445951

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ISRAELI MURDER OF A JOURNALIST

On By rebelbreezeIn Assassination, Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Internationalist Solidarity, Mass Media Criticism, National Liberation, Palestine, Police Violence, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 8 mins.)

On Wednesday (May 11th), a Palestinian journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh was shot dead by Israeli military with one shot to the head. At the time of her murder, she was wearing conflict protective clothing clearly marked “PRESS” but the bullet entered her head under the helmet. Ms. Abu Akleh’s murder has caused outrage around the world, which has been intensified by the Israeli military’s attack on mourners, even on the bearers of her coffin (one of whom has since died) and their attempt to blame the Palestinian resistance for killing the journalist.

(Credit photo: Ahmad Gharabi/ Getty)

WHY THE OUTRAGE THIS TIME, ABOUT THIS JOURNALIST?

Ms. Abu Akleh was a journalist of nearly 25 years’ experience, employed since 1997 by the Qhatari-based news agency Al Jazeera and her reports were familiar to millions in the Arab and wider Muslim world. She was with other journalists, one of whom was also shot but wounded in the back and is expected to recover, covering an Israeli Army raid into the refugee camp in Jenin in Palestine. Both Al Jazeera and Associated Press agencies insisted that the shooters were Israeli military and mapping on-the-spot investigation has discredited the Israeli version firstly that the killer was a Palestinian fighter and then latterly, that it might have been.

Shireen Abu Akleh lies dead or mortally wounded while her terrified colleague fears the same fate (Source: Internet)

“This is one person,” remarked a commentator, “ but hundreds are being killed in the Ukraine war!” Another commented that the Russians have shot journalists in the Ukraine.

Thousands and millions and thousands of millions of people are killed in wars and as a result of wars. Yes and in a way their very numbers makes that difficult to grasp. In the war in the Ukraine before the Russian invasion, 14,000 is the number of estimated dead. Since the invasion, 9,599–24,5991 civilians have been killed, such a wide disparity in estimates a reflection that the conflict is still ongoing and also of the propaganda battle being fought over almost every aspect of the conflict.

In Palestine, the conflict death toll began mostly from 1936 and rose to unknown numbers of Palestinians (due the huge expulsions and fleeing terror) in 1948 when the state of Israel was created, and between 2008 and 2020 alone the death toll is estimated at 5,8502, not counting of course this year and last, with another three added since Sunday, including Abu Akleh. The overall figure of Palestinian civilians killed between 1936 and 2020, with huge gaps where the numbers are unknown, is 2,816,410.3

All three of the latest of Israel’s victims (unless they’ve killed more before I finish writing and editing) were unarmed civilians. Unarmed civilians are the group most likely to be killed in war (10 million in WWI; 50–55 million in WWII, whilst 2,000,000 civilians is the estimate for the Vietnam War). Even though the killing of civilians is an automatic result of war, there are all kind of laws and conventions agreed by most states, including major warlike ones, against the deliberate killing of civilians. But it does seem as though some states have carte blanche in that regard, international law or not.

Israeli police attack funeral of Shireen Abu Akleh, including beating pall-bearers — one of the injured died later. (Photo credit: May Levin/ AP)

For many people, every killing of a Palestinian announced adds to that ongoing toll by Israel, year after year for nearly eight decades. That’s one important significance of the death of Shireen Abu Akleh – she comes to personalise, to give a face to the millions of victims of Israeli Zionism.

Another significance of this murder is that Abu Akleh is the most recent of at least 45 journalists killed by Israeli military since 2000 – that’s more than two per year. The UNESCO Observatory lists 22 journalists killed by Israeli military since 2002 and the case remains “unresolved” in 19 of Israel’s judicial investigation — with no investigation at all listed in two of them.

One of the nearly 50 journalists killed by the Israeli military since 2000 — Yasser Murtagh in 2018 (Photo: Reuters)

Raising the issue of Russian armed forces’ alleged deliberate killing of civilians and of reporters, whether true or not, just does not compare. The allegations might be true, of course — an invading army is likely to encounter opposition in the course of which some of its personnel may kill civilians by intention and without justification. Indeed, armies before now have killed even those of their own country, their own ethnic group. In the currently relentless onslaught of western commentary, often quoting Ukrainian or NATO sources without question, along with the banning of much alternative comment, it is — and will continue to be for some time – difficult to say which is true and which is not. But the two conflicts do not compare, neither in scale nor in length of existence, nor does the death toll of civilians including reporters.

“WHATABOUTERY“

When Russia invaded the Ukraine, anybody who raised the issue of Palestine with regard to the other conflict, e.g “what about the US/NATO support for Israel?” was accused of ‘whataboutery’. ‘Whataboutery’ is thought of as a device to distract from confronting the actual issues initially under discussion by introducing another different or tangential one.

Of course, people do such things and rational discussion is frequently undermined and even shattered by such practice. But, in this case, when US/NATO was saying that it was supporting the post-Maidan Ukrainian regime for reasons of democracy and self-determination, was it justified to point out its record of war and invasion in the Middle East and its support of Israeli Zionist aggression? It seems clear to me that it was but that would not in itself be proof that the Ukrainian regime was wrong. Was it right to point to the regime’s attacks on Russian-speakers and in particular on the Crimea and Donbas regions? It seems to me that it was, in that gave context to secessionist feeling in those areas to which the Russian regime could well want to give military support, whether that were for protection of ethnic kindred or for its own selfish reasons.

None of that “whataboutery” takes away from the tragedy of war in the Ukraine, of course not, but it is valid in considering motivation, given that the US, the leading power in NATO, is also the biggest supporter of the Zionist state and that the EU is not far behind. Palestine exposed that whatever the rights and wrongs in the conflict, NATO and the EU’s motives were not about justice and peace.

When international sporting and cultural organisations of the western capitalist world began to ban Russian teams and individuals from participation, were people justified in saying “Hey, what about Israel?” Surely they were, for that ongoing struggle in which Palestinian land has been ripped from the hands of its people, in which the latter are daily oppressed and from time to time massacred, in which they suffer military occupation, daily discrimination, ethnic cleansing, racism and apartheid – have they not been calling for decades for banning and boycotting Israeli and its sporting teams? And what was the response? They they were bringing politics into sport! And those who did show their solidarity in sports competitions were often penalised for doing so.

When states began to apply economic sanctions to Russia and to Russian individuals, were Palestinians and their supporters not justified in crying out “Hey, what about Israel?” Of course they were.

The strange thing is that those who accused others of “whataboutery” in the past for raising the issue of Palestine in the context of the war in the Ukraine have now begun to cry “what about the Ukraine?” in the context of the international outrage about the murder of Shireen Abu Akleh. Former critics of ‘whataboutery’ have themselves become ‘whatabouters’ now – and without even the shadow of the justification of their accused predecessors.

