Archive for the ‘Anti War Movements’ Category
USA President Genocide Joe Biden
What public figure do you disagree with the most?
Genocide Joe Biden has the blood of thousands of innocent Gazans on his hands.
“Vote Left” Transfer Pact in June 2024 Irish Elections? – A Positive People Before Profit Initiative
People Before Profit is proposing a “Vote Left” transfer pact to operate in the June 2024 Local and European Elections, 26 Counties
Presenting this positive initiative Paul Murphy TD said
He was fully aware that there would be different perspectives and, but People Before Profit “sees this as just the start of a process to form a left alternative.”
Paul Murphy TD
Link :
PBP Vote Left Transfer Pact Proposal
A useful detailed discussion is taking place on the Cedar Lounge Revolution Blog
(Link : The Cedar Lounge Revolution)
A correspondent, IrishElectionLiterature, opened the discussion on a positive note :
Link :
Vote left, Transfer left, Then What?
In the article below, important points from the discussion are highlighted.
This is a serious matter, especially in a context where it is necessary to confront and defeat the extreme racist right.
Colm Breathnach offers a very good template :
Just a personal thing, but here’s my own general set of rules when it comes to voting where a Proportional Representation system is in operation (obviously First Pat The Post system is much more challenging in terms of decisions):
- Start with the furthest left and keep voting until you reach the border of what you consider to be the left (for me, that’s social democratic or social liberal parties). Of course that border can shift – the Irish Greens were once inside my border of “left”, now they are definitely outside.
- Exclude candidates who consistently hold reactionary positions regardless of their ostensible politics – favour genocide, homophobic etc etc. So the Daly’s of the world don’t feature or let’s say a centre left candidate who justified Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
- Adjust to take account of specific concerns which one might deem important for progress to radical transformation of society. So for example you may alter your ranking to the take into account the candidates position on climate change or Irish unity etc.
Colm continues :
Read the rest of this entry »Ireland’s Open(ish) Border : “selective Garda passport checks on the Border already take place, at times on the basis of quite blatant racial discrimination” – Statement by Human Rights Organisations and Trade Unions
A number of Irish human rights organizations and Trade Unions have issued a very strong statement following a stampede of racist publicity concerning “Open Borders”.
Here is an example from the Sunday Independent (May 5 2025)
Do you believe there should be checkpoints at the border with Northern Ireland to limit the number of asylum-seekers coming from the U.K.?
The newspaper published this summary of its survey :
Once again, Andrew Flood offers a devastating reply
With the trap carefully baited & Sinn Féin blundering into it here’s the spring being sprung. Farage & Dowson cackling with glee as their weird investment pays off. It’s a trap all the way down of course because …
Andrew Flood
It gets dafter – 82% want to go through an expensive deportation process to somewhere we have a common travel area with & where people deported can just walk back across any of the 400+ border crossing points again you can see where accepting this logic rapidly leads
Andrew Flood
Massive Public Support for Pro-Palestine Encampment at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) – Book of Kells Closed Indefinitely
Palestine Solidarity at the centre of Dublin City – May 5 2024
#DivestNow #AcademicBoycott
Irish Times Report, May 5 2024; Ronan McGreevy, Fiachra Gallagher
Trinity College Dublin closed ‘until further notice’ as protest against Israel ties continues
Several dozen students who have set up camp on the university’s grounds, blockading entrance to Book of Kells, say they will remain ‘indefinitely’ until demands are met
Read the rest of this entry »Dublin Far-Right Racist Connections – A Sunday Independent story highlighted by Paul Murphy TD
Far-right racists regularly target Paul Murphy TD (People Before Profit), Dublin South-West. These sinister activists picket the homes of elected politicians; a few days ago they targeted the home of Green Party Minister Roderic O’Gorman, who is gay and is responsible for the housing of immigrants.
Paul Murphy observes :
Good that some media is finally drawing the obvious link between the far-right and the disgusting intimidatory scenes outside Roderic O’Gorman’s house.
This isn’t a lack of civility in politics.
It’s an organised attempt to undermine democratic rights.
https://twitter.com/paulmurphy_TD/status/1781954648292683804?t=c3ttmKhAR-_G9oNaoBVPyA&s=19
Picketing family homes is from the same playbook as burning 🔥 immigrants’ accommodation, city centre riots such as November 23 2023 in Dublin, and propaganda attacking the rights of specific national groups.
We offer one example: Ukrainians forced to live in Ireland, fleeing from Russia’s genocidal war.
Read the rest of this entry »Stormont 1st Minister O’Neill (Sinn Féin) and Deputy 1st Minister Little-Pengelly (DUP) met US firm supplying Israeli military in Washington DC
Gerry Carroll, a People Before Profit member of the Stormont Assembly in Belfast, raises very disturbing questions.
This is a Suzanne Breen Belfast Telegraph Report, April 18 2024
People Before Profit MLA Gerry Carroll has slammed Michelle O’Neill and Emma Little-Pengelly for meeting a US engineering company which supplies the Israeli military with machinery to use in Gaza.
During their visit to Washington last month, the First Minister and Deputy First Minister met with Caterpillar, which provides its huge D9R armoured bulldozers to Israel.
The machines have a highly controversial history.
They were also used in the 2008-09 Gaza War, which left up to 1,400 people dead.
In 2003, American peace activist Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by a D9R as she tried to stop a bulldozer demolishing Palestinian homes in southern Gaza.
Mr Carroll lambasted Ms O’Neill and Ms Little-Pengelly for also meeting Israeli-founded cybersecurity firm Forescout, which has a contract with the US Department of Defense.
