A few weeks ago, I wrote a post called “Why You Shouldn’t Stay Neutral On Palestine”.
I argued against the idea that we should try to fix Irish problems but not international problems. Now, I still agree with the general premise of what I wrote, that there is no particular reason why Irish lives or Irish issues have more worth or deserve more consideration that Palestinian lives or Palestinian issues. And I still agree with the idea that there is no need to make a choice, that you can support helping Irish people and support helping Palestinians, indeed, the people I voted for in the elections earlier this year were in favour of both.
So yeah, I still agree broadly with what I said all those weeks ago (or was it months ago? The older I get the less concept of the passage of time I have.) The lives, the health, and the hopes and dreams, of every human being matter whether they were born in Ireland, Palestine, France, the U.S, Greenland, or any country you could name. So I reject the idea that “we need to worry about Irish problems and not overseas ones.”
However, as I finished up the post and made it go “live” on my blog, I had this troubling little feeling that there was something else I needed to say that I didn’t say, and later on in the day, it clicked with me what it was.
That is, the mass slaughter of Palestinians IS an Irish problem.
So, you’re not convinced that we should worry about international problems as much as we should worry about Irish problems? You think we should only worry about fixing things at home and not problems abroad? Fine, if you can’t be persuaded otherwise, then, in order to be logically consistent, you still need to be protesting Israel’s vile destruction of Palestine. Let me explain.
To understand what’s going on, you need to understand that Ireland is only “sort of” neutral. I support Ireland’s position of neutrality, not because I support states of “neutrality” in general, I’m not neutral on whether murder or arson is bad to take two examples, but Ireland’s position of military neutrality allows this country to stay out of military conflicts that would get a tiny island like Ireland bombed off the face of the Earth.
So I agree with Irish neutrality to the extent that it does exist. But remember, it only kind of sort of maybe perhaps exists!
In fact, it’s not uncommon when talking about neutrality for Irish people to kind of smirk, if not laugh out loud. Sure, we’re supposed to be neutral, but we all kind of know it’s bullshit.
And what is probably the center of the violations of Irish neutrality, is Shannon airport.
https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/ireland-fight-end-us-military-use-shannon-airport
https://www.irishcentral.com/news/politics/shannon-airport-iran
I remember when Ireland participated in the “War On Terror” by letting U.S planes land in Shannon airport. I remember, all through primary and secondary school, learning that Ireland was a neutral country, we stay out of military conflicts. And now, despite that proud tradition (if it was ever real to begin with), Ireland was participating in the horrific Iraq war? And it made me quite cynical, it gave me an even greater understanding of the fact that the Irish government loves nothing more than saying one thing and doing another.
And I thought about how Ireland is not exactly a strong military country. I’m not sure Ireland could survive a war with even, I dunno, the Isle Of Man to be honest. I did not like how the “neutrality but only when it suits us” potentially put a target on the back of our small island.
So Ireland has been only sort of kind of maybe perhaps neutral when it came to the U.S’s horrible war against Iraq, and when it came to the U.S’s ongoing conflict with Iran. So, do you really believe Ireland is going to hesitate to support Israel?
Now, I know what you might be thinking, wasn’t there a video a few weeks ago where the Taoiseach said nice stuff about Palestine and stuff? Yeah, I saw that video too, here it is.
In this video, Taoiseach Simon Harris announces that he recognizes Palestine, and two other countries, Spain and Norway, did likewise. And at the time, I admit that I did feel hope. The leader of my country (so it seemed) was taking the position that Israel’s genocidal madness had to stop. I did feel a bit of hope, but it was a cautious hope, and sadly, the “cautious” part of that hope seems to be more and more validated every day.
Now that the hope in this announcement has largely died off, I have a more cynical view on what Mr Harris was doing with that announcement. He’s not stupid, he knows that in ten or twenty years, the genocide in Gaza will be recognized by pretty much everyone as an absolutely abhorrent violation of everything that is just and right. Give it a decade or two, and there’ll be no, “Oh Lord isn’t it terrible, BUT” it’ll just be, “What a horrific tragedy, how could anyone just stand by and let it happen?” Indeed, twenty years from now, if I’m talking to someone who today is a small child, I don’t know how I’m going to explain to them that yeah, there were plenty of people who just didn’t care.
But, Simon Harris made an announcement when he said the genocide is bad and stuff! So twenty years from now, his legacy will be safe! At least that’s his hope, but my hope is that people will remember how when it came to Palestine the scales were more sharply tipped towards words than action.
Because the truth is, the Irish state says one thing, “We recognize the state of Palestine” and does another, i.e, supports the continuing mass murder of Palestinians.
If the Irish government wanted to, they could pass the Occupied Territories Bill, which is:
“Bill entitled an Act to give effect to the State’s obligations arising under the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War and under customary international humanitarian law; and for that purpose to make it an offence for a person to import or sell goods or services originating in an occupied territory or to extract resources from an occupied territory in certain circumstances; and to provide for related matters”
https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/bills/bill/2018/6/
So if Simon Harris really thinks Palestine is lovely and that it shouldn’t be destroyed and oh isn’t it terrible, he wouldn’t hesitate to pass this bill surely?
Well, no, his excuse is that he can’t pass it because the mean old E.U won’t let him!
However, two legal experts, Takis Tridimas of King’s College London and Panos Koutrakos of the City University of London, have stated that Ireland is allowed to pass the Occupied Territories Bill despite E.U law.
So, we have Simon Harris saying, “Oh I’d love to help Palestine, I actually have at least one Palestinian friend, but, oh it’s the E.U you see, the E.U won’t let me,” and when he’s told the E.U won’t stop him from passing it, he just, I suppose, puts his fingers in his ears and says, “I’m not listening.”
So, to summarize, if your position is that the Irish should stay out of international issues and focus on fixing Irish issues. I disagree with you. I strongly disagree with you in fact. We will probably never agree on this point.
However, if I fail to convince you otherwise, that’s fine. But if you want to be morally and logically consistent, you still need to be fighting Ireland’s complicity in Israel’s horrific mass murder in Palestine. That IS an Irish issue. How could what horrific crimes our government chooses to participate in not be an Irish issue?
It’s time to stop pretending. To stop pretending that it’s possible to believe only Irish issues matter, while at the very same time, look the other way while Ireland participates in the mass slaughter of innocent men women and children. Either your conscience will force you to care about these people, because no matter where they are from, they are your fellow human beings, or you will have to recognize that Simon Harris’s genuflecting to both the U.S and Israel is, very much, an Irish issue.
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