‘INTERNATIONAL’ OUTRAGE

It’s worth asking what we mean by “international” in the case of the outrage over the murder of Shireen Abu Akleh. That “international” includes a large part of the Arab world. It includes a large part of the non-Arab but Muslim word4. It includes a large part of the non-Arab, non-Muslim world in western Europe and in the USA and in many other parts too. Certainly the Irish public in general has empathised with the Palestinians for decades.5

But it does not include what the western media mean when they use the words “the international community” – the outrage does not encompass the ruling classes of the Western European countries, much less of the USA, nor even the ruling classes of much of the Arab and Muslim world. In this they are being to a degree, honest. Because those ruling classes have either supported the Israeli Zionists directly, or have supported the USA which keeps Israel alive. Only seven elected representatives of the USA’s Democratic Party – out of the 225 it has in the US Congress, quickly expressed condemnation of the killing and called for a quick and independent investigation. Not one of the 210 Republicans expressed condemnation at the time – even though Shireen Abu Akleh was a citizen of the USA!

Protest in Delhi at the Israeli murder of Shireen Abu Akleh — and clearly not by Muslims alone (Hindus and Sikhs seen here also). (Photo source: Internet)
Shireen Abu Akleh murder protest march passing through Grafton Street, Dublin, Ireland yesterday (Photo source: IPSC FB page)

Leaders of a few countries expressed regret but could not bring themselves to even say that she had been killed by the Israeli military. The authorities in Berlin banned an attempt to hold a vigil over the death of the Palestinian journalist, including it in their ban on any Palestinian solidarity events at this time of year, when people commemorate the Palestinian ‘Nakba’. That is what Palestinians call the ‘Catastrophe’ that resulted from the seizure of Palestine by the Israeli Zionists, the creation of its state and the mass expulsion of Palestinians.

It is worth noting too that the media we are reading, which at first either ignored this murder, downplayed it or repeated the Israeli lies that Shireen Abu Akleh had been shot, not by Israeli military but by Palestinian resistance fighters, is compiled by journalists too. On the one hand this points to the severe loss to the world when a journalist who exposes injustice is killed (or persecuted and jailed for extradition to another country, as in the case of Julian Assange). On the other, it points to what a large contingent of hired liars and prevaricators is included among the ranks of journalists, that they cannot even stand up for the truth and protest the murder of one of their own occupation or trade.

Source images: Internet

And it teaches us how much our sources of information are mediated and manipulated by the national and corporative news media. Years ago we were being told that social media would free us from their manipulation or at least provide a viable alternative – independent news and commentary sources would flourish and we could be our own media. Yet the bans and exclusions put in place by Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and governments have shown us what an illusion all that was – in terms of information, we are generally even more controlled and manipulated now than we were before the advent of social media.

Hopefully, those who did not know this already will have learned, both from the coverage of the war in Ukraine and from the murder of this journalist. Those who thought that there was any justice in Israel or generally in the western governments towards the Palestinians, will hopefully have been disabused of that illusion too. Shireen Abu Akleh cannot be brought back to life nor can she be replaced. What we can do is strive to pull down that State that killed her and to knock away all its props around the world.

End.

FOOTNOTES

1https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Russo-Ukrainian_War

2“According to the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), some 5,600 Palestinians died between 2008 and 2020 while nearly 115,000 were injured. During the same period, around 250 Israelis have died while approximately 5,600 were injured” https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2021/05/12/the-human-cost-of-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict-over-the-past-decade-infographic/

3https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_casualties_of_war

4Because a great many non-Arab Muslims sympathise with the Palestinians, who mostly ascribe to the faith of Islam and to Muslim culture. However, some Palestinians are Christian, some of Jewish (in the sense that a minority of the population of Palestine was Jewish for decades before the Israeli Zionist occupation) and some of no religion. Shireen Abu Akleh was baptised a Christian; her funeral service was held in a Catholic church and her remains were taken to a Protestant cemetery.

5The Irish cannot fail but be struck too by some parallels with the British occupation of Ireland – the impunity of the Zionist occupiers, for example and the attempt firstly to blame the resistance for those killed by the British Army, followed by a fog of conjecture and holding their own inquiry; the attack on mourners, the seizing of the national flag and attacking people for displaying it (the display of the flag was officially illegal under Israeli law in 1967 and unbanned in 1993 but as seen, is still often objected to by Israeli police).

SOURCES

Conflict deaths in Palestine 2008-2020: https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2021/05/12/the-human-cost-of-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict-over-the-past-decade-infographic/

Conflict Palestinian civilian deaths since 1936-2020: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_casualties_of_war

At least 45 Journalists killed by Israel since 2000: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/5/12/infographic-the-journalists-killed-by-israeli-forces-since-2000

https://en.unesco.org/themes/safety-journalists/observatory/country/223793

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/5/13/al-jazeera-condemns-israeli-attack-on-shireen-abu-aklehs-funeral

https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/pallbearers-drop-journalists-coffin-as-israeli-police-hit-mourners-with-batons-1304514.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shireen_Abu_Akleh#Early_life_and_education

DUBLIN NEW YEAR SOLIDARITY GREETINGS TO PALESTINE

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Event Report, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, PalestineLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

Palestinian flags fluttered in the breeze over the iconic Ha’penny Bridge in Dublin City centre, while banners festooned its length on New Year’s Eve. The numbers were down from previous years, more likely from the soaring Covid19 infection rate than from any lessening of the long-running Ireland solidarity with the oppressed Palestinians. This was ironic since, unlike previous years, this was not a rally braving sleet, snow, rain or icy wind – in fact, the very mild weather raised only the amount of breeze necessary to set the flags fluttering.

(Photo by Tamin Al Fatin, IPSC)
Tamin Al Fatin, IPSC Chairperson, centre photo (Photo by IPSC))

The event is organised every year for New Year’s Eve at the same location by the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign and supporters, among which were Irish and Palestinians, handed out leaflets encouraging BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) of Israel, an apartheid ste. Martin Quigley, for the IPSC led some chants on a megaphone, which were taken up by people on the pedestrian Bridge, among which were that “Israel is a terrorist state”, that “Palestine will be free” and in solidarity that “we are ALL Palestinians”.

Each year more Palestinian land is stolen, more of their homes demolished or under threat of eviction, in Gaza they have periods without electricity, they are restricted in importing fuel for heating or cooking (never mind transport), or building materials (so much has been destroyed by the Israeli bombardments), they continue to be harassed and made have lengthy waits at checkpoints, their inshore sea is polluted, their fishing boats further out are attacked and harassed ….