He said: “It is deplorable for the First and Deputy First Minister to meet these firms during Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
“Caterpillar is complicit in the Israeli occupation, enabling the illegal bulldozing of Palestinian homes. This is not reflective of Caterpillar workers, but of the horrific profiteering of Caterpillar bosses.
“Israeli-founded Forescout continues to do business with Israel’s chief military backer, and should never have been at that meeting.”
Read the rest of this entry »“Livingston say Celtic fans displaying an ‘unapproved’ tifo was ‘utterly unacceptable’ ” – Scottish Soccer report by the BBC
Livingston say Celtic fans displaying an ‘unapproved’ tifo was ‘utterly unacceptable’
This British Broadcasting Corporation report neatly summarizes a commercial corporate assault on the political and civil rights of Celtic soccer supporters, the Green Brigade. Most readers of this blog will recognize the faces of Ireland’s Easter 1916 Rising leaders on the large banner. The Green Brigade has regularly demonstrated with Palestine Flags at Celtic games.
These fans are now banned from Celtic home games :
Read the rest of this entry »Palestine, Ukraine and the crisis of empires – Simon Pirani
Simon Pirani’s article is recommended. Unfortunately many Irish left-wing organizations and activists, such as People Before Profit and Clare Daly MEP, have adopted the policy advocated by the British Stop the War Coalition. In the conclusions section of this essay Pirani observes :
In May [2021], you wrote that Stop the War is “supporting the people of Palestine, who have a right to resist occupation”. I agree with that. But why no such statement about Ukraine?
And if Ukrainians, or Palestinians, have a right to resist, what does it mean? Does it only mean standing up to tanks with your bare hands, as Ukrainians have had to do? Does it mean throwing stones, often the only weapons that young Palestinians have? What about proper weapons? Do you think Palestinians have a right to those? And Ukrainians?
About the Author :
Simon Pirani is a British writer, historian and researcher of energy. He is honorary professor in the School of Modern Languages and Cultures at the University of Durham.[1] From 2007 to 2021 he was senior research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies (with a period as senior visiting research fellow in 2017-19).[2]
In 2018 Pirani published Burning Up: A Global History of Fossil Fuel Consumption, in which he portrays consumption growth as a result of world capitalist economic expansion.[3] He argues that the relationship between technological systems that account for most fossil fuel use, and the social and economic systems in which they are embedded, is paramount. His articles and presentations on this theme are collected on his website.[4] He also writes about these themes on a blog, People & Nature Link : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Pirani
Palestine, Ukraine and the crisis of empires
On the Easter weekend, on the latest gigantic march in London against UK complicity in Israel’s war on Gaza, a group of us took a banner that said “From Ukraine to Palestine, occupation is a crime”. We were welcomed by marchers around us, and people took up our slogan.
But beyond a slogan, what can we, in the labour movement and social movements in the UK, do about these conflicts that are transforming the world we live in, and heightening fears of bigger, bloodier wars?
Read the rest of this entry »Who Organised a Belfast Patrick’s Weekend Palestine March – Minus the Original Speakers? Bernadette McAliskey looks for answers
Bernadette McAliskey asks questions :
The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) should provide answers.
Bernadette McAliskey :
Was this march organised by Belfast ISPC? On what date did the platform change from the three speakers below and become a platform of primarily spokespersons for political parties of the NI Assembly,? On what date were the political parties first invited to speak? Why was the list of political party speakers including Sinn Fein not announced prior to the March and rally itself, allowing those who didn’t want to hear from political parties whose leaders were in the White House, or those doing little or nothing for Palestine to have stayed away? Who made these decisions, the consequences of which must have obvious to them at the time, given the depth of feeling from anger to disappointment? What did they expect from an unsuspecting audience when a Sinn Fein speaker was sprung on them? Did they, through naivety, expect Sinn Fein to decline or was the reaction foreseen and thought to OK?
Without some transparency and explanation of the who, when and why, the organisers have very little credibility left with independent activists who are daily raising awareness; building support for boycott of Israeli goods on the ground; fund raising for medical aid, for children, for food aid in Gaza and helping as best they know how, Palestinians living here to cope with the pain and trauma of their fear for family and friends at home as well their exile.
Either lack of foresight and transparency, intentional deceit, or plain old-fashioned elitism needs to be owned up to, unless the organisers have a better explanation. This is no way to build any principled unity on Palestine, or anything else for that matter.
Vincent Doherty :
This is a moment of decision nationally for the IPSC. Sinn Fein would prefer if we all forgot their treachery in fine wining and dining with Biden in the midst of the genocide. Just like a few years ago when they were meeting with Likud despite having signed up to the BDS campaign. It’s the elephant in the room, and one that needs to be addressed.
Sally Rooney: Killing in Gaza has been supported by Ireland’s ‘good friend’ in the White House
Sally Rooney: Killing in Gaza has been supported by Ireland’s ‘good friend’ in the White House
Our Government is basking in the moral glow of condemning the bombers, while preserving a cosy relationship with those supplying the bombs
Source :
“The cries of the innocent will haunt us forever if we stay silent.” These are the words of Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, speaking at an event in Boston this week about Israel’s devastating assault on Gaza. And who could disagree? What is taking place in Palestine now is one of the most profound and shocking moral catastrophes of our time.
Already for months on end, Israeli military forces have been pounding the besieged, starving and largely homeless population of Gaza with relentless aerial bombardment. Cut off from the outside world, Palestinian survivors have been forced to document the crisis in real time, sharing stories, images and footage of mass graves, destroyed buildings and abandoned bodies. And with no end in sight, the United States continues to pump money and weapons into Israel to prolong the onslaught.
Read the rest of this entry »
Tomás Ó Flatharta 