(Photo by Tamin Al Fatin, IPSC)
  • As of 2019, more than 5.6 million Palestinians were registered with UNRWA as refugees, of which more than 1.5 million live in UNRWA-run camps.
  • According to prisoners’ rights group Addameer, there are currently (2021) 4,650 Palestinians held in Israeli jails in Israel and the occupied territories. Palestinians view them as political prisoners attempting to end Israel’s illegal occupation. Of those: 520 are being held without charge or trial.
  • At the end of September 2020, 157 Palestinian minors were held in Israeli prisons as security detainees and prisoners, at least two of whom were held in administrative detention. Another 2 Palestinian minors were held in Israel Prison Service facilities for being in Israel illegally. The IPS considers these minors – both detainees and prisoners – criminal offenders. In addition, a small number of minors are held in IDF-run facilities for short periods of time. (And the Israeli Prison Service since October 2020 has been refusing to publish figures or to supply Palestinian human rights groups with them).

BIG POWERS BACKING ISRAELI ZIONISM

The United States is the major power backing the Israeli Zionists and partly because of its position in the world and partly also for their own economic or political interests, most of the European states back the Zionists too.

In 2018 Donald Trump, as US President, moved the US Embassy for Israel into Jerusalem, endorsing the Zionist claim that the multi-faith city is Jewish and Zionist, although it is an occupied city even in international law. Shortly before he reluctantly left the office of the US Presidency, Donald Trump also endorsed Morocco’s illegal occupation of Western Sahara in exchange for Morocco recognising Israel. So far, Joe Biden, Trump’s successor, has not reversed either of those decisions.

(Photo by D.Breatnach)

THE PEOPLE OF THE WORLD SUPPORT THE PALESTINIANS

As is usually the case, it is the ordinary people in Ireland and around the world that support the Palestinians, while the big capitalists and imperialists, while occasionally criticising the Israeli Zionists, continue to support them politically, economically, culturally and militarily. Even in the United Nations, an organisation controlled by the big powers, a majority condemned the Zionist state in 17 separate motions in 2020 and last year formally ratified another six resolutions criticising Israel.

So why has international action not been taken against this terrorist state? The answer is that although the UN has 193 member states, only its Security Council decisions have to be carried out and there are only five permanent members of the Security Council: USA, UK, France, Russia and China. And what’s more, their decisions have to be unanimous.

(Photo by Tamin Al Fatin, IPSC)

On the other hand, so many civil organisations around the world have declared themselves in solidarity with the Palestinians and in Ireland. Hundreds of thousands have marched in so many countries and sports people, many popular culture stars and academics have refused to perform or attend conferences in Israel. One can no longer find Israeli goods in most shops or supermarkets (and when on occasion they are on sale, their country of origin is not marked on the product).

End.

(Photo by Tamin Al Fatin, IPSC)

Video (playable only on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/100001732057139/videos/pcb.4926773100723710/647305976619628

INTERNATIONALIST SOLIDARITY – THE DIVIDING LINE BETWEEN THE PEOPLE AND OUR RULERS

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Popular Resistance, US Imperialism1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 12 mins.)

The oppression of the Palestinians led to an outbreak of active resistance recently in Jerusalem, to which the Israeli Army reacted with increased repression, timed to harass Palestinian Muslims during the period of Ramadan and the height of devotees attending the Al-Aqsa mosque, escalating into attacks on worshippers within the temple itself. At the same time, Israeli Zionist settlers threatened dozens of Palestinian families with eviction from their homes in East Jerusalem. Reacting to these events, one of the Palestinian organisations fired home-made rockets into officially Israeli territory, to which the Israeli armed forces responded in turn with drone missiles and missiles from its air force jets on Gaza. As Palestinians in the West Bank came out on to the streets to protest, they were fired on with live ammunition by Israeli soldiers. The death toll has climbed to 200 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, including 59 children and 35 women, with 1,305 people wounded; while ten Israelis have been killed, two of them children.

The casualty figures once again show the gross disproportion between what the Palestinians and their Zionist masters experience: in civil and human rights, citizenship, in land ownership, electricity and clean water supply, heating, fishing, education facilities, building materials, freedom to travel inside and outside the state, in depth and breadth of surveillance, in arms and defence capability, in states that support them. And in city structural damage: despite the many home-made rockets launched against the zionists, there has yet been no significant damage in Israeli towns, while their armed forces have effected large-scale structural damage in Gaza and bodies are still being pulled from the rubble.

In only one area perhaps do the Palestinians have the advantage over the Israeli Zionists: in support among the people around the world.

Israeli Zionist missiles strike the tower housing many media services, including Associated Press and Al Jazeera, which drew broad criticism from the mass media for a change. But families also lived here. Everyone was given ten minutes to get out. The Israeli Occupation Force has not yet bothered to explain its rationale for targeting this building. (Photo source: Internet)

PALESTINIAN SOLIDARITY MARCH DEFIES POLICE THREATS

Responding to these attacks on Palestinians the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the main organisation for Palestinian solidarity in Ireland, called for solidarity demonstrations and in particular advertised a solidarity rally to take place in Dublin’s city centre for 2pm on Saturday 15th May, asking those in attendance to comply with measures against Covid19 infection, to wear masks, maintain social distancing and comply with stewards’ instructions.

The IPSC was contacted by the Irish police force, the Gardaí, who told them not to go ahead with the event, that if they did they would intervene to stop it and also made threats of €5,000 fines and prison against the organisers. In a later public statement the Gardaí declared that they “have no role in permitting or authorising marches or gatherings. There is no permit/ authorisation required for such events”! But there is apparently an ability and power to intimidate and threaten progressive organisations to deter them from organising solidarity events.

Or to kettle socialist and socialist republican Mayday marchers and demand all their names, addresses and dates of birth before threatening them with arrest if they did not disperse. Or to threaten Debenham workers and their supporters, assaulting some of them while escorting KPMG forces in to evaluate stocks during pandemic restrictions.

A Palestinian policeman stands among the rubble of the tower in Gaza recently occupied by families and media agencies. (Photo source: Internet)

The predicament of the IPSC exposed the vulnerability to this kind of intimidation of a broad organisation that seeks to win friends in ruling circles. The leaders and organisers are placed in a position of not only personal but also of organisational vulnerability. Even should they be prepared to defy the State to fine and/or imprison them, would they also be prepared to damage their organisation, to lose some friends they are cultivating in the circles of political influence? What was one of the strengths of a broad organisation can thus be converted into a weakness, whereas a more radical or even revolutionary organisation, with less influence in influential circles can decide on defiance, risk fines and jail with however perhaps less possibility of influencing official opinion and ultimately, action.

Fortunately in this case one such organisation did step forward and took up the baton: the Trinity College BDS group expressed its solidarity with the IPSC on its treatment by the Gardaí and called their own rally for the exact same place and time as the original one called by the IPSC.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/thousands-attend-rallies-in-irish-cities-in-solidarity-with-palestine-1.4566435

Video of rally at end of demonstration, near Israeli Embassy

Despite concern over Covid19 transmission and Garda threats – and the extremely short notice and much smaller circle of contacts of the TC BDS group — the response was magnificent, both in expression of internationalist solidarity and in maintenance of the right of the people in Ireland to organise such progressive events.

Before the appointed hour, people began to gather in large numbers at the Spire in O’Connell Street, Dublin’s main street and north city centre and, after being addressed by a number of speakers, set off in a march towards the Israeli Zionist Embassy near Ballsbridge, beyond the south city centre. As they marched their numbers grew until, approaching the Embassy, they numbered several thousand. Along the way, bystanders applauded the marchers and passing vehicles blew their horns in solidarity.

A section of the Dublin rally in solidarity with Palestine photographed outside the GPO in the city’s main street before they set off on the 5.5km march to the Israeli Embassy (Photo credit: PA, Breaking News)

Marchers shouted slogans of solidarity with the Palestinians, calling for the freedom of Palestine and the expulsion of the Israeli Ambassador as a mark of the Irish people’s objection to what is being done to the Palestinians.

Near the Embassy, a number of speakers addressed the crowd and after dispersing, a number of demonstrators boarding public transport to return home were congratulated by the drivers.

LESSONS FOR US

The situation regarding calling and holding the demonstration in Dublin outlined some of the weaknesses of a broad organisation when it faces repression from the State and the greater resilience of a smaller organisation in being able to defy the State. It may be necessary in future to maintain support for both types of organisation, each being appropriate for particular situations.

Also demonstrated was the necessity to openly defy unjust laws and prohibitions at times and particularly around the right to organise, to protest and to show solidarity, which the demonstrators did so well on Saturday. Such situations also reveal the difficulty for the Gardaí in carrying out repressive actions and they are reduced to threatening individuals.

THE FAR-RIGHT MARCHES TOO – FOR WHAT?

Meanwhile, a couple of hundred of the far-Right also marched in Dublin, allegedly in defence of civil liberty. Not in solidarity with the Palestinians’ civil liberties and not in defence of our civil liberty to organise to show solidarity with people in other struggles. No, they marched in defence of the right to defy health protection regulations, in proclaiming the Covid19 pandemic to be a) a hoax or b) greatly exaggerated, in claiming that wearing masks damages one’s health and even intelligence(!), in insisting that vaccinations are a) dangerous to one’s health or b) means of injecting nano-machines into people’s bloodstream in order to control them.

A clip posted by Ireland Against Fascism showed one of the QAnon Saturday screechers for months outside the GPO, Dolores Webster, aka Dee Wall, lately self-declared “digital journalist” (don’t laugh), in total ignorance of the actual reality (but when has that mattered?), broadcast a claim by video from her studio (her car), accompanied by the strains of Abba from the headphones of her head-bobbing passenger, that the “scum in the Dawl” had allowed the Palestinian solidarity march to go ahead to distract from the alleged general removal of freedom and in particular from the far-Right group Irish Yellow Vests to hold their rally on May 1st.

When all the Covid19 precautionary restrictions are removed, what will these elements have to march about? The will need to return to the topics that engaged many of them in the recent past: racism, anti-immigrants, islamophobia, homophobia and anti-socialism, along with their false patriotism. None of that is welcome of course but at least it will be without this false concern for “civil rights and freedom” and closer to the reality of what the far-Right in general stand for – and fascists in particular.

SUPERPOWER BACKING AND IMPUNITY

The current atrocities of the Zionist State, which it carries out with impunity, along with its history, starkly reveals the effect of its main backing power, the USA, and the imperialist alliance dominated by that Power. The USA backs Israel with military aid to the tune of $10 Million daily, which is aside from other direct and indirect aid. Israel is the only state in the Middle East which is not only very friendly to the USA but totally dependent on the support of that superpower. For the ruling class of the USA, Israel is the only state in the Middle East which is totally safe forever from fundamentalist Muslim revolution or from left-wing anti-imperialist revolution and is therefore an extremely important factor in the USA’s plans to totally dominate the Middle East.

Solidarity marcher in Dublin on Friday with a home-made placard (Photo Credit: PA, Breaking News.ie)

This imperialist alliance finds reflection not only in the action/ inaction of governments in Europe, for example but also in the reporting of the mass media. One of the latter’s tropes is the constant emphasis on the numbers of Palestinian missiles fired, without revealing their general ineffectiveness in delivering destruction, in total contrast to the Israeli missiles. Another is their constant repetition of a lie, that “Hamas seized power in Gaza”. The truth is that Hamas swept the board in the Palestinian Authority elections in 2006. The “seizing” that was done was by Al Fatah, which usurped the results in the West Bank and installed themselves there; they tried to do the same in Gaza and, in a short fierce struggle, were beaten.

But the Western powers decided that Hamas was illegitimately in power, seized funds due to it and supported its blockading – by both Israel and Egypt. No explanation is offered in the general mass media as to how a generally politically-secular Palestinian public would turn from its decades of allegiance to Fatah to vote for the fundamentalist Muslim Hamas, which was Fatah’s surrender of the goals of Palestinian independence and freedom and the return of the refugees, in exchange for running a colonial administration with opportunities for living off bribery and corruption and Fatah’s settling down to that status quo.

CASTING A GIANT DARK SHADOW

It was not only in Dublin and in towns across Ireland that Palestine solidarity demonstrations were held on May 15th but by people across much of the world, generally in opposition to the wishes of their governments and ruling elites. It is worth thinking about how this has come about, in particular in contradiction to a mass media hostile to the Palestinians.

Palestinians come to view the remains of the tower block that was home to families and that housed a number of media agencies. (Photo source: Internet)

The Zionist state of Israel was declared in 1948, its anniversary actually only three days ago – May 14th, the first states to recognise it being the USA and the USSR. In Ireland at the time, there was general support for the new state which continued to the “June War” of 1967 and somewhat beyond. The general Irish population were horrified by the history of the Nazi-organised Holocaust and sympathised with the Jewish survivors. Irish nationalists and even Republicans empathised with the Zionist civil and armed struggle against the British (who, ironically, had begun the process of Zionisisation of Palestine). The 1966 film Cast a Giant Shadow purporting to show that struggle, starring Kirk Douglas and a cameo appearance by Frank Sinatra, was widely enjoyed and cheered in cinemas across Ireland. Though some of the film’s characters were based on real-life counterparts, the general narrative was a grotesque distortion, hiding the massacres of Palestinians and the expulsion of thousands as the Zionist state was created.

Many Irish language supporters admired how the new state had brought the Hebrew language, for centuries only spoken in religious contexts, back into everyday usage.

Solidarity marcher in Dublin on Friday with a home-made placard and a thought-provoking message (Photo Credit: Sam Boal, The Journal)

Yet, a few years ago, general pro-Palestinian sympathy across Ireland had become so strong that Israel’s Ambassador to Ireland declared the country “the most anti-semitic in Europe”. That of course is what the Zionists call anyone who supports the Palestinians or criticises the Israeli state harshly and only a few days ago, the current Ambassador accused some politicians of spewing hate towards Israel. He was responding not only to Left and Sinn Féin TDs who criticised the actions of Israel towards the Palestinians, but also to the Tánaiste (Deputy Prime Minister equivalent) Leo Varadkar who commented that Israel’s actions are “indefensible” and Government Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney, who said at an EU conference that the EU had “fallen short” and failed to project its influence in agreeing a common position in opposition to illegal activity by the Israelis against Palestinians.

Palestinian solidarity march in Cork on Saturday (Photo source: Internet)

The fact that establishment right-wing politicians feel obliged to take a public stand, however ineffectively, against actions of the Israeli Zionists and implicitly against the Zionists’ biggest international backer and world superpower, the USA, is a strong indication of how much Irish public opinion has changed over decades. Since the Cast a Giant Shadow film, the state’s shadow of which we are aware now is indeed frighteningly giant and very dark. In response, the natural cultural and historical feelings of the Irish people have stirred in sympathy with the oppressed Palestinians – and in defiance of threatened police repression at home.

end.

SOURCES

Coverage of events in Ireland: https://www.thejournal.ie/peacful-protests-solidarity-with-palestine-5438356-May2021/

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/thousands-attend-rallies-in-irish-cities-in-solidarity-with-palestine-1.4566435

https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/protests-held-around-the-country-in-support-of-palestine-1127787.html

Recent reports on the conflict: https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/national-international/weary-gaza-marks-muslim-feast-as-violence-spreads-in-israel/2812715/

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-57138996

Israeli Ambasador to Ireland clashing with politicians: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/israeli-ambassador-accuses-some-tds-of-spewing-hate-towards-jewish-state-1.4564184

CÚPLA MÍLE PROTESTORS RATHER THAN MÍLE FÁILTE FOR TRUMP’S VISIT

On By rebelbreezeIn Anti-War, Cultural Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Irish Language, Irish Left, National Liberation, Palestine3 Comments

Diarmuid Breatnach

          Ireland has broken off its love affair with the USA but the breakup’s been coming for a long time. Of course it was always a kind of mythical USA that was the love object, of film stars, rock n’ roll, friendly presidents, Irish-U.Stater politicians, of U.Stater tourists – never the real USA, good or bad. One could feel the tensions in the relationship during the Viet Nam War, though that was mostly to be seen in the youth and some lefties. But then came the lying scandals in the US Presidency of Nixon and Clinton and the naked warmongering throughout all, including the Bushes, Snr. and Jnr.

Looking southward from around the middle of the crowd in front of the Garden of Remembrance, Parnell Square, Dublin. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

          Ireland, below the level of its Gombeen politicians, has split up with the USA (at the level of ITS politicians and millionaires [often the same thing]) but it has been a relatively civilised breakup and thankfully with no children (well, apart from the Irish illegal immigrants – sorry, undocumented visitors).

While some businesses in an Dún Beag might have turned a profit out the Fear Mór’s visit, having the Chief of the World Superpower drop in on us has cost us – around 10 million euro, according to the Irish Independent. Loads of extra Gardaí on the ground in Co. Clare and Limerick, in the air and on sea, does not come cheap (though I’m sure the overtime was welcome). All would have been bad enough if we had invited him but we hadn’t. Will the Irish Government present the US Presidency with an itemised bill? Probably not.

Blimp rising — taken from northern edge of rally.
(Photo: D. Breatnach)

At the invitation of The Irish Examiner, a number of organisations and individuals had written letters to Trump for publication (see link below); most were critical and these included Amnesty International, Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, National Union of Journalists, National Women’s Council of Ireland, National Union of Students; Brendan Ogle, Tara Flynn and Clare Daly. For entertainment value I’d pick out the IPSC’s and Tara Flynn’s (well, she is a comedian). The ICCL also had a newspaper advertisement criticising Trump, which was sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union and figured logos of a number of other civil rights organisations.

There were protests in various parts of the country, including one to greet his arrival at Shannon airport (hopefully US munitions and troop carriers were pulled to one side so as not to hinder his landing). The Irish Times said there were about 200 protesters there so, on past reporting, there could have been anything between 300 and 1,000. It is not easy to get to Shannon airport unless one has a car, even from Galway the gaps between bus arrival times are substantial. And no train station.

(Photo: G.Guilfoyle)

DUBLIN RALLY

          Dublin had a showy and packed anti-Trump rally, with a Baby Trump blimp floating above the crowd outside the Garden of Remembrance. An activist brought big letter placards which, with the help of volunteers from the crowd, spelled out anti-trump messages in English and in Irish. Indeed an interesting feature was a number of placards partly or completely in Irish.

(Photo: D.Breatnach)

(Photo: G.Guilfoyle)

The theme of “welcome” or “fáilte” was of course played upon in reverse, in speech and placard, with more than a hinted reference to the old Bord Fáilte slogan inviting tourists to the land of “céad míle fáilte”.

On this placard play is made of the old “Céad míle fáilte” sentence (“a 100,000 welcomes”) but with a different twist.

The event was managed by Unite Against Racism which is, for the most part, People Before Profit, which in turn is really the Socialist Workers’ Party. A number of other left-wing party flags could be seen too. A group of Shinners were at the rally with their trademark flags (never go anywhere without the party’s flag) but no “dissidents” were present as a group, though I certainly noted some as individuals.

The speakers at the rally covered a number of themes, including of course misogyny, migrants, Palestine, war-making and imperialism. Liam Herrick of the ICCL was an unusual sight to see on an outdoors protest platform, speaking at the second part of the rally. Curiously, the rally organisers had sent a major part of the attendance off to march around the city centre for awhile and of course, when they got back, they had shed a great part of their numbers. A torrential downpour no doubt encouraged the desertions.

Glenda, “the woman of letters”, with some of her work.

Coming towards the end of the rally, a performer accompanied himself on guitar while he rendered some songs for the diminished attendance. Woody Guthrie’s “Plane Crash at Los Gatos” (also known as “Deportees”) would have been an apposite choice, a song about Mexican labourers being employed in the south-eastern US fruit harvests and then driven back across the Border. Guthrie was moved to sing about them when in 1948 a plane carrying mostly deported Mexicans crashed, killing all on board and though the names of the crew were given in the news reports, the Mexicans were referred to only as “deportees”.

At the rally, eventually Trump was deflated (the blimp, I mean), tethering weight bags emptied of water, placards were packed, flags furled …. and I went to get some shopping.

End.

(Photo: G.Guilfoyle)

(Photo: G.Guilfoyle)

(Photo: G.Guilfoyle)

(Photo: D.Breatnach)

REFERENCES AND FURTHER INFORMATION:

https://www.independent.ie/world-news/north-america/president-trump/ring-of-steel-to-protect-trump-for-two-days-will-cost-10m-38173483.html

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/specialreports/letters-to-the-president-dear-mr-trump–928499.html?fbclid=IwAR0j1hb62cIjBWLxTaXhVwlUCaVaCD76SX-78s_RRJX1aN7ZJTOH2iJDwuU

CELEBRATED PALESTINIAN CARTOONIST EXHIBITS IN IRISH CITIES

On By rebelbreezeIn Cartoon, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, PalestineLeave a comment
(Lots of images but text reading time less than 5 minutes)

Diarmuid Breatnach

As Palestinians and their supporters around the world mark anniversaries of the Return to Palestine demonstrations and Land Day, Israeli snipers kill Palestinian children.  Dublin marks the day with a solidarity rally and exhibitions and talks by internationally-recognised Palestinian cartoonist Mohammad Saba’aneh.

          The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign organised a rally to mark the anniversary of the start of the Return to Palestine demonstrations last year and also Land Day. Sadly, marking a Palestinian anniversary usually involves marking the deaths of martyrs and this was no exception, as Israeli Occupation Force snipers killed four demonstrators, three of them 17 years of age.

Section of the Palestine solidarity rally at the Spire in O’Connell Street, as it was ending.

After the rally, of which I just caught the tail end because of the weekly Save Moore Street From Demolition campaign duty, I managed to catch the exhibition of noted Palestinian political cartoonist Mohammad Saba’aneh and to buy his book PALESTINE in black and white. Sadly, a prior appointment meant I had to miss his talk, which I would have loved to attend, especially as I dabble a little in cartoon-drawing myself.

The World (or its governments, including the Arab countries) ignores the oppression of Palestinians by the Israeli Zionists. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

Fortunately, Mohammad Saba’aneh was still there and was kind enough to autograph his book for me. When I took a photo of him with Fatin Al Tamimi, photographer and Chairperson of the IPSC, she insisted on taking a photo of me with him too – shukran.

Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh and myself. (Photo: Fatin Al Tamimi with my camera phone)

Photographer and Chairperson IPSC with Artist Mohammad Saba’aneh.

On Thursday, Saba’aneh had also given a talk at the National College of Art & Design, along with Tuqa Al Saraj, also a Palestinian artist but today based in Dublin.

Mohammad Saba’aneh was born in 1978 in Ramallah in occupied Palestine, where he still lives. He is a Palestinian painter and caricaturist who has been imprisoned by Israel because of his art. He has a daily cartoon in the Palestinian newspaper al-Hayat al-Jadida and his work features in publications across the Arab world.

A veritable cartoon strip. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

HELPING THE DEAF AND THE TRAUMATISED WITH CARTOONS

          Saba’aneh used caricature with deaf students to help them adopt another language to express their feelings and with children who witnessed an Israeli assault to help them psychologically. He took part in many workshops designed for children to develop critical thinking. Saba’aneh was responsible for organizing an international fair at Mahmoud Darwish museum in 2014 in which more than 100 international artists participated. Freedom House chose one of his works in 2016 as one of the year’s most important photos. His first book was published in the US in April 2017.

Children in Israeli Zionist jails — one of my favourites. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

INTERNATIONAL WORK AND RECOGNITION

          Saba’aneh is the Middle East representative for Cartoonist Rights Network International and the Palestinian ambassador for United Sketches, an international association for freedom of expression and cartoonists in exile and participated in many international publications such as The truth has more than one face in Europe and Sketch of Freedom in the US. He. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2017 Marseille International Cartoon Festival Prix d’Or. Pulitzer–winning cartoonist Matt Wuerker described him as “an inspiration for cartoonists around the world.” Noted graphic journalist Joe Sacco has said of this work that it is a “gut punch that gets straight to the essence of the stark reality of Palestinian life under Israeli occupation.”

Life for children in Palestine under the Israeli Zionists. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

PROGRAM DATES:

Thursday 28th March – NCAD (Dublin), 7pm, Harry Clarke Lecture Theatre
Friday 29th March – TCD (Dublin), 3pm, Room LTEE1, Hamilton Building
Saturday 30th March – Dublin, 2.30pm, The Pearse Centre, 27 Pearse St

All of the above now over.


Monday 1st April – Waterford, 7.30pm, The Tower Hotel
Tuesday 2nd April – Limerick, 8pm, Perys Hotel
Wednesday 3rd April – Galway, 7pm, Black Gate Cultural Centre
Thursday 4th April – Maynooth University, 4pm, Venue TBC (Afternoon)
Thursday 4th April – Celbridge, 8pm, Celbridge Manor Hotel

End.

Judicial Justice under the Israeli Zionists. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

SOURCES:

Background information: Wikipedia and IPSC FB page

Photos (unless otherwise indicated): D.Breatnach

LINKS:

IPSC: https://www.facebook.com/groups/20826333992/

Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

A nod to Michaelangelo’s the “Birth of Adam”. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

 

 

 

The cost of NOT boycotting Israeli products. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

Posters on railings outside Pearse House.

Praise for Sen. Frances Black’s Bill to ban imports from the “Occupied Territories”. Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

 

Artist: Mohammad Saba’aneh.

Symbols in Palestinian cartoons. The Key for the right to return is somewhat of an irony, as when the Christian Spanish Monarchs expelled the Sephardic Jews from Al Andalus, many of them also took the key to their house with them.

 

 

 

DUBLIN PALESTINIAN SOLIDARITY DEMONSTRATION – CROWD CALLS FOR EXPULSION OF ISRAELI AMBASSADOR

On By rebelbreezeIn Civil Rights, Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

The regular blowing of horns by passing motorists, including taxis and buses, would have indicated that something of interest was happening in the city centre yesterday, Monday 5th June. As people came within sight of the centre of O’Connell Street, they could also see the Palestinian flags flying, the banners and the placards.

View of the rally on the east side of the central pedestrian reservation, looking southwards. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

The Great Return March

The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign had convened a rally of hundreds in the central pedestrian reservation of O’Connell Street, main street of Ireland’s capital city, near to the Spire and opposite the historic and iconic building, the General Post Office. Billed as a rally in solidarity with the Great Return March of Palestinians, demonstrators carried placards denouncing the shooting dead by Israeli soldiers of demonstrators as well as of journalists and paramedics. The Palestinian death toll since March 30th has reached 120, with over 5,500 injured. Palestinians have also accused Israeli snipers, when they wish not to kill, of shooting young men through parts of their legs calculated to ensure permanent disability. The shooting dead of unarmed protesters, the killing of paramedics and journalists (who wear clearly identifiable clothing), are all crimes according to international law but, as Palestinians and their supporters repeatedly ask, who will hold Israel to account?

A view of part of the rally on the central pedestrian reservation, looking southwards.
(Photo: D. Breatnach)

The demonstrators being targeted by Israeli military are protesting the expulsion by Israel of 700,000 of what was then the majority Arab population of Palestine in 1948, followed by their exclusion and that of their descendants from Israeli-controlled Palestine. There are an estimated four million Palestinians 1 barred from entry to Palestine, their lands or those of their grandparents, while anybody in the world who can prove his or her Jewishness, even though their families had not lived there for thousands of years2, can gain entry and claim Israeli citizenship.

Placards held by supporters in the rally yesterday upheld the right of the Palestinians to return to their homeland. It is ironic that the Zionists since 1924 at least have been upholding that demand for people who had never set foot in the land, nor whose ancestors had not for thousands of years but are denying that right to Palestinians driven out within living memory and their descendants.

View of the rally on the west side of the central pedestrian reservation, sretching southwards. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

Speaking through a microphone, Martin Quigley thanked those attending the rally and after some remarks, introduced the Chairperson of the IPSC, Fatin Al Tamimi. Speaking about the right of return of Palestinians, Tamimi also said that she had relatives in both Hebron (West Bank) and in the Gaza strip and spoke about the privations of the people there blockaded by Israel, including contaminated water and lack of electricity. However not only is Israel guilty but also Egypt, as Tamimi alluded to when she said that Egypt had only temporarily opened the Rafah Crossing Gate, which Egypt maintains, for the feast of Ramadan, as a result of which she was expecting to be able to see her sister for the first time in seven years (the crowd cheered and applauded this news).

Marting Quigley for IPSC. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

“Expel the Israeli Ambassador and close down the Embassy!”

Two other Palestinian speakers addressed the rally, including one who had come out through that very Rafah crossing, Asad abu Shark who was introduced as from the Great March of Return and Ahmad El Habbash, introduced as representing the Palestinian Community in All Ireland3. All speakers drew attention to the Nakba (from Yawm an-Nakba, meaning “Day of the Catastrophe”, referring to the expulsion of thousands of Palestinians in 1948 –), to the right of return, the terrible conditions within the Gaza strip (which place, they said, would become uninhabitable by 2020 — see link), the impunity of the Israeli authorities and the inactivity of “the international community”.

Fatin Al Tamimi, Chairperson of IPSC, addressing the rally.
(Photo: D. Breatnach)

Al Tamimi was cheered loudly when she called for the expulsion of the Israeli Ambassador to Ireland and the closure of the Israeli Embassy, a call repeated by other speakers.

Ronit Lenten, who introduced herself as “an Israeli Jew” and representing Academics For Palestine (Ireland), also spoke briefly.

Last to speak was John Lyons, a Dublin City Councillor for the People Before Profit party, who made similar points. Referring to visit of his own to Palestine he referred to the courage and persistence of the Palestinians in merely trying to live their daily lives under the conditions of Israeli military occupation, apartheid and harassment and called on the Irish people to match that determination in taking action in solidarity with the Palestinians.

An Ireland-based Palestinian speaker addressing the rally. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

Throughout the speeches, the solidarity beeping of horns of passing car and bus drivers could be heard and occasionally shouts of encouragement from open bus or car windows.

Bill to ban imports from Occupied Territories

All speaker highlighted the importance of the BDS campaign (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) and the need for Irish people to contact their elected public representatives to ask them for concrete action in support of Israel, including for a Bill to be introduced in the Seanad by Senator Francis Black, (well-known singer, also campaigner for human rights and for support for recovery from alcohol addiction). The Bill in question is the Occupied Territories Bill, the intention of which is to place a national ban on any products shown to be exported from territories under illegal occupation. The Bill, a draft of which has already been approved in committee (see link), is expected to go before the Seanad in July, though that may change and, if passed twice there, will go on to the Oireachtas for debate and, if passed there, into Irish law.

One of the IPSC’s leafleters and passers-by who have just accepted a leaflet. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

Calling on all present to stay in touch with the IPSC or with other Palestine solidarity organisation, Martin Quigley brought the event to an end by leading the rally in leading a number of chants: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” “Free, free Palestine!” “One, two, three, four – occupation no more!” “Five, six, seven, eight – Israel is a fascist state!”

Early moments as Palestinian supporters gather, view northwards. (Photo: D. Breatnach)

Argentina cancels scheduled football match with Israel. Dozens of Palestine flags defy GAA ban.

In a separate but related development, the national soccer team of Argentina yielded to calls to abandon its scheduled ‘friendly’ match with the Israeli national soccer team (see relevant link). Strong advocacy for the cancellation had been brought about by the movement for BDS both within and outside Argentina but statements of team officials to the media made it appear that members of the team had been threatened (but without producing any evidence of such).

And on Sunday, dozens of Palestinian flags were flown during a match at Omagh between Senior Gaelic Football teams Tyrone and Monaghan. The actions seemed not only to represent solidarity with the Palestinians at this time but also defiance of GAA officials who had removed flags and a banner at a previous match (see relevant link).

 

End.

POSTSCRIPT:

Palestinian solidarity demonstration in Dublin Friday 8th June (not organised by IPSC).
(Photo: D.Breatnach)

Footnotes:

1 “Today the number who qualify for UNRWA’s (United Nations Refugee and Welfare Agency) services has grown to over 4 million. One third of whom live in the West Bank and Gaza; slightly less than one third in Jordan; 17% in Syria and Lebanon (Bowker, 2003, p. 72) and around 15% in other Arab and Western countries. Approximately 1 million refugees have no form of identification other than an UNRWA identification card.”

2Or the many Jewish converts who never had any contact whatsoever with Palestine.

3 Actually no individual or separate organisation can claim legitimately to “represent the Palestine community in Ireland or anywhere” but there does exist a Palestinian organisation in Ireland which has appropriated that title as its organisational name. A number of different organisations (and none) find support among the general expatriate Palestinian community, including Hamas, Al Fatah and perhaps the PFLP.

Links:

Expulsion of Palestinians from their homeland and statistics on refugees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Palestinian_exodus#Palestinian_refugees

IPSC: http://www.ipsc.ie/ and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/IrelandPSC/

Sadaka Ireland: http://www.sadaka.ie/

Frances Black‘s Occupied Territories Bill: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/oireachtas-to-table-bill-on-goods-from-illegal-israeli-occupations-1.3308838

Living conditions in Gaza — “uninhabitable by 2020”:

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/middle-east/gaza-could-be-uninhabitable-by-2020-un-warns-1.2337255

Cancelation by Argentina of match against Israel (this report doesn’t mention alleged threats): https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/06/palestinians-argentina-cancels-israel-game-180606113926752.html

Dozens of Palestinian flags defy GAA ban: http://www.irishnews.com/news/2018/06/04/news/dozens-of-palestinian-flags-flown-at-healy-park-despite-ulster-council-saying-they-are-banned-1346368/?param=ds12rif76F

“The Occupation of the American Mind”

On By rebelbreezeIn Cultural Comment, Current Affairs Comment, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, US Imperialism, USALeave a comment

Narrated by Roger Waters of the Pink Floyd band, a useful documented discussion on how the population of the USA, the main political and financial supporter of the Israeli Zionist State, is conned into supporting Israel.

NB: “The US mind” is the subject, not “the American mind” — there is no reference to Latin American or Canadian thinking on the issue.

The film exposes the use of the US media combined with Israeli propaganda, pressure on politicians and media figures and demonisation of opponents.

Interestingly, at least one prominent commentator argues that the USA agrees with Israeli policy largely because it agrees with its own — but doesn’t tell us what that US policy is, much less explain it.  Perhaps that’s beyond the film’s scope or the film is aimed at liberal opinion and exposing naked imperialism would be going too far — but in places, the narrative does hint at it.

Interestingly too that line of argument undermines the narrative that the Israel lobby (incorrectly termed “the Jewish lobby”) is the dominant factor is US policy towards Israel.  A USA Jew also points out that most of his co-religionists in the US do not agree with the hard, right-wing, neo-liberal politics of the Israeli leaders.

Worryingly, in reference to a strand of fundamentalist Christianity in the US which supports Israeli policy, a commentator tells us that one in three US citizens believes that the Bible is factual.

But very encouragingly, the film argues that Israel is at last — finally — losing its propaganda grip on US youth in the colleges and in black communities.

Worth watching to understand the history of US public support for Israel but also to learn how untruthful propaganda works with regard to words.


http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=21527

ISRAEL: FREE ALL THE CHILDREN!

On By rebelbreezeIn Civil Rights, Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Prisoners1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

 

A dense crowd gathered outside Leinster House, home of the Dáil (Irish Parliament), at lunchtime today. Palestinian flags were in evidence as was a banner denouncing the jailing of Palestinian children by the Israeli authorities. Some passing drivers tooted their horns in solidarity.

View of section of crowd outside the Dáil
(Photo: D.Breatnach)

A hollow space existed inside the crowd where young people knelt, blindfolded and with hands bound, to represent children taken prisoner by the Israeli state. According to the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which organised the solidarity protest, between 500 and 700 children are detained every year by the Israeli military, i.e up to an average of two a day.

Young people acting as Palestinian children arrested by Israeli military (Photo: D.Breatnach)

The protest was attended by many TDs (members of the Irish Parliament) and Senators comprising a broad representation of political parties and independents. Ibrahim Halawa, the Irish citizen who was arrested by Egyptian police while still a minor of 17 years of age, subsequently to spend four years in jail without trial, also attended.

Young woman representing Palestinian children jailed by the Israeli authorities
(Photo: D.Breatnach)

IPSC Chairperson Fatin Al Tamimi addressed the gathering and referred to “Israel’s apartheid prison system where torture and ill treatment during arrest and detention are routine, including horrendous abuses against children.” Tamimi went on to say, to loud applause: “Apartheid Israel must be held to account for its outrageous treatment of Palestinian children which violates the right of the child.”

After the protest a letter was handed in to the Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs calling on the “the Irish Government to do all it possibly can to end these abuses of Palestinian children by Apartheid Israel. More than just condemnation, action is needed to bring pressure to bear of Israel to end these attacks on children, children who have known nothing but occupation and systemic violence their whole lives. Palestinians, not least Palestinian children, deserve freedom, justice and equality.”

The Irish Government action required was not specified but over the years demands have been made to call the Israeli Ambassador in for censure or even to expel him but no such action has taken place. As a participant on the demonstration said: “When the Irish Government did not even take serious action at the use of forged Irish passports by Mossad assassination squads, you know that they are not going to do anything about Palestinian children being jailed and ill-treated.” (The Irish Government expelled one minor diplomat only over that revelation in 2010 and even then the Ambassador stated that he could not guarantee that such faked passports would not be used again).

Photos of a small sample of detained children
(Photo: D.Breatnach)

Photos of another small sample of Palestinian children detained by Israeli Occupation Force
(Photo: D.Breatnach)

WIDESCALE VIOLATION OF THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

According to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, apart from rights to survival (violated by Israel in its 2014 bombardment of Gaza, for example, when it killed 504 children and made thousands homeless), and adequate living standards (also violated by Israel in Gaza with damaged sewage treatment plants and water, power and fuel restrictions), children also have

  1. Development rights: include the right to education, play, leisure, cultural activities, access to information, and freedom of thought, conscience and religion.
  2. Protection rights: ensure children are safeguarded against all forms of abuse, neglect and exploitation, including special care for refugee children; safeguards for children in the criminal justice system; protection for children in employment; protection and rehabilitation for children who have suffered exploitation or abuse of any kind.
  3. Participation rights: encompass children’s freedom to express opinions, to have a say in matters affecting their own lives, to join associations and to assemble peacefully. As their capacities develop, children should have increasing opportunity to participate in the activities of society, in preparation for adulthood.

By jailing children, Israel is violating the rights of the child in each of these three broad categories above. Yet, according to UNICEF, only two states have currently failed to ratify the Convention after signing: the USA and Somalia. In other words, Israel has signed it but clearly is violating it as a matter of course.

Trials of Palestinian children have a 99.74% conviction rate, and “do not meet international standards for fair trial” according to Amnesty International. According to the IPSC, many more children are temporarily detained, sometimes taken by soldiers raiding homes in the dead of night, and later released after severe interrogation periods without prosecution. Defence for Children International Palestine states that some two-thirds of all children detained will face some sort of physical or mental abuses, including torture and sexual threats, during this process. UNICEF says that “Ill-treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system appears to be widespread, systematic and institutionalised”.

According to the IPSC, “over 12,000 Palestinian children have gone through the Israeli prison system since 2000, while nearly 2,500 have been killed and countless thousands wounded. In Gaza alone, where children have borne the brunt of three vicious Israeli assaults over the past decade, UNRWA estimates that “more than 300,000 children are in need of psycho-social support”.”

(Photo: D.Breatnach)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LINKS, SOURCES:

http://www.ipsc.ie/child-prisoners/pictures-solidarity-ahed-tamimi-palestinian-child-prisoners
https://www.unicef.org/crc/index_30229.html